A New Year message: Letter from London
Few could have presumed that within weeks of a new decade
beginning we would become so absorbed in navigating such sinuously unfolding
tragedy. Long months indeed and significant setbacks became the test of each of
us as coronavirus overtook our wishes for 2020. Like many businesses Justerini
& Brooks was forced to adapt, and re-adapt, at some pace. It is a testament
to the teams and individuals within Justerini & Brooks, as well as to the
companies which partner with us, that such profound changes were absorbed into
our business practices so quickly. It would be far from accurate to paint a
summary of 2020 which was somehow positive, but the reality is there was much
in those endeavours which provides both pride and hope.
The hospitality sector has been severely impacted by the
Covid-19 situation. Justerini & Brooks has a long history supplying many of
the top restaurants, clubs and hotels right across the country – skilled
businesses which consistently show us all some of the very best in enterprise.
It has been a truly awful year for these companies and their employees and a
key priority has been to be there for them as they deal with the impact and
implications of rotating Tier changes. None of our staff working in this area
were furloughed and our aim was to keep a focus, commitment and dialogue going
with all of our On-Trade customers as they went through unprecedented upheaval.
In fact our commitment to this sector as it comes out of this truly dreadful
situation is we actively aim to be an even stronger partner.
A very different picture was being painted within our
Private Client teams. It feels ill-tuned to note that 2020 saw the biggest
Burgundy campaign of our 272 year history – with sales last January/February
almost touching £6m. Perhaps more extraordinary was a Bordeaux primeur campaign
- released during a full lockdown - which far exceeded that sales figure. Over
the course of 2020 the average price of a bottle of wine sold to our private
customers declined marginally to £80 a bottle ex tax. On the other hand, our
customer storage facility – Cellarers – was put to unprecedented use throughout
the year. With customers all around the world being more at home, the Cellarers
operation was stretched to double its normal delivery capacity right through
the year, and contrary to actual customer purchases in 2020, the average bottle
value requested to be delivered out of people’s Reserves increased as customers
seemed to decide now was the time to drink some of their more special bottles.
The average price per bottle materially rising to £200 a bottle ex tax.
It is an obvious misnomer that established businesses are
somehow stuck in the past. But they do have the benefit of directly learning
from it. The commercial truth is no business survives without being closely
connected to the needs of its customers and alive to an always-changing
environment. Businesses which have grown over years and decades - even
centuries – each will have continuously seized change. It was exactly one
hundred years ago, at the beginning of the last Twenties, that Justerini &
Brooks, as well as its staff and its customers, emerged from the grim horror of
those previous years, including the Spanish influenza. Through effort those
same people made the following years a period of substantive growth and
innovation. Within Justerini & Brooks it included the launching of the
concept of Cellarers which brought us access, for the first time, to a whole
group of customers who didn’t have the means to store cellars at home. It included
the creation of our house whisky J&B Rare which helped connect us more
closely with the growth happening within the United States, which itself helped
fund our acquisitions of several West End wine merchants – acquisitions which
materially increased our access to mature wines as well as bringing more new
customers. Those years changed this company’s trajectory.
There are many reasons for hope. Much of what happened in
2020 was unwelcome. But the choices we now each make are for us. Its whether we
let such disruption be an end to our plans, or choose to ensure it becomes a
beginning.
Chadwick Delaney
Managing Director