Nine out of every ten bottles of wine drunk in the UK are purchased in a supermarket. So it is pretty obvious that this is where people by the vast majority of their wine. The appeal is clear; low prices and no need to swing past the wineshop or off-licence after the weekly shop. It is however one of the most difficult environments to buy decent wine; staff have usually little knowledge of the wine and thus cannot be relied on for advice, and many wines – let’s face it – are cheap and nasty because of the supermarket’s obsession with pricing policy and maximising profit margins. Yet it is possible to find nice wines in supermarkets. I will try to shed some light in the darkness of supermarket wine by posting tasting notes of my picks of the best bottles under £10 from the major UK supermarkets here. But there are some general tips that can help the buyer of supermarket wine increase their chances in picking up something decent that is good value and worthwhile drinking.

 

1. Stay clear of very cheap bottles, generally under £6. For example in a £5 bottle of wine over half the price is made up of tax and duty, and after other costs such as transport only 37p. is left for the actual wine. For a £10 bottle £2.76 is spend on the actual wine. You should be able to really taste that massive difference between 37p. and £2.76. Buy something between £6-10 and drink considerably better.
2. The premium ranges of supermarkets offer better chances for good wine. Here supermarkets often make use of the knowledge of established producers and large cooperatives to make an own brand wine. For example Sainsburys Taste the Difference Sauternes is made by Château Guiraud. This well established and respected 1er Grand Cru Classé producer knows a thing or two about producing good sauternes, and should be able to knock out something pretty good for Sainsburys, even if it is mainly sourced from rejected lots for their first wine.
3. Stay clear of wood aged wines under £10. Ageing wine in wood is expensive. First there is the cost of the barrels. Second there is the cost of storing these barrels for months or years in cellars. This will add a lot of costs to a wine. For example a new standard French Allier Oak barrel can set you back up to £2 000. So for cheap wines there is a need to cut corners. This varies from using wooden staves, wood chips and cubes, to artificial wood flavour. The former method is quite acceptable, the latter utterly unacceptable in my opinion. There is no way of knowing which method was used, so best stay clear of cheap wood aged wines all together.
4. Avoid wines from well known regions. Supermarket Châteauneuf-du-Pape or Bordeaux for example are usually pretty dire. This is because the better wines of these regions fetch prices that are generally outside the range that supermarkets want to stock. Yet consumers know the names of these famous areas well and supermarkets who want to cash in on this usually turn to the absolute bottom of the quality (and price) scale. It is much better if one appreciates wines from certain premium regions to go for something similar from a less famous neighbouring area. For example if one likes Châteauneuf-du-Pape, why not spend that money on a much better Gigondas or Lirac?

So there are four general tips for buying better wine in a supermarket.  I will follow this up over the next months with my top-5 reds and whites from each from the main UK supermarkets.