Kumala, one of the leading SA wine brands in the UK – reportedly because UK drinkers thought it was Australian – is in the news for all the wrong reasons.  Oz Clarke, no stranger to SA thanks to WOSA freebees, did an expose on supermarket wine discounting for the BBC Watchdog consumer affairs program last week.  One of the exhibits was the discounting of  £10 Kumala Zenith red to £5 for almost six months at Sainsbury’s.

Watchdog reckons perpetual discounting implies the wine was never worth more than £5 in the first place while Oz reports that a £5 (R80) bottle of wine has only 20p (R3) of wine in it after VAT, duties and retailer margins are factored in.  Still so long as WOSA get their levies, the international fat face of SA wine will be smiling and flying in sommeliers and press galore from the green and pleasant land.