JamesSuckling.com LLC, the wine media company of wine critic James Suckling, signed an agreement yesterday with Tmall, the premium on-line platform for Alibaba, the world’s largest ecommerce company. JamesSuckling.com will provide exclusive content for the Chinese internet giant for its September 9 Wine Day.
Based on the agreement, James Suckling will provide exclusive contents including videos, interviews and take part in Q & A section for the group’s retail platform Tmall to help promote Italian wine culture and educate Chinese wine lovers on Italian wines on Wine Day. Tmall will in return create a dedicated landing page for James Suckling to feature these contents.
Deemed by many as the most authoritative critic on Italian wines, James worked as European Bureau Chief for Wine Spectator for almost three decades before launching his own website JamesSuckling.com in 2010. He is also the Wine Editor for Asia Tatler and its nine luxury magazines in the region with 2.3 million readers.
The Wine Day, first announced by Alibaba founder Jack Ma at Vinitaly earlier in April, is hoping to replicate the sales success of the company’s Single’s Day on November 11. The unofficial holiday, targeting unmarried consumers in China, brought in more than $14 million online sales in just one day last year.
This year for the Wine Day, Alibaba projects that about 100 million people will participate in the event, and expects to triple its online wine sales with the help from the wine festival this year. The group’s retail platform Tmall sold over 230 million bottles of wines last year and 80 percent of the sales were from imported wines, according to the company.
Imported Italian wines, for instance, are worth an overall $2 billion in China, reported Reuters, citing figures released by think tank Nomisma, lagging behind French, Australian, Spanish and Chilean wines. The wine festival, however, is expected to give a huge boost to Italian wine sales. “Right now, 6 percent of the wines we sell in China are Italian. We want to change that 6 percent into 60 percent, and help you sell as much Italian wine in China as possible,” Ma said at Vinitaly.
Last year, China’s retail wine market is valued at 78 billion yuan or $11.7 billion, wrote Reuters. Alibaba estimates that 30 percent of the sales happened online and the company was responsible for half of the online sales.
Online sales of wine and spirits in China are projected to double every year for the next three years to 80 billion yuan or $12 billion, says Chris Tung, the group’s marketing officer in Asia, at VinExpo in Hong Kong this year. “In five years’ time, we expect sales of alcoholic products on various online platforms to account for about 70 per cent of total wine and spirits sales in China,” he explains.
Alibaba currently boasts 400 million users and 120 million clicks per day. It includes a B2B portal Taobao and Tmall, its online retail platform.
Launched in 2010, JamesSuckling.com features more than 30,000 tasting notes, high-definition videos and articles. The company also organizes large premium consumer events in Hong Kong, China, Thailand, the United States, and Europe. It’s most recent events are Great Wines of the Andes in September in Miami, New York and Los Angeles and Great Wines of the World in Hong Kong in November.
“The agreement with Tmall falls in line with my company’s overall strategy of being the key wine media in Asia as well as maintaining its key market share in North America and Europe,” said Hong Kong-resident James Suckling, CEO of JamesSuckling.com. “China is moving more and more to an on-line wine market and Alibaba’s dedication to being No. 1 in the market is a force to be reckoned with.”
Photos from top to bottom: More than 1,000 guests attended Great Wines of Italy event in Hong Kong last year, organized by JamesSuckling.com; Founder of Alibaba Group Jack Ma tasting wines at Vinitaly this year; Wine lovers at the Great Wines of Italy event carefully studying top Italian wines
