TWE - Chart, page-67

Treasury Wine's Squealing Pig heads to global market
https://www.copyright link/content/dam/images/h/0/y/m/0/f/image.related.afrArticleLead.620x350.h15b25.png/1536808076693.jpg
Treasury Wine Estates' Squealing Pig brand originally started in NZ's Marlborough region and is headed next year onto the global stage. It is the biggest selling rose in Australia now.Mike Heydon

Penfolds owner Treasury Wine Estates will launch one of its fastest-growing local brands into the United States and United Kingdom early in 2019 to try and capitalise on a global shift by consumers into lighter, refreshing wines as the rosè category produces strong growth.

Squealing Pig has become the biggest selling brand in the rosè category in Australia in the past three months after its sales doubled and now the company wants to replicate that success offshore and try and turn it into a brand with global clout like its much bigger stablemates Penfolds and Wolf Blass.

Milennial drinkers with a taste for lighter wine styles have been driving the sharp growth in rosè generally.


The general manager of Woolworths' powerhouse Dan Murphy's liquor chain, Campbell Stott, said on Thursday the trend would continue and it was also being fuelled by a shift away from sauvignon blanc among consumers.


"There's been a migration away from sauvignon blanc into something new," Mr Stott said. "It's refreshing. It's seen as stylish".

The variety had also managed to transcend from being mainly consumed during summer months to an all-year round beverage.

"We've found it to be quite consistent now. People like to have a rosè in the fridge instead of a sauvignon blanc," he said.

Treasury Wines has been aggressively promoting the Squealing Pig brand in Australia in big liquor chains operated by Woolworths and Coles and according to the latest Aztec sales data, its value and volume doubled in the three months to mid-August.


Treasury's Penfolds brand is the flagship for Treasury, and its robust growth in the China market has been one of the main drivers of the strong profit growth generated by Treasury over the past four years where its share price has risen from $4 to above $18. But younger brands like 19 Crimes in the US and Squealing Pig are filling niches as the group eyes younger drinkers.


Squealing Pig is a New Zealand south island brand first established in 2011. The brand also sells under different wine varieties including sauvignon blanc and pinot gris, but the rosè is the standout performer.

The rosè category has doubled in size in the past two years and is now estimated to be worth $82 million in Australia at a retail level, which doesn't include wines sold in restaurants and bars.

Treasury Wines deputy chief marketing officer Angus Lilley said on Thursday the company was already in talks with big retailers and distributors offshore for a likely launch into the UK and United States initially in early calendar 2019.

"Plans are in place to launch internationally through coming months," Mr Lilley said.


Mr Lilley said there was a global trend underway for refreshing, light wine styles, and Squealing Pig was squarely targeting that shift. The first Squealing Pig rosè was released in 2015.

"It is a macro-trend and rosè plays to that," he said.

He said rosè was being consumed by both female and male drinkers and had shaken off some of the historical patterns where it may have traditionally been preferred more by female drinkers.

"The rosè category is absolutely on fire," he said. But it still only represented between 3 to 4 per cent of total bottled wine sales across the market in Australia, even though the category had increased by 23 per cent in the past year.


Treasury chief executive Mike Clarke last month outlined Squealing Pig as one of the best performing brands in the company's stable, albeit off a low base.

Mr Lilley said the grape supply in NZ for the brand had been steadily built up to ensure it was ready for the global market as popularity increased. "The commercial ambition is very closely linked with the supply chain," Mr Lilley said.