Black autumn for U.S. wine sales (-11% in November), somewhat better for Italy (-3%)

It was a negative autumn for wine sales in the United States: total wine consumption in November marks a monthly trend decline of 11%, a figure that brings the volume sales gap in the first 11 months 2023 to -8%. It goes better for Italian wines alone, which, between US off trade and horeca, limit losses to -3% in November and -3.5% for the year. This is noted by the Observatory of Unione Italiana Vini (Uiv). 
According to the Uiv report based on SipSource, a tool that monitors 75% of U.S. retail establishments, the minor contraction in Italian wine consumption during the period is attributable to the - so far good - hold of the sparkling wine segment (+2.2% trend over the year), against a generalized drop in still wines, with reds at -9%, whites at -3% and rosés at -13%. Definitely negative data, although in general hopeful signs seem to be coming from other countries, according to the latest Istat surveys.
Among channels, losses in out-of-home consumption (restaurants, bars, hotels) stand at -5%, while off premise demand (large-scale retail, wholesale, liquor store, grocery) is reported to be falling to -9%.
In November 2023 alone, with the overtaking of white wines, sparkling wines (+8% over the same period 2022) became the Italian type most consumed by U.S. wine lovers, with a share close to 38%, compared to 35.5% for whites and 17.5% for reds, the latter in sharp regression (-16%). The difficulties of reds are not limited, however, to products from Italy: in 2023, the decline in the total market is 10%, bisected by a -15% November. The only positive item is cocktail wines, which grew by 2% both in November 2023 and in the computation of the 11 months.