Cheap and very cheerful

Cava has been quietly carving massive inroads into the sparkling wine market, says Patrick Schmitt. Most sales are own-label and few people even know it’s Spanish

GUESS WHAT’S the second largest sparkling wine brand in the UK? Lanson? Veuve Clicquot? Decided? Well, it’s Freixenet Cordon Negro. Surprising, isn’t it? Especially as this is based on value, not volume, in the off-trade (MAT January 2004).

The Cava, in fact, sits just ahead of Veuve Clicquot, but some way behind Moët & Chandon, with less than half this pole-positioned brand’s sales.  Lanson comes in fourth, followed by another interesting entry, Martini Asti.

Then, the other major Cava brand, Codorniu, can be found in 15th place. Basically it’s Freixenet’s Cordon Negro and Codorniu that lead the branded Cava market by some margin, with Marqués de Monistrol and Freixenet’s Segura Viudas some way behind.

This might make interesting reading, but ask the consumer to name a brand of Cava and he, or she, would most probably be stumped, according to an interesting new piece of market research.

While Cava is a booming market – leading the sparkling wines sector with a share of 54% (almost 1.6m cases), and experiencing just a whisker under 13% growth (MAT on 2002) – 68% of Cava sales are ownlabel.

Which means: Cava is the brand. And, although branded Cava has shown a 28.8% rise, it is from a much smaller base.  Furthermore, while Freixenet is up with the best and biggest of the sparkling wines or, more to the point, Champagnes, it is not marketed explicitly as a Cava – the word does appear on the label, but it’s far from prominent.

But the story becomes more remarkable when one looks closely at the research, which was conducted by Wine Intelligence last year.  Much of the trade’s criticism of Cava centres on price-cutting and the resulting cheap image of the sparkling wine.

A typical own-label Cava is around £4 or less, while most non-Champagne sparkling wines retail at around the £6/£7 mark.  However, ask the consumer which has a more quality image, and after Champagne it’s Cava, not those more expensive sparkling wines from various regions around the world.

So it seems Cava’s low-price hasn’t damaged its image to the extent many believed and, over half of those asked said they would spend more than £5 on Cava, although very few would shell  ut over £7.99.

Furthermore, ownlabel Cava doesn’t seem to have the stigma of, let’s say, own-label Champagne say the consumers tested.  According to the research, not everyone actually seems to realise Cava is Spanish.

In fact, only one in eight of the people surveyed "picked up on the Spanish connection".  And overall, Wine Intelligence notes that it has become apparent that consumers know far less about sparkling wines than still ones. In fact, most are unable to define the differences between Champagne, Cava and sparkling wine.

For this reason, Wine Intelligence suggests Cava producers need to focus on educating the consumer, while it is also noted by the people sampled that the packaging could convey a more high-quality image.

"Cava needs to use its packaging to reassure consumers that they are not making a social mistake," it says in the report, while "innovative packaging formats would help push on-trade sales." Take the 20cl Freixenet Mini Cordon Negro for example.

It is also suggested that producers attempt to create ladder brands to help the image of Cava. And it does appear that more premium Cavas are starting to appear on supermarket shelves.

In particular, Marqués de Monistrol has tried to differentiate its product by listing a "vintage" version, which apparently sold very well in Sainsbury’s over Christmas.  Another trend boosting the sales of Cava is the proliferation of rosés, or rather rosados.

Marqués de Monistrol has a rosado listed in Waitrose and Oddbins, for example, and United Wineries’ international marketing director Bill Rolfe suggests the success of such sparkling wines is part of the whole resurgence of interest in rosé as a whole.

Overall, although Cava would certainly benefit from a more premium positioning, and more value-added activity to encourage consumers to reach for the sparkling wine, the practice of price cutting seems to have done little lasting damage to the image of Cava – consumers still  hate the drink as a step above simply sparkling wine.

Nevertheless, it’s very much seen as the cheaper alternative to Champagne and would do well to really build its own identity.