“The 50 wine brands featured have all made an appearance in the five lists prior to this one.

Royal Tokaji Wine Company came in at number 31 in the top 50.

“’It’s a funny one,’ Charlie Mount, Royal Tokaji marketing director says. ‘For a small producer like us, I like to think we are relatively peasant. The fact is, if my team and I could sit down with every potential consumer in the world then we would, but we can’t. Brands help people pick wine off the shelf.’

“Royal Tokaji has a complex history, but it hasn’t been smooth sailing for the company. ‘We nearly died due to communism,’ Mount adds. ‘There is a paradox and a contrast between history and being quite new.’ Part of this newness is playfulness Mount wants to explore further. At tastings, Royal Tokaji’s Essencia is served on a spoon. The brand has an Oddity wine that Mount says plays on the strangeness and silly, more fun side to wine. ‘Not everyone wants to spend half an hour analysing the wine they want. Some of our wines deserve to be treated with reverence, some less so. France says certain things to people, but Hungary does not.’

“In 2014 Royal Tokaji grew by 35% in terms of sales across the board and had two years of strong growth before that. ‘Business was incredible, the harvest was a disaster,’ Mount says. ‘Just as sales were going up and it was all tremendously positive, the weather let us down.’

“One market Royal Tokaji would like to crack is Germany. ‘It is realistic, I’m also going to have some fun with Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan. There are so many consumers who want to try something new and I don’t want to be static. There are certain wines that we have to make, but the winemakers have the freedom.’ One thing you shouldn’t expect, Mount quips, is red wine.”

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