Chinese computer IT professional imports wine into China

January 20, 2011

A wine-loving Chinese information technology professional-turned entrepreneur has launched a new company to import wine to her homeland from Long Island, New York.
Jing Li, 33, who lived in the United States for more than seven years and who was an IT expert for a decade, established her enterprise in Beijing a year ago after leaving her job as a database manager at a New York advertising agency.
Li, who has two MBAs, calls her company, Beijing New Long Island Co. Ltd.
She said personal factors dictated the career change to wine importer. “I like wines and often drink wine at dinners and go to wine bars in New York City with friends,” she explained. “I had the idea of starting my own business for a while before I started. It has to be something I’m passionate about and have complete interest, and the wine business seems a natural choice.”
Li said she chose Long Island wines, which have little distribution outside of the New York area and only minimal exports, because she spent weekends in the Hamptons and became curious about the wines. Last year she visited 40-plus vineyards, tasting every wine produced in the area, and then selected her first shipments, seven palates, each 56 cases, from six small producers: Channing Daughters Winery, Lieb Cellars, Martha Clara Vineyards, Paumanok Vineyards, Peconic Bay Winery and Wolffer Estate Vineyard.
She used her own rating system which combines quality, price, varietal information “with the thought of matching Asian cuisine and what my Chinese customers may like,” LI said. “I absolutely need good quality wines to introduce to the China market for first step!”

LI said she bought mostly reds, because they sell best in China, but may add sparkling and dessert wines.
But she didn’t count on the prices Long Island producers asked for their wines. “They want $1-a-bottle wines,” James Silver, general manager of Peconic Bay Winery, said of Chinese wine buyers. Peconic Bay’s wines and others selected by Li retail for about $18 a bottle at the winery.
Li said she understands that relatively small productions and high labor costs are factors that make wines from Long Island pricier. Nevertheless, she said Chinese consumers are reluctant to pay relatively high prices for unfamiliar wines. “It’s purely because of perception,” she said, noting that the Chinese, new to wine, go for big names and well-known appellations. “Because Long Island wines are not the few bucks kind of wine, consumers are more cautious about spending over 100 remembi on a unknown brand wine.”
Many wines from Chile, Australia and Argentina sell in Chinese supermarkets for 50-80 remembi ($7.50-$12) each.
Those prices may motivate Li to look elsewhere for products for mass. She says she’s considering the Finger Lakes and California. “I much prefer to keep my niche as Long Island only,” she added.
Li sells her imports, at least for now, to high-end hotels and restaurants in Beijing, but she has plans to expand to other cities.
Long Island wine producers have exported for more than a dozen years, albeit in small quantities. Specific export figures for Long Island wine aren’t available. Susan Spence, who runs the export program for the New York Wine and Grape Foundation, the Canandaigua-based statewide trade group, estimated that less than15 percent of statewide wine production is exported.

Paumanok Winery owner Charles Massoud said he hopes Li’s venture succeeds. “If it works for her, it works for us.”

Source: http://www.winebusiness.com/news/?go=getArticle&dataid=82697

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