Getting drunk on Drops of God

IT’S impossible to overstate the impact of the Japanese manga Drops of God on the wine industry. Now newly adapted into a French-Japanese TV show, the comic series which debuted in 2004 caused wine sales to soar among young Asians as no phenomenon before it has.

Wine producers featured in the fictional manga – such as Chateau Calon-Segur, Chateau Palmer, Saint Estephe and Chateau Le Puy – had a 130 per cent rise in sales in Japan during the first year of the manga’s publication. Meanwhile in South Korea, sales of fine wines increased significantly as a direct result of Drops of God, rising from less than a third of alcohol sales to around 70 per cent of the market. Similar effects were also seen in China, Taiwan and other Asian countries.

When the manga was translated into French in 2008, French wine producers had another sales boom. Chateau Mont-Perat, for instance, was one of the vineyards memorably featured in the manga. Demand soared to a point that it could raise its normal price of 15 euros (S$22) per bottle to 150 euros, and ramp up production to 50,000 cases from 25,000.