The Chinese wine market remained sluggish during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday peak season partly because the impact of the Covid-19 epidemic limited the demand, Yicai Global learned.

“Sales are even poorer than last year,” a distributor of Yantai Changyu Pioneer Wine, a well-known Chinese wine producer, told Yicai Global, the local wine demand has been in contraction for four consecutive years.

The local catering business is still suffering the impact of domestic outbreaks that forced companies to suspend business frequently this year, resulting in increased wine inventory and reduced wine sales, he added.

Business activities and gatherings have dropped greatly this year because of the Covid-19 epidemic, said Wang Wei, a wine importer in northern China’s Tianjin. Wine sales around the Mid-Autumn Festival and the National Day holidays are expected to decline more than 30 percent compared with previous years, he pointed out, adding that he began selling other more popular alcoholic products, including craft beer and Moutai-flavored liquors, to make up for the losses in the wine market.

The weak demand in the wine market is systemic, Yang Zhengjian, dean of WBO Wine Business School, told Yicai Global. The wine market will likely remain weak until the first half of next year.

As a response to nonperforming sales, Changyu cut the annual sales goal by as much as 50 percent for some distributors in areas severely hit by the epidemic, the distributor noted.

To maintain a healthy inventory and improve its financial performance, Changyu will adjust sales tasks in some markets and accelerate a series of reforms, such as focusing on mid-to-high-end products, restructuring the business division, and transforming its business digitally, rather than obtaining growth by squeezing distributors, Sun Jian, general manager at the firm, said to Yicai Global.

Five of the 12 listed wine companies achieved revenue growth in the first half of the year, with only four reporting profit growth. Except for industry leader Changyu, other companies recorded bad performances. Dynasty Fine Wines Group’s revenue dropped 44 percent, with net profits at Citic Guoan Wine, Grace Wine Holdings, and Xinjiang Yizhu Wine plunging between 60 percent and over 70 percent.