C&C’s choice of three unique portfolios offers venues an exciting variety of wines

By Gordon Davidson

It wasn’t 60 years ago when C&C’s Kenny Gray began his drinks trade career working in Scotland’s pubs and bars – but maybe less than half that time ago, he remembers a licensed trade that largely treated wine as ‘an afterthought’.

Speaking to SLTN on the occasion of our 60th anniversary, Kenny is delighted to report that wine is now front and centre of Scottish hospitality, with a well thought-out wine list standing as a clear sign of an establishment’s quality.

“Back when I began in the pubs, we were only selling wine in wee 187cl bottles, and the choice was ‘red, white or rosé’,” Kenny recalls. “Nowadays, more and more venues recognise wine as something that adds value, and there’s a desire to offer more choice and quality.”

Increasingly, it’s the C&C group that pubs, bars and restaurants work with to source that choice and quality of wine, via its three wholesale businesses – Bibendum, Matthew Clark and Tennent’s Direct – each offering bespoke portfolios and different approaches to suit the specific needs of each trade customer.

With the group’s beer portfolio reaching into no less than 4700 licensed outlets, there is, says Kenny, an exciting opportunity to grow the C&C wine business.

“Tennent’s Direct provides Scottish customers with the nation’s favourite brands  – Tennent’s, Heverlee, Menabrea and Magners –  but they are delighted when they see the full portfolio of products we can offer, including an extensive wine range.

“Matthew Clark is focused on being the trade’s ‘one-stop shop’, so it’s got the ability to supply most customers with a complete range of wines, beers, soft drinks, and spirits, delivering value at every price point.”

Bibendum is C&C’s wine specialist, with a beautiful portfolio of world class producers, delivering  what Kenny describes as a ‘creative approach’ to wine, with a real emphasis on both its producers and staff training, for which it has won multiple awards.

C&C Group is focused on customers, ensuring each distribution business focuses on delivering against customer needs, supporting them to win in the face of a challenging environment so they can delight consumers.  

“At C&C we harness the power of our scale to ensure that Tennent’s Direct, Matthew Clark and Bibendum can arm our customers in Scotland with the best market, consumer insight and ranging advice,” says Kenny.

“Because of the strength and depth of our wine portfolio, on any high street we can supply wine to multiple places, whilst still protecting the uniqueness of each outlet.”

From his position astride three very different wine supply streams, Kenny has a clear overview of the ebb and flow of consumer demand for wine, and currently feels that the category is emerging from a post-lockdown slump.

Kenny also believes that wine’s return to on-trade relevance is more broad-based than in years past, presenting businesses with an opportunity to construct wine lists with thoughtful upselling options.

“What we are seeing now, as well as growth in sparkling, is growth in Provence rosé and Provence rosé style, because most other wine producing regions in the world have cottoned onto that and are producing things that look and taste very similar.

“We continue to see prosecco in growth, and we are seeing people trading up. It used to be you’d have one prosecco on the list, but with people willing to pay slightly more for better quality, you have to give them premium options.

“That’s why for me the really important thing is your wine list – how you structure it, how you price-ladder it – there’s a lot of well-researched techniques, and we can help our customers to use those, and with training staff, so they have the confidence to sell the product.”

But given the choice, what would Kenny himself order from the wine list? 

“I am still a sucker for a barrel-aged white rioja,” he confesses. “Something with a little bit more meat on it.

“The wine industry for me is like a kid walking into a sweetshop. There is just so much choice.

“I love the fact that anytime I go anywhere, visiting a supplier abroad, I am learning. That never stops in the wine industry. 

“You learn about varietals you’ve never tried before, you learn about new techniques.”

C&C regards it as ‘massively’ important to forge connections between themselves, their suppliers and their customers, ideally by getting everyone together in one place and ‘creating some memories’, so Kenny rarely travels to those vineyards alone. 

“Getting our customers over into the vineyards to actually meet the people that make the wine, so they can better understand it, makes it so much easier for them to sell it to their own customers.

“Being able to stand there and say: ‘I was in the vineyard, and you would absolutely love this wine’ – that’s just invaluable.”