Top ten whites at your new, soaraway Tesco

From today, Britain’s largest supermarket chain Tesco, retailer of more wine than any other outfit I can think of in the world (and I’m not proud of this fact, which reflects hegemony rather than any sort of superiority), is introducing 370 new wines to make a total of 1,100 different offerings from the wine department. This is the result of what they call “the largest category review ever conducted by a UK supermarket”. (Incidentally, in case American readers think this is of no relevance to them, you might be interested to know that it is an ex Tesco wine buyer who is currently in charge of their attempt to break into the US market via their burgeoning network of Fresh and Easy stores – a very different image from Tesco's in the UK.) 

What’s of interest to wine lovers, and of potential concern to other retailers, is that Tesco’s focus is – at last – moving upmarket. Well over 200 of the new wines will retail at more than £6.98. In tandem with rival Sainsbury’s, who have done so well with their Taste the Difference range of better quality wines (see tomorrow’s wine of the week), Tesco is putting increased effort into offering not just the cheapest but some much more interesting wines in its core range. (All of the above is independent of last year’s move into retailing ‘fine wines’ described here.)

There does seem to be a bit of an upgrade in their choice of suppliers with the likes of Bisol of north east Italy, Planeta of Sicliy, Laurenz Moser of Austria and Aurelio Montes of Chile among new recruits to the delights of supplying Tesco, although they are reluctant to relinquish their devotion to the special offers and promotions that have been responsible for such a high proportion of all British supermarkets’ wine turnover in recent years.

So why is Tesco trying to move upmarket? Publicly they say they are simply listening to what their customers tell them – a favourite supermarket activity and not one pursued with that much vigour by smaller merchants. Tesco has been amazed by the success of its online wine sales, particularly those of relatively smart wine. Privately the explanation is not unrelated to a new bit of logistical software which allows them to target the distribution of small lots of wine much more precisely. But cynics might say that they, like all big forces in UK drinks retailing, are also preparing ammunition against any government curbs on what they see as flogging too much cheap alcohol. And then there is the small matter of overall UK wine sales growth slowing down so alarmingly.

But what you’re probably most interested in is which wines to head for, even if tracking smaller lots down in the vast network of different Tescos all over the UK can be a frustrating experience. I have put in brackets after the wine name the number of stores Tesco say that particular wine will be available in. They claim that there will be 20 to 30 stores which carry every single one of their wines, and that they will all be available online in cases of six, although the numbers below suggest that the most sought after wines may well appear in only in an elite 18 stores. Although today marks the start of this move upmarket and presumably not all wines are in their intended destinations yet, feel free to add any comments below, especially on Tesco's online service. 
 

Tesco are going mad on rosé, doubling their selection to 63 different examples, which they reckon is more than any other UK retailer. In a similar but rather dimmer reflection of the Zeitgeist, they have doubled their organic and Fairtrade offerings to 21 and 10 wines respectively.

Here are my favourite new Tesco whites (pinks and reds follow), listed by increasing price with the price, alcohol content and number of stores in which it should be available. SC stands for screwcap. Please forgive any slightly inaccurate appellations. They don’t seem to mean as much to the Tesco team as to nitpickers J&J here.

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