State-owned wine trader Tokaj Kereskedohaz has signed a ten-year agreement with Costco, a big US membership warehouse chain, to sell Hungary’s famous Tokaj dessert wine, Tokaj Kereskedohaz CEO Istvan Kiss told MTI.
Under the agreement, Costco will buy an annual 250,000 bottles Mr Kiss said. The order is about one-tenth of Hungary’s wine exports to the US, he added.
The first orders will be for the 2001 vintage of Tokaj 3-puttony aszu, in gift boxes. Costco will resell the bottles for USD 15-20, about twice the price the wine goes for in Europe.
Tokaj Kereskedohaz has 2m bottles of the 3-puttony aszu from 2001 in its cellars. It will deliver another vintage to Costco when its stocks dry up.
Tokaj Kereskedohaz is also in talks with US retailer Walmart on selling Tokaj in its stores, Mr Kiss said.
Hungary’s wine exports to the US came to USD 3.9m in 2009.
personally, they should stop peddling the dessert wine exclusively. there are so many fine wines and regions why only sell the syrup i don’t know. can’t stand the stuff and if that is all the u.s. has to go on to judge hu wines….well
I agree Clara they need to appeal to the younger age group who drink more wine, when I look in supermarkets in the UK for Hungarian wines I only see the occasional bottle of Bulls Blood and there are certainly some great Hungarian wines out there other than that.I also take lots of sparkling wine to the UK when I visit and everyone loves it its cheap and very good!!!
Totally agree with other comments. Tokaji Aszu is lovely, but the dry versions from Tokaj are much more interesting. Wonderful grapes like Furmint and Harslevelu produce excellent still wines. I recently also tasted the exclusive Kabar grape from Chateau Deerszla which is an absolute treat !!
Erik. FYI.
Metonymy (pronounced /mɨˈtɒnɨmi/) is a figure of speech used in rhetoric in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept. For instance, “Washington,” as the capital of the United States, could be used as a metonym for its government.
Walmart. Yeah. Cause that’s where I go when I’m looking for some fine wines…
Tokaj wines in general are usually very good.
The question I want to ask is: in some of the local
supermarkets in Hungary there are wines labeled “Tokaj/i”. They are no more Tokaj wine than my aunt’s my uncle?
Similarly I know a bank that uses the “visa” name and “logo” and the same situation applies.
Commercial piracy?! Or not?