Champagne shipments finally on the up

Thursday, 29 May, 2025
The Drinks Business, Giles Fallowfield
After a weak start to the year and poor 2024, Champagne shipments rose in April by 3.6%, to 19.2m bottles versus April 2024, with exports up an encouraging 12.6%.

Champagne shipments rose to both European markets and destinations outside the EU, where the three most important countries for Champagne are the US, the UK (post-Brexit) and Japan, the former up 13.5% and the latter rising by 12.2%. However, French domestic shipments dropped a further 7.8% underlining that demand is flatlining in the birth place of Champagne.

It’s significant that of the three supply sources for Champagne (the houses, the growers and the co-ops), it’s the last-named group that’s doing best in the current market, by some way. The co-ops saw their monthly shipments rise 13.8% overall in April, while their export shipments jumped 35.8%. The houses also saw some signs of recovery with the overall figure for April up 4.1%, and exports doing better with a 12.5% rise in the month.

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