20,000 visitors due to attend Wine Paris & Vinexpo Paris 2022

ith just 20 days to go before it opens, Wine Paris & Vinexpo Paris is sticking to its guns, and French wine industry representatives are right behind the organisers of the exhibition, due to take go ahead from Monday 14 to Wednesday 16 February in Paris. An impressive line-up of national and regional industry representatives met on January 25 at the Pays d’Oc headquarters at Domaine de Manse, near Montpellier to sign a manifesto and reassert the need for this cohesive event (combining Vinexpo, Vinisud and Vinovision) to go ahead. In their favour, the health situation in France continues to improve, and restrictions are gradually being lifted.

“As it stands today, there is no doubt that February is the right time to market wine”, claimed Stéphane Zanella, chairman of the Roussillon wine marketing board (CIVR), stressing “you don't take part in a trade fair just for the fun of it. The companies who are there as exhibitors need it. We are now emerging from a two-year dearth of events. During that time, trade has continued but the exhibition is an opportunity to present products to future and potential clients”.

For the French wine industry, the challenge of ensuring the exhibition goes ahead is to consolidate “a stronghold for showcasing France’s extensive range of wines at the best time of year for meeting buyers”, explained Fabrice Rieu, chairman of Vinisud. “We must not sacrifice years of hard work for the sake of the health crisis”, agreed Rodolphe Lameyse, CEO of Vinexposium, which organises Wine Paris & Vinexpo Paris. Although he understands concerns about low visitor attendance, particularly among wine merchants from Bordeaux (but also Burgundy), who are asking for a postponement or price reductions as a precaution, the organisers aim to remain focused on the facts and “stay rational”.

“At this stage, I have no reason to believe that the exhibition will not meet its sales targets,” stressed Lameyse, pointing to the current decline in Delta and Omicron variants in France, with restrictions on events and international visitor traffic being lifted. The figures speak for themselves, with a strong surge in visitor pre-registrations. “We're starting from a low base, but the weekly growth rate of pre-registrations is higher than the nominal baseline year (+30%)”, explained Lameyse. He announced that there are currently 7,000 pre-registered visitors (55% of them French), leading to predicted unique visitor numbers of 20,000 by the exhibition. This is a 30% drop on the 29,000 visits in 2020. With a forecast of 65% French visitors, the organisers nevertheless point to good representation by foreign buyers across the distribution channels. The five top-ranking countries for pre-registrations are the Netherlands, Belgium, the United States, Great Britain and Canada.