Australia's growing taste for champagne Bottoms up: Australians are drinking champagne at record levels. Photo: Erin Jonasson Australians drank, sprayed and toasted their way through more than 5.4 million bottles of champagne in 2012, cementing the nation's position as the seventh biggest market in the world for French bubbly with sales of more expensive vintage champagne brands now at record levels. Latest figures from the Comite Champagne, the official website of the Champagne region in France, underline Australia's growing importance to French wine makers, with champagne sales increasing by a healthy 11.2 per cent in 2012 to 5.406 million bottles. But it was the growth in vintage champagne, a champagne style produced exclusively from exceptional wines of a single harvest that has caught the French government's attention. The Comite Champagne said in 2012 Australia experienced "unprecedented growth" in its downing of vintage champagne with an increase of 79.1 per cent to 233,000 bottles, a rise of 100,000 bottles from 2011. Non-vintage champagne still accounts for the overwhelming majority of champagne sold in Australia, with more than 96 per cent of the market. Tough economic times have dampened champagne sales elsewhere however. Australia and Japan were the only two countries in the top 10 champagne markets to actually record an increase in champagne consumption in 2012. The popping of champagne corks from Perth to Melbourne was even better than the wine's home market of France which actually recorded a 5.64 per cent fall. However, Frenchmen can still drink Australians under the table when it comes to their famous tipple, with a staggering 171.4 million bottles sold in 2012 - equating to nearly three bottles of champagne for every man, woman and child in France. Elisabeth Drysdale, director of the Champagne Bureau in Australia, said a number of factors have helped boost consumption of the beverage in recent years. "I think in the last couple of years you have definitely seen with the high Australian dollar a lot of champagne come into this market place, and it's been more competitive on the retail side," Ms Drysdale said. Also, we are educating people that champagne is not just a wine for special occasions that it is a wine that can be drunk throughout a meal. We are seeing Australian consumers also interested in trying different styles of champagne and this is really reflective on wine lists if you go into wine bars or restaurants and you see so much more variety. Chris Morrison, group head sommelier for upmarket eateries Guillaume at Bennelong in Sydney and Bistro Guillaume Perth and Melbourne said he has witnessed recently stronger interest from customers for vintage champagne. "Vintage champagne is being heavily discounted, and the fact that non-vintage champagne has been a wonderful 'value proposition' for consumers over the last four or five years these consumers now are just naturally trading up," Mr Morrison said. Mr Morrison said as the level of wine education among drinkers grows they tend to gravitate to more expensive or premium wine styles such as vintage champagne. Anyone whose confidence or level of education grows in any kind of brand or any kind of subject naturally they become more adventurous and want to discover something different. For some people it's a big leap but I think champagne is also one of those beautiful brands where that large gap between vintage and non-vintage champagne pricing consumers still think it's worth it to experience those wines. The massive growth in Australia, for both vintage and non-vintage, is in stark contrast to the rest of the developed world where sales of champagne are in steep decline, with bubbly strongholds such the UK and America recording a drop in champagne sales of 6 per cent and 8.7 per cent respectively.