5 Things We Learned in February 2025
A new signifier for luxury, the value of invented traditions, and an economic warning.
1. The reinvention of tradition
An old winter tradition called wassailing has returned to England, to the delight of cider makers.
The word ‘wassail’ comes from an Old English toast to good health, and a good Wassail can, apparently, protect the next year’s crop. It works like this: a crowd gathers to sing at the apple trees, asking them to fruit.
The queen of the year then drops some toast into heated cider. The toast is then put in the tree branches, while the cider is poured at the tree roots. The toast is there to attract the robins, who are harbingers of spring. Shotguns are fired to keep malevolent spirits away.
A New York Times report about the phenomenon says that by the 16th century, there were ceremonies to bless not just orchard trees, but also bee hives, sheep and cattle. Interest in the modern day wassails is huge, with hundreds of people turning up to watch.
It sounds like something vignerons should be doing, not just to attract the visitors, but also because who doesn’t need their vines blessed?
And if you’re thinking, “but that’s not an ancient wine tradition”, don’t worry about it. As British historian Eric Hobsbawm famously wrote:“Many of the traditions which we think of as very ancient in their origins were not in fact sanctioned by long usage over the centuries, but were invented comparatively recently.”
Just get the thing started, and everybody will soon be swearing it’s an ancient custom.
2. Rethinking wine education
It was one of the most successful launches ever done by Areni Global — the presentation of our Rethinking Education whitepaper at Wine Paris on 11 February 2025. Eighteen months in the making, it was the culmination of more than 130 interviews with international trade professionals, plus two roundtables, as well as literature reviews and desk research. And what we concluded is that there is an urgent need to rethink training pathways in the wine sector, regardless of whether people are working in fine wine or in other segments.
“The wine trade excels at teaching people about product knowledge,” said Pauline Vicard, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Areni Global.
“What we discovered, however, is that there is a major mismatch between what wine professionals want to study and what the trade needs to thrive, especially in these increasingly challenging times.”
Clearly, anybody who works in the wine trade needs in-depth wine knowledge. But what we discovered is that while there are plenty of educational bodies that can supply that knowledge, there are few places where wine professionals can learn how to turn that knowledge into sales and business competencies. Worse is we discovered that graduates and early career professionals often even realise that a wine career is an option.
All this and more was presented at Wine Paris. The room was absolutely packed and people had so many questions that it didn’t end until we were literally thrown out of the room. Some of the comments were sobering — one food and beverage educator said there had been a very obvious decline in interest in wine among students in the past two or three years.
It’s a subject that obviously touched a nerve, that we’re going to keep talking about. If you want to join the conversation, you can get your copy of the whitepaper here and for a snapshot of the results, listen to the podcast episode below.
We’d be extremely interested in your feedback.
3. What happens to brands that didn’t premiumise?
Jeff Siegel, writing in Meininger’s International, has argued that the rush to premiumisation is one of the reasons the wine market is now in trouble.
“The wine industry, in its mad dash to embrace higher prices, overlooked that most basic of economic principles, that higher prices result in lower sales,” he wrote.
“Call it the revenge of the law of unintended consequences: Not only have higher prices reduced demand, but they have also turned wine into something reserved for special occasions, further cutting consumption.”
And now there’s no place for those lower-end brands, as Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) discovered recently when it tried to sell its budget labels, but failed to get a reasonable offer. Finally, TWE pulled the sale.
TWE is clearly doing well with its premium and super-premium wines — its limited release Grange La Chapelle, retailing for €2,600 a bottle, garnered plenty of attention at Wine Paris.
The pity of the situation is that those bargain basement brands that it can’t sell — Wolf Blass and Lindemans — were once renowned Australian wines that offered wonderful value for money, before they were downgraded to the discount bin.
As Anthony Madigan wrote in Australia’s WBM, “Wolf Blass is a remarkable brand – perhaps the Australian name most closely associated with wine.” He went on to lament its decline.
As Siegel said of these types of reliable and well-made wines, they once made it extremely easy for people to drink wine three or four times a month, instead of three or four times a year. They also played a role in introducing people to wine. Their demise is unfortunate.
Like what you are reading? Subscribe to our newsletter to be the first to access new articles.
4. It’s a rich person’s economy
In late February, a number of US media outlets reported that rich Americans are spending like there’s no tomorrow.
“The top 10% of earners—households making about $250,000 a year or more—are splurging on everything from vacations to designer handbags, buoyed by big gains in stocks, real estate and other assets,” wrote Rachel Louise Ensign in The Wall Street Journal.
“Those consumers now account for 49.7% of all spending, a record in data going back to 1989, according to an analysis by Moody’s Analytics. Three decades ago, they accounted for about 36%.”
A lot of that money is going into things like trips to Europe and luxury goods. In theory, that should mean good times for anybody involved in the fine wine business.
But the oncoming economic turbulence caused by trade wars could snap those wallets shut. Meanwhile, working class and middle class households are spending less than they were before September 2023. That means the economy is very dependent on a smaller number of consumers. If the wealthiest watched their stocks and property decline in value and stopped spending, it would lead to a major downturn.
Meanwhile, 20% of the American public are ‘doom spending’, meaning they’re stockpiling goods because they’re afraid that they’re going to get more expensive.
Hopefully, nothing will make that 10% of spenders pull back, because if they do, there’s nobody to pick up the slack. But, according to Steve Rattner in the New York Times, business leaders are feeling optimistic about the economy. Let’s hope they’re right.
4. A new type of wine event?
Physical books are back! And not only that, sales are trending upwards once again because books apparently signal luxury. They’re so trendy and luxurious, that fashion brands like DKNY are partnering with book clubs.
“[Books are] about demonstrating intelligence, demonstrating discernment and demonstrating the value of time, because to have your own time is one of the greatest luxuries in the world,” said James Denman, a brand consultant specializing in luxury and fashion, speaking to the Wall Street Journal.
“Reading—not being always online, not always being connected, not having the phone constantly next to you—has come to imply that you are just operating at a different level.”
Maybe wineries need to launch their own literary salons, to get in on the ‘demonstrating intelligence’ economy.
As the team at Areni Global are all avid readers, this is something we can help you with! We have a stack of recommendations ready to go.