Swiss drinking more local wine

Consumers in Switzerland drank around 255 million litres of wine last year – about 20% of which was homegrown white.

In 2019, wine consumption in Switzerland rose by 4.7% on 2018. This corresponds to almost 40 bottles per capita.

The popularity of Swiss wine – especially white – is growing, according to the Federal Office for Agriculture. Between 2018 and 2019, consumption of Swiss white wine increased by 10.3% to around 48 million litres; that of Swiss red went up by 1.6 % to 44.3 million litres.

Consumption of foreign white wine also increased, but less so, and totalled around 41 million litres (+5.9 %) in 2019. Consumption of foreign red wine increased to 119.8 million litres (+3.4 %).

Total sparkling wine consumption in Switzerland rose by 3.3 % to about 20 million litres. More statistics are available in German, French or Italian.

The increasing popularity of homegrown wine is reflected on the shelves of the eight largest local retailers. By volume, the market share of Swiss wines accounts for 27.5% – an increase of 1.1% over the previous year, according to the Swiss Wine Market Institute. It reports that less than 2% of Swiss wine is exported.

Wine consumption is expected to decline in 2020 as a result of coronavirus-related restrictions.