Wine Consumption: Do Germans Drink Sweet or Dry Wine?

Picture: Christian G.E. Schiller and Steffen Christmann, Weingut A. Christmann, in Seattle, USA. Weingut A. Christmann belongs to the group of winemakers that make exclusively dry wines.

See:
The German Winemakers at the Forthcoming 4. Riesling Rendezvous in Seattle, Washington State, USA

When you travel outside of Germany and check the wine lists of restaurants and retail stores in terms of German wines, you easily get the impression that Germans are hooked on sweet wine. It is the fruity-sweet Riesling style that is so popular in the world and that many equate with German wine and the German’s preference for wine. But this is faulty. Germany drinks dry. Like the rest of the world. Let us take a look.

The Germans consume about 20 mio hectoliters of wine every year. 14 mio hectoliters of total consumption are imported, red and white wine mainly from Spain, France and Italy. All the imported wines are dry.

Picture: Christian G.E. Schiller and Wilhelm Weil, Weingut Robert Weil, in Kiedrich. Weingut Weil belongs to the group of winemakers that make both dry and fruity-sweet wines, in addition to noble-sweet wines.

See:
Visiting Wilhelm Weil at his Weingut Robert Weil in Kiedrich, Germany
Tasting with Wilhelm Weil the 2010 Weingut Weil Wines in Kiedrich, Germany

The balance is wine made in Germany. The Germans consume about 6 mio hectoliters of German wine, while Germany produces roughly 9 mio hectoliters annually, with 3 mio hectoliters being exported.

1/3 of the German wine production of 9 mio hectoliters is red wine and very little of it is exported. The German red wine is generally dry. Thus, half of the 6 mio hectoliters German wine consumed by the Germans is red wine and it is dry.

Picture: Christian G.E. Schiller with Dr. Manfred Pruem, Weingut J.J. Pruem at Schloss Johannisberg. Weingut J.J. Pruem belongs to the small group of winemakers that make no dry wine, all of them, I believe, based in the Mosel Valley.

See:
JJ Pruem Goes Supermarket: Meeting Katharina Pruem and Tasting the Incredible JJ Pruem Wines at Wegmans

This leaves us with 3 mio hectoliters of white wine. My guess is that 2/3 of the 3 mio hectoliters of white German wine consumed in Germany is dry and 1/3 sweet. Thus: 2 mio hectoliters of the total consumption of German white wine is dry and 1 mio hectoliters is sweet.

Conclusion: Only 1 mio hectoliters of the wine consumed in Germany is sweet. That is 5% of total consumption. Not more than 1 out of 20 bottles of wine consumed in Germany is sweet.

So, 95% of the wine consumed in Germany is dry and sweet-style wines are niche wines in Germany. This is pretty much in line with the consumption patterns in the rest of the world. But the delicious low alcohol, fruity-sweet Rieslings that German winemakers are able to produce, are unique in the world and popular everywhere.

This back-of-the-evenvelope calculation is pretty much in line with a statement VDP President Steffen Christmann made at the recent 4th Riesling Rendezvous in Seattle, Washington State: "If you take the German white wines that cost Euro 15 plus, 95% of the production is dry."

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