Exclusive: Israeli supermarket chain in negotiations to buy Binyamina Winery
Posted on August 27, 2008
Binyamina Winery is for sale! The Israeli discount supermarket chain Chetzi Chinam is currently in negotiations to buy Israel’s fifth largest winery, Binyamina, according to the Israeli Hebrew press. This site is the first place to report this story in ENGLISH.
According to the Israeli financial newspaper, Globes, the negotiation between the heads of Hetzi Hinam to acquire Binyanima Winery for about 42 million shekels (about $11.8 million) include not only the winery but also the brand and property in central Binyamina (which is about 28 dunams or 6.9 acres). According to the article, in 2007, the winery had sales of about 45 million shekels and makes up about eight percent of the Israeli wine market.
Binyamina was purchased in the 1990s by Avi Lerner and Danny Dimbot, Israeli expats who have made a successful career in Hollywood. According to Israel’s biggest paper, Yediot Aharanot, as their Hollywood career has bloomed, they are spending less and less time in Israel.
About twenty-two percent of Binyamina’s revenues are based on the export market - the Jewish kosher market in the United States and France and also the general market in England, Denmark, and South-East Asia.
Hetzi Hinam is the third largest chain in Israel, according to Globes. As Israeli wine has significantly increased in quality, Binyamina has had a hard time keeping up. Several of the talkbacks in the Globes article have been extremely critical of Binyamina’s wine, and hoping that a potential sale will allow Binyamina to catch up with the rest of the Israeli wine world, although they have been doing a very good job with their Yogev series. Only a handful of wines from the winery received a score of 90 or above in Daniel Rogov’s 2008 Guide to Israeli Wines.
Other Israeli wineries owned by large conglomerates include Barkan Winery, owned by Tempo, Israel’s biggest brewery (owners of Maccabee and Goldstar, brewer for many local bottlings of other beers and agents for Pepsi Cola in Israel). Tabor Winery was purchased a while back by the owner of the local Coca Cola bottler. There was some immediate fear that this would have harmed Tabor and kept them from pursuing quality, but that fear was proven unfounded as Tabor has constantly improved in quality.
» Filed Under Israeli wine industry Tags: Tags:Binyamina, Chetzi Chinam, winery sale
Comments
Leave a Reply
