The French Wine Industry

[Gardian]

Now, it's not unknown for me to have a 'grumpy old man' rant about the odd thing here & there.  Our local Cooperative Viticole is one of them.

Nice wine, nothing special, but very reasonably priced & it's the local stuff, so we feel that we're in some small way supporting community.  However, the shop never opens till 09.30-ish, closes (as always) for a 2hr+ lunch and doesn't bother on Sundays even in July / Aug.

I've just read in the local paper that they're in dire financial straights and are going to merge with another not-so-local co-op - it's more of a takeover in reality.  Inevitable redundancies, leading ultimately to more grubbing-up of vines locally. (It's been happening quite a bit in recent years.)

I just say to myself, why on earth don't these people get their *** in gear and do some marketing and try a bit harder? There are vacant shops in the village (which is mobbed with tourists just now) where one could be taken on for the Summer season.  Lazy opening hours + an unwillingness to try something like that, is symptomatic of a total absence of a selling culture, i.e. they have no other important customers.

OK, it's a dog eat dog world, survival of the fittest, etc.  All true, but it stirs one's (former) business instincts, doesn't it?  You feel as though you could do 10x better with your eyes blindfolded, don't you? 

 

[NormanH]

No.

If they were like that France would be like England.

[ebaynut]

[quote user="Gardian"]

I just say to myself, why on earth don't these people get their *** in gear and do some marketing and try a bit harder? There are vacant shops in the village (which is mobbed with tourists just now) where one could be taken on for the Summer season.  Lazy opening hours + an unwillingness to try something like that, is symptomatic of a total absence of a selling culture, i.e. they have no other important customers.

OK, it's a dog eat dog world, survival of the fittest, etc.  All true, but it stirs one's (former) business instincts, doesn't it?  You feel as though you could do 10x better with your eyes blindfolded, don't you? 

 

[/quote]

Why not take one of these shops on yourself, and perhaps in a year or two you could post on here letting us all know how its not worth starting up a business in France with all the costs and paperwork. [Www]

[Gardian]

Yes, I know what you mean, but 'trying just a little bit harder when the marketplace is difficult', makes sense, doesn't it?  It's to do with survival, not about being 'French'.

My point is that this business will effectively go under. The local grapes won't be taken to the new co-op, which is 20kms away.  Some growers will find other places for vinification, but many will just give up.

There are other buoyant co-ops relatively local to us which do try harder.  Going to have to patronise them.

The real problem I guess is that there's too much wine chasing too few drinkers, hard as I try to balance the situation!   

[NormanH]

There is a rude joke (which I will try to render not too offensively)

There are two 'ladies of the night' one French one English and a hopeful suitor asks both of them 'What is your name'

The French lady says 'Je m'appelle Fifi, et ça fait 20 que je m'appelle comme ça'

The English lady says  'What do you want it to be?'

It seems a symbol of the different approaches to selling.

[Iceni]

Gardian, what was the response when you offerred your advice to the Co-op ?

John

[just john]

Serious effects for those stuck in their cups

 Zut-alors-French-wine-sales-go-down-the-drain

 

[Chancer]

[quote user="Gardian"]

OK, it's a dog eat dog world, survival of the fittest, etc.  All true, but it stirs one's (former) business instincts, doesn't it?  You feel as though you could do 10x better with your eyes blindfolded, don't you? 

[/quote]

I agree 100% Guardian but I also used to reconcile myself to Normans point of view that I dont want my area to become like England -some chance!

It also tugs at my emotions when I see people that I know and like struggling for survival yet continuing with the same old same old, putting prices up and reducing opening hours/days when customer numbers drop. Without exception all of the tourist (we have 2M per year in Picardie) and restauration businesses in my area are breathtakingly rude to their diminishing customer base, even the recently opened Hôtel Ibis which initially was like a breath of fresh air has degenerated to the lowest common denominator namely the gene pool from which it recruits.

My local brasserie is still pinning their hopes on finding a rich English person to buy them out, I read their first advert placed in 2007 which happened to be a bumper year for them due to the construction of our new airport. It was advertised as suitable for a couple or person able to work alone (presumably an octopus)

Turnover €86K

Monthly rent €458

Resultat d'exploitation €14k

And the asking price €150k [:-))][:-))][:-))] They even suggested that I should buy it and pay someone to run it [8-)]

The place could and should be a gold mine given the 2000 employees opposite, indeed when I first arrived it was doing quite well (but could have done so much better) despite their treatment of customers, now it is almost deserted, they have actually asked me for advice but when I broach the subject of the welcome and making people want to come back I might as well be speaking martian.

I think the terminal blow has been their refusal to pass on any of the recent reduction in TVA with the exception of a post it pad announcing "café €1 au lieu de €1.20", none of the other restaurants in the area have reduced their prices either.

In the 70's there were more than 7 bars and cafés in the short strip facing the factory, we are only 1km from the main town of 100k habitants that everybody agrees is crying out for a good restaurant yet the brasserie will soon close I fear. The price has dropped to €46k but still no interest.

[Sunday Driver]

Around here, local enterprise seems to be alive and well....

We have a small bar/restaurant in our village which was previously owned by an Englishman.  The food was mediocre, opening times erratic, and the premises had been up for sale for some time.  In the end, the mairie purchased the property and let it out to a young French couple.  Nowadays, the village square is crammed with vans and trucks every lunchtime and the restaurant is packed out. 

They also do catering for local groups - last year all the sixty year olds in the village were invited to a lunch there.  The meal was first class and lasted until teatime, at which time we all wandered off to the boules piste....

 

 

[babcock]

Our village had a wine cave. These days after modifications and extensions it is also a small(ish) Spar market. They will even deliver your groceries. It would be profitable on its Sunday morning trade alone! It's open 8:30 - 7:30 and yes it does shut for lunch. I have never been the only customer whatever time I have been in. It's a family business and a great asset to the village.

[Gardian]

[quote user="Iceni"]

Gardian, what was the response when you offerred your advice to the Co-op ?

John

[/quote]

John ..............

A shrug of the shoulders.  Seriously.

I would imagine that morale is rock bottom, because apparently this merger / takeover has been on the cards for 6 mths or so.

[babcock]

Another oddity in the French view of business is that "it doesn't matter that the immos fee is 8% because it's the buyer who pays" A local immo put his fee down to 5% and was visited by a rival immo who said they all had to charge the same and threatened him with the gendarmes.

[Stan Streason]

Opening hours is the biggest difficulty I have coming to terms with French life.  My holiday home is roughly half an hour from any major commerce so if I'm not on the road by 11.00 its not worth the effort until later on.  I cant even get up early and get it over and done with because they dont open till 9am. Couple of weeks ago, having identified a lawnmower I wanted I set out but was held up by a minor accident between a combine and a tractor.  Got to Mr Bricolage at 11.55 to be told no one would assist me to buy (and I couldnt buy without assistance). In a fit of pique I spent €535 on a lawnmower somewhere else.

Was also turned away from one reastaurant because they stopped serving food 3 mins previously at 2pm and another did not open for dinner till 8pm. 

I understand that everyone needs a life but I work in a service industry and you do whatever is needed whenever a client wants it in order to get the job done.

Perhaps my visits are not long enough for me to chill down to the French way, but it bugs the life out of me.

[Frederick]

This is also an age "set in my ways " thing with many..Our local cave was run by a nice but very laid back guy who opened when he chose to regardless of the times on the door...He retired recently and a young guy has taken over the running of it and what a difference ! In the past you took your own cask or relied on one dropped off there that just could have once contained somthing other than wine ...you took a chance ..Today you can purchase a new wine box up to 10 litres or more and he will fill it with the wine of your choice .Return with it and the guy will remove the tap fill you up and put it back in resealed ....Now that is an improvment ! The old boy who retired was obviously not having any of that nosense .....The place has more customers and keeps to the opening times today .

[Clair]

[quote user="Stan Streason"]I understand that everyone needs a life but I work in a service industry and you do whatever is needed whenever a client wants it in order to get the job done.

Perhaps my visits are not long enough for me to chill down to the French way[/quote]

Both very valid comments [:)]

Up to a couple of years ago, there hadn't been a butcher's in the

village and the locals had had to rely on a travelling butcher driving up to the square twice a week.

The conseil municipal then offered a young butcher some financial incentives to encourage him to renovate and open a shop.

He was also offered the opportunity

to run the soon-to-be-open butcher's counter in the Gamm Vert, but he turned it down.

Now that the Gamm Vert expansion plans for

a butcher's counter and an extended regional food section have been approved, he has tried to rally the villagers behind him in stopping the opening of a competitor.

I have been asked to sign the petition and I have been told that as the butcher has been there first (two years!), we should support him (I thought we already did!) by boycotting the newcomer!

All talk about giving the customers choice or about healthy competition just fall on deaf ears!

[NormanH]

[quote user="Stan Streason"]

I understand that everyone needs a life but I work in a service industry and you do whatever is needed whenever a client wants it in order to get the job done.

Perhaps my visits are not long enough for me to chill down to the French way, but it bugs the life out of me.

[/quote]

Without twisting your words I have to say that one thing I often notice is that people often give as a reason to buy in France is that 'We love the lifestyle', and then promptly say how irritating such and such a feature is.[:)]

[Frederick]

It may well come to pass that given the little interest some business owners have in keeping their customers and building up more,,the likes of ebay and other sites will finish them off altogether. I certainly shop on line more and more these days ..I have just bought an item that works out at less that the cost of fuel to go out and buy it...and it will drop into the post box within 3 days.Given the distances people have to drive in France to shop for most stuff... on line shopping is just going to get bigger and bigger ..

[Gardian]

[quote user="babcock"]Our village had a wine cave. These days after modifications and extensions it is also a small(ish) Spar market. They will even deliver your groceries. It would be profitable on its Sunday morning trade alone! It's open 8:30 - 7:30 and yes it does shut for lunch. I have never been the only customer whatever time I have been in. It's a family business and a great asset to the village.[/quote]

Your post is exactly what I was driving at.  Just a bit of old fashioned commonsense enterprise + (yes) a bit of hard work.  Good luck to them, though it sounds as though they won't need it.

Oh and Norman, it's really isn't about coming to France and wanting it to be all rural and 'typically French', and then moaning because they don't open at lunchtimes.  It's moaning because some businesses are lazy and refuse to look further than the end of their noses.  "We won't try that because this is the way we do it and what you're suggesting will never work".  Incidentally, heard that repeatedly in the UK: that business is now on it's knees.  

[NormanH]

[quote user="Gardian"]

Oh and Norman, it's really isn't about coming to France and wanting it to be all rural and 'typically French', and then moaning because they don't open at lunchtimes.  It's moaning because some businesses are lazy and refuse to look further than the end of their noses.  "We won't try that because this is the way we do it and what you're suggesting will never work".  Incidentally, heard that repeatedly in the UK: that business is now on it's knees.  

[/quote]

I was aiming that comment more at the post I quoted, which says 'it bugs me', more than your original post.

I agree about some aspects of the wine trade (very big where I live)

I treasure one image on a door of a cave.

"Ouvert tous les jours.

Fermé le dimanche et lundi."

[Stan Streason]

[quote user="NormanH"][quote user="Stan Streason"]

I understand that everyone needs a life but I work in a service industry and you do whatever is needed whenever a client wants it in order to get the job done.

Perhaps my visits are not long enough for me to chill down to the French way, but it bugs the life out of me.

[/quote]

Without twisting your words I have to say that one thing I often notice is that people often give as a reason to buy in France is that 'We love the lifestyle', and then promptly say how irritating such and such a feature is.[:)]
[/quote]

I dont disagree.  I had hoped that my post gave enough indication of my awareness of the incongruity of what I was saying however it does not have to be 100% unthinking acceptance of everything to like the lifestyle.  We are in the first 6 months of second home owning and even though the property is in reasonable condition there is much decorating to be done and many things to be purchased.  During my visits there is so much to be done that at present I find the differences in attitudes to doing business very frustrating.  And yes I know that says as much about me as it does about the French.  (But I doubt I will ever think that the attitudes to customer service couldnt be improved).

[NormanH]

I think that Customer service (especially in the larger chains) is not a French forte [:)]

[mint]

[quote user="NormanH"]I think that Customer service (especially in the larger chains) is not a French forte [:)]
[/quote]

You believe in the English understatement then, Norman?