South Korea's wine imports jump last year with French wines most popular
South Korea’s wine imports increased at their fastest rate in four years in 2017, driven by increasing demand for white and sparkling wine according to government statistics.
The country shipped $210 million worth of wine in 2017, a 9.7% increase from the previous year, according to the data collated by the Korea Customs Office.
This was the first time that the value oustripped $200m. Imported wine was also one of the fastet growing alcoholic beverages, with a double digit jump between 2011 and 2013, though growth slowed down from 2014 to 2016 as imported beer began to pose more comptition.
Local discount chains and convenience stores threw themselves behind marketing campaigns for budget wines, which helped to boost sales of white and sparkling wines. An increasing number of single person households in South Korea also helped sales of wine in mini bottles.
French wines were the biggest seller, increasing by 13.5% year on year to reach a value of $68.68m in 2017. Chilean wines came second only to France with $40.64 worth of exports while Italian wines took third place with exports valued at $12.3m to South Korea.