Coravin: South America ‘the next frontier’

Coravin’s CEO Frédéric Levy has said that that after making “significant headway” across Asia Pacific, the company will look to South America as a new market for its devices.

The latest Coravin Model 1 for Millennials around the world

“2016 was a very strategic year for us,” said Frédéric Levy at a recent meeting in Hong Kong. “We’ve now expanded to 50 countries whereas two years ago we were only present in 15. It’s been a very fast expansion but we’ve always been careful to forge key partnerships with high-end retailers.”

Coravin has just signed a deal with Bed Bath & Beyond in America and Nicolas’ network of wine retail shops in France and also distributes its devices across Enoteca and Watson’s Wines in Hong Kong and Harrods in London but, as Levy admitted, Coravin has become more “mass market” since the company has started targeting Millennials with its newer, cheaper Model One which has already launched in the US and Europe and arrived in Hong Kong last month.

Referring to the previous models’ pricing which is around £300 or HK$2,800 for the Model Two and Model Two Elite, he said: “It’s s not very affordable [for Millennials] and very early on we had it in mind to do something more reasonable and so Model 1 at a price of around £200 or HK$1,800 fits that. Also as it’s lighter and brighter in colour it looks more approachable despite having the same technology.”

Also, despite making “significant headway” in Asia Pacific with a regional office in Hong Kong and launching in Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam, Thailand and Taiwan last year, Levy revealed that South America is also in Coravin’s sights with an additional US$26 million invested to support research and development.

“It’s the next frontier. We turned our attention to that part of the world in November and like everywhere else, younger consumers are making up a significant part of the market.

“They see what their parents are drinking and want to do exactly the opposite. If the parents are drinking Bordeaux or Burgundy, they’ll look at Chile or Argentina.”

Coravin also plans to launch in China, where there are 48 million potential Millennial wine consumers – roughly defined as anyone under the age of 35 – and India and South Korea are also in the pipeline.

“We’ll only be in places with an established wine market though,” said Levy. “Hong Kong and Singapore are our big focus in Asia currently and we are still a small team, so we’ll start slow and gradually build up.”