UK toasts royal jubilee with English bubbly

English wine producers are eyeing 2012 as the year home-grown wine, especially sparkling varieties, could become a mainstream product as retailers throw their weight behind it to coincide with Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee.

Over the past decade, improving quality, increasing volumes and solid performances at expert tastings have established English wine as more than a passion for amateurs, though it still accounts for less than one per cent of the UK market.

Climate change has upped temperatures in southern England to within one degree of Champagne in northern France, meaning some English sparkling wine is now on a par with champagne for soil and climate conditions. Some varieties have even beaten their French rivals in blind tastings.

“It has become a proper business with skilled professionals growing vines and making wines,” said wine critic Jancis Robinson, whose website jancisrobinson.com recommends a variety of English wines.

“(English wine) needs to increase its market share since the total volume produced is set to increase considerably over the next few years, the result of new plantings.”

British supermarket Sainsbury’s launched its first own-label English sparkling wine this month and Tesco, which currently stocks one English white wine, said it was considering wines for the Jubilee and possibly for its website.

Upmarket chains Waitrose, which spearheaded the English wine movement among retailers, and Marks and Spencer, said they planned to promote home-grown varieties to celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s 60 years on the throne in June.

Sales of English wine at Marks and Spencer increased by 15 per cent in 2011, ahead of the wider wine market, and Waitrose, with a 38 per cent share of the English wine market, is predicting a 10 per cent growth in sales this year.

An estimated five million bottles of English wine will be produced in 2015, compared to four million in 2010.

Retailers and producers will focus on sparkling wines this summer, in the hope that Brits will ditch champagne, cava and prosecco in favour of homegrown fizzy wine when they hold street parties to toast the Jubilee.

Producer Ridgeview will launch a commemorative wine for the Jubilee and Denbies vineyard in Surrey plans a Jubilee ball.

England’s colder climate makes for more acidic wines, which can be a hard sell in still varieties.