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Beaujolais Nouveau released in Japan amid declining demand

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Beaujolais will pack up shop and move to China - there will be another market to tap there once Japan's moved on.

13 ( +13 / -0 )

The Beaujolais Nouveau 2017 vintage went on sale in Japan on Thursday, but with people's tastes maturing, the traditional celebration of the French wine's seasonal release is on the decline.

Which is a polite way of saying that folks are starting to wake up and realize that they have been ripped off after all these years.

Suntory is to blame as well, as they started delivering this "fine wine" (cough, cough, cough) in plastic pet bottles, and telling customers that wine in pet bottles is just as "tasty" as one's that come in glass.

21 ( +21 / -0 )

So, the fad is finally fading, as all fads do.

11 ( +11 / -0 )

I'm not a sommelier, but I think there's something wrong if you have to unscrew a cap to pour your wine.

-4 ( +7 / -11 )

there's something wrong if you have to unscrew a cap to pour your wine.

There's only something wrong if there's no wine on the table.

Having it in the glass is more important than how it comes out of the bottle.

11 ( +17 / -6 )

Look at the packaging and presentation of the bottle. Looks like floral scented hair mist on a drugstore shelf. The decline won’t stop with that kind of marketing.

14 ( +15 / -1 )

Having it in the glass is more important than how it comes out of the bottle.

Key word "bottle".....typically assumed to mean glass, at least when it comes to wine anyway.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Look at the packaging and presentation of the bottle.

Or that really, really, REALLY cheap fake "champagne" my Mom used to buy us kids on our birthdays!

7 ( +8 / -1 )

these photos wont help it too haha,anyways glad to see this piss go away

5 ( +6 / -1 )

@Yubaru

Oh, I feel your pain. Imagine my horror when my Mother used to buy Thienot or Lafitte rather than genuine Krug!

6 ( +7 / -1 )

I never understood this Beaujolais Nouveau thingy in the first place.

Now that the Japanese drink wine more frequently than before, the event (of celebrating the release of Beaujolais Nouveau) has become not so special

I also imagine that more japanese people can now recognize a good product. Most wines made for the japanese market range from "disgusting" to "meh", and this brand is certainly no exception. So it would be time to sell a better product instead of selling as much as possible of the cheapest thing.

7 ( +8 / -1 )

Didn't actually know there was such a thing as Beaujolais Rose or sparkling! It does look cheap doesn't it.

Beaujolais will pack up shop and move to China - there will be another market to tap there once Japan's moved on.

Exactly.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

I like to drink. I like everything. I like wine. I like beaujolais. It goes particularly with Japanese food, because - famously - "its the only white wine that happens to be red." Full bodies reds tends to overpower/clash with dashi/soy based flavors. [BTW Table red and curry rice is good!] Beaujolais's gammay grape makes a crisp and fruity glass. Drink it cold and have it with nimono, or tempura, or sushi. Its really good. Did I mentioned drink it cold? I like a frosted bottle in a chilled glass. My wife is fine with standard 'room temp' = 65 fahrenheit. Taste is a matter of taste.....

Just like other wines, there are cheap, quality, pricey and stupidly priced beaujolais wines. I rarely if ever drink stupidly priced wines. Unless you are in the business, are a snob, or really just dont' care about money because you have waaaaay to much of it, IMO here is almost no reason to habitually drink a wine that cost more than $35.

I think the beaujolais offered in Japan is good and at a good price. At least, at the place I get it in Kobe. The department store is a bit pricey, but not really. The cheap stuff is fine. The quality is actually more price competitive than here in CA. Probably because Japan is a top destination for the beaujolais market. And many Californian wineries make their own "beaujolais style" wines for throw away loss leaders.

Like I said, I like wine. And I get why many don't, or at least many are rightfully turned off by the wine industries self-promotion. Its a shame that wine drinking has been promoted as some kind of schwanky thing in Japan and, well, everywhere-- just like sushi has been promoted. And you get a lot of cheap, knock off sushi rolls with yuck fish dripping with orange sauce and masago. Bleck. Give me a good piece of fish on properly cooked rice, and a beer any day of the week and twice on Sunday.

3 ( +6 / -3 )

Saw budget retailer Don Quixote set up their standard 'straight out the cardboard box' product displays, a 600 yen and an 1800 yen bottle of B.N. Good luck with that.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Was always a fad.  Used to be the same in the UK in the 1990's.  Agree that a light red can be good with local food, but the rush to drink this stuff early and overpay for the privilege was just silly.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Hell hath no fury like a JT poster in Beaujolais Nouveau season.

3 ( +6 / -3 )

I used to heard about Beaujolais Nouveau on the TV news, I don't heard that too much. I think the reason of declining demand of Beaujolais Nouveau is many young people don not drink alcoholic beverages these days. So they don not have interest in alcoholic news too much.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

My partner always opens a bottle and drinks only one glass. I use the rest for cooking, so i never pay more than 500yen.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

As someone who likes wine, I tried to get into Beaujolais Nouveau but just couldn't.

I always found it tasted like watered down wine.

5 ( +5 / -0 )

It's not about the wine....it's a celebration of culture!

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

It is a celebration indeed because it is the earliest wine of the year you can drink after vinification.

And with a piece of freesh bread and pâté, and some additional appetizers of your choice, it becomes a cheap gastronomical feast !

Whether you like or not, it is alcohol with all its induced effects, good for friendship or camaraderie ;)

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Black Sabbath, no one is complaining about Beaujolais, just Beaujolais Nouveau.

For some reason, DH picked up a bottle a few years ago. It was ¥2500. As soon as I opened the bottle, I could smell alcohol, and the taste wasn't much better. It tasted like I could have used it to take the paint off my car. Friends from Europe who also live in Japan said it was a bad year, that they relegated it to cooking after the first glass. Some years are better than others, but I haven't bought it again. For the hell of it I Googled our bottle, and it was going for $7.00 overseas. As I had long suspected, cheap wine with the price jacked up.

Sorry, not a fan...

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Never understood why people make a big deal of this garbage, all of my French mates are also confused as why it's so big here as apparently no one drinks it there and it's considered crap wine. Guess it was just a good case of marketing.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

I must say I was pleasantly surprised that Japanese wine is not the undrinkable trench water I was led to believe. It's not magnificent either but sometimes the least obvious producers will surprise you.

Even the British (sparkling) wine isn't as awful as you'd imagine.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

 Googled our bottle, and it was going for $7.00 overseas. As I had long suspected, cheap wine with the price jacked up.

If you think THAT is jacked up you should have been here during the bubble years when a bottle of Old Parr (rot-gut scotch) went for 100,000 yen a bottle at snacks! Johnie Red was 150,000 yen a pop or higher!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Marketing scam, customers are waking up and smelling the cheese.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

I do like a bit of the old uisce beatha. The Japanese whiskeys are quite agreeable. Could never get into the bourbons. To me, they taste like mouthwash.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

That swill was still grapes growing on the vine 9 weeks ago. Worst wine France makes, in my opinion.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

If you think THAT is jacked up you should have been here during the bubble years when a bottle of Old Parr (rot-gut scotch) went for 100,000 yen a bottle at snacks! 

I remember!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

The Chinese are too smart for buying overpriced poor quality wines, so this fad wont work there.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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