Why we drink more – but better – in lockdown Wine News

Remember from the start of it all, when the World Health Organization warned that alcohol consumption was an “unnecessary coping strategy” in the face of the pandemic? Yes, that was good, wasn’t it?

In a surprise to no one specifically, the British drink more in lockdown. Waitrose says 25 percent of us reported drinking more in the past few weeks. Meanwhile, liquor sales have increased 78%, cocktail ingredients have increased 48%, and tequila sales have nearly doubled, as people fill the evenings creating increasingly elaborate ‘quarantines’. . And we all pushed the rosé away like it’s about to run out (please, my god don’t let it run out), with the supermarket reporting five times as many searches on its site for wine.

“The unusually warm weather has driven up demand for rosé,” says Becky Hull, wine buyer at Waitrose, “with many people choosing a glass of something pink to relax in the sun. We also saw a strong demand for versatile and user-friendly wines as people sought to recreate a restaurant experience at home.

The problem is, during lockdown, as we swim in this sea of ​​sameness, there is very little that marks the transition from day to night as successfully as a glass of wine. I tried to save my exercise hour until 7pm which helps me a bit. A bath is also a decent full stop to the workday. But nothing reaches the place like a real aperitif.

If you manage to abstain, good luck to you. I’m sure you’ll come out of lockdown with perfectly hydrated skin and the liver of a 14 year old. But then, even among those of us with wetter whistles, I’m not convinced that we are drinking to excess. As a friend on leave recently said, “The problem with locked out thirst is that you get drunk after about two drinks and you’re ready to go to bed by 10pm.”

Could it be that instead of drinking heavily too much, we are now consuming little, often, and perhaps better than usual? In “the front”, we might have delayed Monday through Thursday before gorging on a Friday and Saturday night, without thinking too much about what we are drinking. Now we’re more likely to enjoy the weird glass of something nice during the week, and maybe toss a few cocktails or open a special bottle on the weekends, without being snuggled up.

A YouGov poll, released in early April after a few weeks of lockdown, suggested the majority of us (75%) were drinking the same amount or more than before the coronavirus. Things could have gotten a little more desperate since then, okay. But I wonder if, rather than drinking a lot more, we drink better?

Matt Thomas, owner of Vinoramica, an independent wine store in north London, says many wine retailers in the area have found they are busier than ever as people turn to local suppliers for wine. alcohol in the absence of pubs, bars and reliable supermarket deliveries. “As soon as the lockdown was announced, our revenue increased dramatically,” he says. “It’s hard to say, however, whether overall people were drinking more or less, as I think we took a significant chunk of pubs, restaurants, bars and probably also supermarkets and online businesses.”

Customers are willing to spend more on quality wines as the lockdown progresses, Thomas says. “At the very beginning, end of March beginning of April, we were selling a large part of our entry level wine case, which was the £ 50 case.

“Since then it has decreased considerably. This week we’ve probably only sold a dozen entry-level boxes, and now we’re selling a lot more premium boxes – the £ 65, £ 95, and £ 110. We have therefore certainly noticed an evolution towards more upscale wines. ”