Wine in Nairobi: What’s in the Supermarkets?

Kenya is world famous for its wildlife, magnificent scenery, and diverse cultural mix, but not surprisingly given its relative poverty not wine. Wine consumption within a very poor country is as to be expected confined to a tiny minority largely the emerging urban middle classes or tourists. Consequently, Kenya is towards the bottom of the world’s league table for wine consumption, but for those with the wherewithal and bitten by the wine bug there is a surprising range of wine on offer through the country’s main supermarkets.

There are three main supermarket chains that dominate in Kenya: Nakumatt, Uchumi, and smaller, but still significant for wine Chandarana. These three supermarkets dominate and constitute by far the vast majority of retail wine sales in Kenya. Wine can be found as with all African countries in Kenya’s thousands of small shops and markets, which is separate story in itself. A difference between Kenya and Europe and South Africa is that none of the supermarkets import wines directly. Instead, they are supplied by six or seven main wine importing companies, which again is a separate subject.

As you would expect for an African country, South Africa still dominates in terms of volume of wine imported into Kenya at approximately 2.3 million litres of wine a year (see www.sawis.co for more statistics). This places Kenya sixteenth on the world-wide table of natural wine exports from South Africa with only Angola among African countries importing more wines (albeit 5 times the amount imported by Kenya). All the major South African brands can be found on the Kenyan supermarket shelves. These range from the “A’s such as A Few Good Men, Alto, Arniston Bay, and Avondale, through the ‘L’s, La Bri, Land’s End, Leopard’s Leap, and Long Mountain, and onto the ‘Z’s represented by the ubiquitous Zonnebloem, and of course everything else in between.

At the good quality end of South African wines value can be found from the bigger producers such as Nederburg where their Winemaster’s Reserve range of whites from Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Chenin Blanc, and Riesling can be bought at around Ksh(Kenyan Shillings)750 to Ksh900 (approximately $10 to $12) a bottle. For the Nederburg Winemaster’s Reserve reds Shiraz, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, and the blend Baronne can be bought for around Ksh1,200 to Ksh1,500 ($16 to $20) a bottle.

At a similar price range to the Nederburg range Bellingham, part of the relative giant Douglas Green Bellingham company, enjoys approximately 10% of the Kenyan market for South African wines. Bellingham’s Fusion range such as Cabernet Sauvignon with a splash of Cabernet Franc, or, Shiraz with a splash of Viognier again offers good value. They also offer the clever marketing twist of a single grape varietal with a “splash” to lure the more adventurous wine apprentice to dip their toes into the world of blends. Particularly good value is Bellingham’s multi-award winner Fair Maiden white blend (Roussanne, Chenin, Verdelho, Grenache Blanc, Viognier) and the very good 2008 vintage can be found at selected supermarket in Nairobi for about KSH1,200 to KSH1,400 ($16 to $19) a bottle.

These prices may seem somewhat heavy viewed from the home of these wines in South Africa. However, if you considered the transportation costs and not least the very high tax and duties on wines in Kenya (more about this in a future blog) these retail prices are low particularly given the relative quality. Also from South Africa, but with a Kenyan flavour is the well marketed Mara wine. This wine a blend of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon is made in South Africa and marketed as Mara Nyekundu (meaning red in the Swahili language) and comes resplendent with a beaded amulet around the bottle neck and attractive label. It is soft and fruity and with a price at around Ksh850 (approximately $11) a bottle and is particular popular with tourist who want an “African” flavour to their wine.

After South Africa and very much coming up on the rails so to speak in volume terms of wine sold in Kenya’s is Chile. The story of the Chilean wine production explosion over the last ten years is well known and is now the world’s ninth largest wine producer. Seven out of every ten bottles produced in Chile is exported and these wines can be found taking up every increasing amounts of shelf space in Kenya’s supermarkets. Gato Negro is claimed by some to be the largest selling bottled brand of wine in Kenya and can be bought for around Ksh500 to Ksh550 (approximately $6.50 to $7.50) a bottle. Its popularity is based much on its price, but its easily accessible and fruity style goes down well with Kenyan consumers. Good quality and value can be found through the wines produced by the dominant Chilean wine company Concha y Toro through its brand Casillero del Diablo. There are the full range of these wines on the supermarket shelves from the whites Gewürztraminer, Chardonnay, Viognier, Riesling, through the reds Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and what has become Chile’s national grape Carmenère. The whites are in the price range of Ksh800 to Ksh900 ($10.50 to $11.00) a bottle and the reds from Ksh1, 250 to Ksh1, 500 ($16.50 to $20) a bottle and in the price-to-quality ratio are the biggest competitors to the better South African wines.

While the New World wine countries dominate in Kenya, there is a broad representation from the Old World wine producers. The big French wine companies and brands are represented through J.P. Chenet complete with bendy-shaped bottles. J. P. Chenet is a wine made by the producer Grands Chais de France, a privately owned French business that is the largest wine exporter in the France. It is marketed almost exclusively abroad, with 64 million bottles sold yearly. The range of J.P. Chenet wines both reds (Merlot and a Cabernet-Syrah blend) and whites (Blanc de Blanc and a Semi-sweet wine) can all be found for between Ksh800 and Ksh850 ($10.50 to $11.50) a bottle. Also from France the Vin de Pays from Piat D’or (a brand from the largest wine company in the world Diageo) most famous in the UK wine retail market, can also be found in Kenya at a slightly cheaper price than the offerings from J.P. Chenet,

Italian wines other than the bulk producers are not that common although Nairobi does have a vibrant Italian community and there is one or two private families that import really high quality and hand selected Italian wines direct (more in a later blog). Spanish wine is less available although Torres Cornas can be found at Ksh1, 275 (about $16) a bottle. Moving back to the New World Australia is well represented through the ever popular Hardy’s brand range of wines and compete at a similar price range to the quality South African and Chilean offerings. Finally, also to be found are Californian wines although these are mostly represented in the form of three and five litre bag offering and what the American’s tend to call “jug” wines. There is nothing wrong with these wines offering good value per litre as they do, but perhaps better as a party or barbeque offering.

There is then an increasingly broad offering of wines through Kenya’s supermarkets. Inevitably the wines on offer are not necessarily the finest examples of the wines available from the respective countries. In general they are part of the worldwide ocean of bulk wines, albeit of sound technical quality, that dominate throughout the world. For the Kenyan consumer the general feeling is one of appreciation that these wines are on offer at all. For the more discerning wine aficionados there are fine wines available from a handful of specialist outlets, which will be the subject of a subsequent blog.