As the Champagne price war hots up, Tesco has asked suppliers to find it 300,000 bottles it can sell for £10 each, and Bollinger can be had for a song.
All the major brands are involved in the supermarkets’ battle for customers. Next Monday Morrisons will offer Bollinger, Moët & Chandon, Lanson Black Label and Nicolas Feuillatte all at less than half price.
This will see the price of Bollinger Special Cuvée drop to £17.95, market leader Moët down to £14.39 a bottle, Lanson at £13.45 while Nicolas Feuillatte, is down to £12.99.
Following its £8 ‘spend and save’ deal of last week in which the price of its Andre Carpentier ‘buyers own brand’ Champagne fell to £8, Tesco is thought certain to react with a cut price deal on a well-known brand.
Even before news of the Morrisons deal broke Tesco is reported to have asked all its Champagne suppliers if they could find 30,000 cases (300,000 bottles) of branded Champagne for the grocer to sell at around the £10 mark.
Agreeing that they had approached suppliers for special deals, Graham Nash, Tesco’s product development manager for Champagne said, ‘We will have a strong promotional package on Champagne in the run-up to Christmas and we are always competitive.’
Morrisons Champagne buyer Catherine Roffey said sales of Champagne in the past three months have grown by 21%.
This is compared to the total Champagne market, which is flat in terms of value and up 1% in volume, according to AC Nielsen figures.
The price of Champagne in French supermarkets has also continued to drop, falling as low as €7 a bottle at some Auchan stores.
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Written by Giles Fallowfield
