I did anticipate serious obstacles before starting up… No, put it another way - I didn’t expect anyone with open hands to say - come Vadim, come Cricova - we have been waiting for you so long now! There, the top shelves in our supermarkets are empty and we didnt know what to fill them with

Joking aside, I knew what I am getting myself into… And I knew it wasn’t just me the first to try to establish the Moldavian Wines in the UK. There were attempts to do that since 1992 and for one reason or another, the world still doesn’t know where on earth is Moldova and what kind of wine does it do.

I have been following the scene quite closely since 2001 and I knew when the time is right, I will do it. Actually, while at uni, I took a module called Entrepreneurship and as part of it, we had to write a business plan and present it… Well, believe it or not, my plan was about Cricova wines… Yep and that was over 5 years ago. Ok, I have been busy since then with computers, however I still kept myself up to date as to who does what.

So what do I have so special to make it a success that no one could do it before me?..

Some of you might expect an arrogant answer, but no, it is nothing to do with me, it has to do with the actual product - THE WINE! Before elaborating any further I will give you the quick picture of the Moldavian Wine Market.

For the past over half a century and probably even more, the wine produced in Moldova was for the internal and ’sister republics’ of the ex Soviet Union with Russia as the consumer number one. That market had a high demand for ’sweeter wines’ and not so much for the normal dry wines. Now, ever since the collapse of the USSR, it was only natural that winemakers would love to take advantage of the new territories. Everyone has and is trying in different ways. Some winemakers have tried to compete on price, some have tried to enter the market with some fancy bottle designs, others with some innovative ideas…

Moldavians even formed a so called ‘Moldovan Wine Guild’ where apparently 7 winemakers are part of it to try to promote together the wines on the western market. Looking at their website, I could see just 6 though… Anyway, the majority of those companies are young, newly created and some of them even employ foreign capital. Lion-Gri for example, has some US investment, Purcari has some German Interest. DK Intertrade supplies some wines to Waitrose. So why couldn’t they succeed to put Moldova on the wine map yet on a larger scale like Australia did not so long ago? Yep, its the same answer as the above - the product, the wine itself. If you ever have tried a wine from Lion-Gri or Bostavan’s Black Doctor, probably you will agree with me… Firebird wines sold in Waitrose are nothing out of ordinary either and certainly not the best of what the country has to offer. The answer is simple - even though the potential is there, a young winemaker can’t produce overnight Gold Medal winners. It takes time, trial and error and I only admire that and I am sure the time will come for them to make outstanding wine, ‘honestly priced’. And only those Gold Medal winners can make the world to turn and say - ok, ok, I will try!

So the next question that would come to your mind will probably be - why Cricova products are so different to make it a better producer than those younger entreprises? How can a state owned company be enthusiastic about what they do? Well, I wouldn’t know to be frank where their enthusiasm comes from, but I had the opportunity to meet the guy who is in charge of all the collection wines and sparkling production and he was with Cricova for the past 30 years, ever since they bottled their first ‘champenoise method’ sparkling! In September this year, while visiting Cricova, we arranged a meeting and he had a bottle of Cabernet 2005. I could see in his eyes the pride… It was a bit cold in the cellar, I mean lower than the average room temperature, so we had to warm the glasses in our hands, but even then, the wine managed to reveal its character with the pleasant aftertaste of black fruits and cherry… This was from the yet unreleased to the market prestige collection Cabernet 2005. The last vintage they made of this wine was in 2001 and the 2005 is even better. Well, there we go - it took Cricova just about 15 years since the USSR collapse to produce a wine that will make your soul sing serenades and still be affordable! Cricova Directors are also very enthusiastic about this line and are always looking to make it even better by sourcing better french oak barrels, better cork, learning from the west in as short a period of time as possible and all with the most humble attitude and love for what they do!

Is this enough to have a good product at the right price I hear you say? Not of course! There are many challenges lying ahead of us and the biggest one is to get those who have tried already Moldovan wine to try again this new ones. While chasing up last weeks the Russian and Eastern European restaurants I found that quite a few of them stock ‘Russian style’ Moldovan wine which comes in fancy bottles, with some funky names such as Old Monarch, Black Healer etc, however all those are either sweet, semi sweet or with poor taste. It is only normal to expect that if you try them wines once and you like your wines natural dry with character, then you will think twice before you will want to do it again.

So, yes - there are enough obstacles in our way and changing the general perception of a product is a task to keep us busy for quite a time, but we have all the confidence we can do it!