by Ginevra Niccolini Serragli
Attracting attention with special presentations: this is one of the keys to cracking the competitive Asian market, all the more so in Hong Kong. Well, Rhône Valley Wines managed to do just that with a tasting held in the gorgeous setting of the California Tower, in the heart of the movida district, Lan Kwai Fong, which went beyond the usual sampling of wines. From Red to Emotion was the title of the evening that offered those present a different emotional experience: a selection of short films evoking the colour red, the colour of passion and of love for us Westerners, and the colour of luck and happiness for the Chinese – as well, of course, as the colour of wine, the guest of honour! “If we want to characterize the Rhône Valley with a colour, it would certainly be red”, says Monsieur Olivier Legrand, marketing director of the association of producers of Rhône Valley Wines, where 80% of the wineries produce red wines. This was the key concept of the evening “We want to convey a simple message; one that is immediate and evocative, one that provokes an emotional intellectual approach. We don’t expect our target customers to be wine masters or oenologists, just people who like drinking good wine, and this leaves room for personal memories and interpretations”, explains M. Legrand “and that is also why we concentrate heavily on the female target: not because women are less exacting, but because they undeniably have a stronger emotional sphere than men. We want to surprise our consumers, giving them memories and associations of ideas linked to our wines”.
The films chosen by the jury ‘Wine from the Heart’ (www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVZtQIP98Xw) and by the public ‘La vie en Rose’ (www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnKjl-8p8Qg) refer to simple concepts of real life, an unravelling of sensory experiences that transport us to the region of France where the wines are produced, between Vienne and Avignon in the south of France, among the vineyards of the gentle hills, where you experience friendships, loves and passions, and then back to the chaos of Hong Kong, which seems to allow the wine to lull it into a slower rhythm, one that is more in tune with bien-vivre. The wines of the Rhône Valley are historically rooted in Europe, with Great Britain, Belgium and Germany the top consumers; the American market, Canada and China are all expanding rapidly. As regards Asia, Korea and Japan are already consolidated markets; and Hong Kong, with its seven million inhabitants, is not just a platform for gaining access to Far Eastern markets, it is a solid market in its own right. The future promotional programme of Rhône Valley Wines envisages underscoring the versatility of the wines proposed, which are not overly structured and complex, and hence are well-suited to pairing with Asian cuisine.
