Drinks International’s Patrick Schmitt and Lucy Brittner broke the news today that VinExpo’s “Rendez-vous” has been “postponed”  per the news release and “cancelled” per the DI story headline.  It’s especially notable given the recent success of VineExpo  Asia Pacific recently in Hong Kong, and the participation of Marvin Shanken as shareholder, according to the DI story.

Here’s how the event was billed, per their website:

Vinexpo has been helping the wine and spirits industry to develop its markets since 1981. Vinexpo nurtures direct contacts with the trade, enabling it to monitor players’ changing needs and to develop new tools for them. Having achieved global leadership with its Vinexpo exhibition in Bordeaux, France and the Vinexpo Asia-Pacific event designed for Asian markets, Vinexpo now proudly presents an innovative concept to establish direct contact with consumers, entitled Rendez-Vous by Vinexpo.

It will be interesting to see what the after-buzz is with more detail on the decision to “postpone”.    The reason cited in the DI story quoting a release from the company was:

“After a lot of effort and taking everything carefully into consideration, the decision has been taken to postpone the event. At this time, 52 tasting areas out of the 150 scheduled have been reserved by Vinexpo customers, often together with their American importers. Even if the range represented features a diversified set of top quality, international products, it still remains a long way off the minimum number of exhibits that was originally decided.”

Robert Beynat, chief executive of Vinexpo felt the limited offering would fail to attract the visitors they wanted.

He said: “We don’t want our exhibitors, who invest in this new project to risk having mixed success.

“However the unparalleled quality of the master classes based on world class wines that have been proposed and the immediate enthusiasm shown by some exhibitors convince us that this event is well positioned. This decision to postpone is responsible with regard to our customers and our partners.”