Le terroir, le cépage et la marque : stratégies de valorisation des vins dans un contexte de mondialisation

Abstract

«Terroir», brands and vine variety : globalisation and wine's valorisation strategies. Today, the wine industry is experiencing deep changes : the reputation of "terroirs" tends to evolve, the social hierarchies settled between "appellations" are shaken by more modest ones, and in particular by those of the "new world" countries. The objective of this paper is to analyse the effects of these transformations on the French wine industry, and more especially on the principles of classifications of first-rate wines, taking into account the fact that history, differences of reputation and institutional structures have an orderly role on the economic behaviour of (wine) producers, especially with regard to international markets. We study two cases - Chinon's "appellation" and Languedoc-Roussillon - that have a different position in the French wine industry. Both of them did not incorporate at the same time and in the same way the AOC label. These two instances clearly show the importance of social perception of wine quality in establishing their values and in explaining all the changes that occured about their classifications. Although Chinon's "appellation" adopted the traditional approach, Languedoc-Roussillon' s strategy consisted of turning the rules of the game in its favour by introducing a new category of wine in France, thus anticipating the changes of the international wine market. This article does not pretend to provide definite answers on the respective merits of classifications but clarifies the economic and symbolic strategies of agents concerned by the cultural transformations of world wine markets.