What's hot, what's not in the wine world?

What is flavour of the year and what's not in the wine world? Prosecco is in sparkling form, outselling Champagne in the UK. Retail insight leader IRI showed last week that Prosecco sales have grown in value by 34% in the last year. This compares to a 1% increase for champagne. However, overall sales of still wine are down 1.8%. And whilst white wine remains the nations favourite tipple, its sales are declining faster than those of red wine. White wine is down 1.6% and red is down by 1.2%. New World wines outperformed old world wines with Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Argentina all growing whilst the wider market declines. So good news for Australia as the value of their wine exports jumped 13%, its biggest increase since 1999. The biggest export market for them is Asia and the biggest increase in volume is for wines priced within the $15 to $20 per litre bracket. One reason Australia is enjoying such growth is that it is benefiting from a weaker currency making Australian wine imports globally more attractive.