California grape crush falls nearly 10%
The Californian wine grape crush fell by nearly 10% in 2019, according to the official preliminary report, with prices for red and white wine grapes also falling 5% overall on 2018.
The total grape crush published by the state’s department of food and agriculture (including table grapes and raisins) fell 9.3% to 4.5m tons. Red grapes (which makes up the largest share) down 12.8% and white wine grapes down 4.3%. Overall wine grapes fell 9.13% on 2018.
The average price of wine grapes also fell by 5%, with red wine grapes down 2.9%, and white grapes down 8.6%.
However, prices in Napa rose 3.9% in the year, to an average of $5,797.07 per ton, followed by Sonoma, up 0.2% to f $2,823.67.
Chardonnay, which held onto its position as the largest white grape variety, with around 15.6% of the total crush, saw average prices fall 7.3% to $899.83.
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Meanwhile Cabernet Sauvignon, the second biggest grape variety by volume, with 14.1% of the total crush, saw prices rise 2.2% to $1,720.61.
According to the California Agricultural Statistics Service report, California crushed around 3.9 million tons of grapes in 2019 – around 8% less than in 2018, with red wine varieties down 12.8% to 2.1 million tons, and white wine varieties down 4.3% to 1.75 million tons.
