UK ignores mighty Mosel 09

The UK’s continued neglect of German wines is encouraging producers to look elsewhere to sell their acclaimed 2009 Mosel vintage, which achieved impressive prices at last week’s VDP Grosser Ring auction in Trier.

“The UK is a very difficult market for us”, acknowledged Eva Raps, managing director of the VDP, pointing to the limited, “sweet and cheap” selection offered by most major retailers to support her observation that “people don’t know about our quality wines.”

With the VDP’s 200 members representing just 4% of Germany’s wines, Raps noted: “The German and other markets like the US and Scandinavia are going very well so why should we put so much effort into the UK?”

Despite this UK reticence, the Mosel producers were effervescent in their praise for the quality of the 2009 vintage. Christoph Tyrell, owner of Karthäuserhof, described the wines as “a mix of ’03, ’05 and ’07 with all the positives of each of these years.”

Likewise, Christopher Davey, managing director of German specialists OW Loeb, one of the only UK trade representatives in evidence at the tasting, praised the 2009 vintage as being “touched by greatness.”

While many of the wines on show seemed very precocious, to the extent that some were almost too soft and straightforward, Ernie Loosen, owner of Dr Loosen, had no concerns about the longevity of 2009. “They’ve got good balance and good acidity so these wines will last,” he declared.

With Spätleses showing particularly well, Annegret Reh-Gartner, owner of Reichsgraf von Kesselstatt, agreed: “2009 is one of the best years for Spätlese and Auslese, but you don’t have the peaks of 2007 which were so good for the Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese.” She added, “2009 was not a bad Eiswein year, but the wines did not go so high in concentration compared with ’04 and ’02.”

Both the tasting and auction events were packed, mainly with German trade and collectors as the world’s biggest wine importer increasingly rediscovers its own domestic product.

Loosen was unsurprised by the strong turnout, explaining: “2008 had a mediocre rating from the press, so when you get a great vintage after that, people always jump at it.”

The highest bid for a 2009 wine, the main focus of the auction, was achieved by three magnums of Fritz Haag’s 2009 Brauneberg Juffer Sonnenuhr Auslese Lange Goldkapsel, which sold for €810 each.

However the biggest price of the afternoon was the €4,000 raised by a single bottle of SA Prum’s 1911 Wehlener Hammerstein Auslese, donated by the producer to the Breast Cancer Foundation.

With all bar the rarest wines available to taste before and during the five and a half hour auction, it was possible to identify a few particularly good value lots among the 70-strong line-up. Willi Haag’s 2009 Brauneberger Juffer Sonnenuhr Auslese, full of elegantly balanced mineral and tarte tatin character, was snapped up for €30 a bottle.

While these VDP wines represent a small niche at the very top quality tier, Ernst Büscher, head of press for the German Wine Institute pointed to the importance of a “top down” effect as the body seeks to build sales of German wines in export markets.

“As trend setters talk more and more about Riesling then it can trickle down to the supermarket shelves,” he suggested, emphasising that with Germany’s coops having improved “immeasurably”, UK buyers and consumers prepared to put aside their prejudices can expect to find decent quantities of respectable Riesling for as little as £5 to £6.

Certainly it would be a real shame to think that, as one of the world’s most exciting and diverse wine markets, the UK could deny its consumers the chance to enjoy a great vintage from this truly inimitable corner of the Old World.

Gabriel Savage, 30.09.2010