Recently one of Bordeaux's more colourful wine producers lifted the lid on how a bottle of wine bought for £1 from a cooperative producer ends up costing £14 or £15 in a UK restaurant.
In a bid to highlight the detrimental impact a recent duty rise is having on the wine trade, Gavin Quinney, the owner of Château Bauduc, set out exactly who gets what out of the £14 you pay for a bottle of house wine.
The figures will certainly surprise many regular restaurant goers, or home wine buyers. After storage and distribution costs are deducted, the restaurant and wine merchant have added their mark-up - and more importantly the government has taken its duty and VAT - only £1 is left to pay the producer who worked all year to make and bottle the wine.
Quinney claims the increase in duty on wine - now makes the UK easiley the most expensive place in Europe to buy wine. "The pound has slumped against the euro while the cost of wine at source, the glass to make the bottles and fuel prices have all shot up - and the government added further duty when prices were already under [this] huge pressure."
It is widely expected that the chancellor will put at least 10p on a bottle of wine in the forthcoming budget.
"Duty on a bottle of wine is now £1.61, with VAT on the duty as well as the wine. There is no duty at all in Italy, Spain and Germany, while France fleeces its "citoyens" for all of 2p a bottle. If you think that at least £2 of each bottle of wine being sold in the UK is now tax, this leaves very little margin for the maker."
He suggests that if there were no UK duty, and if the wine merchant and the restaurant were to make the same percentage margin, the price of the wine - either at retail price or in the restaurant - would be halved.
"That's why wine served in Europe, at this level, is often a fraction of the UK price. The UK has long had a vibrant wine sector which is going to be under threat unless Darling rethinks this crazy taxation policy," he warns.
Another man who has noticed the impact recent price increases have had on the wine trade is Richard Siddle. The editor of Harpers, the trade magazine for wine retailers, says the industry was working on tiny margins and now it's suffering even more.
"The slide of the pound against the euro and the duty increases have been the final nail in the coffin. If you go down the aisles in the supermarkets you will think the 14p duty increase has been largely lost in the system. However, supermarkets still see cheap alcohol as a way of bringing customers through the doors, as long as the government lets them get away with it," he says.
"They are very clever at giving the impression prices haven't risen but, away from the brand names that continue to be discounted, prices are on the up."
The Guardian's wine critic, Victoria Moore, says the duty rise and pound shift has left bargain hunters looking at an ever-decreasing stock to pick from.
"Finding good wines under £5 is beginning to get harder. Competition, shoppers' reluctance to spend much, and supermarket tactics in persuading producers to accept smaller and smaller margins have until recently kept prices right down, even as duty rose," she says.
"In the past, supermarkets tended to absorb duty hikes (or at least force the poor wine producers to do so, thus safeguarding their own profits) but this year 14p a bottle has often proved tricky to magic away.
"I've seen some £5 wines go up to £6 as retailers, forced at last to lift prices, sighed with relief and took the decision to claw back some of the money they were losing thanks to the strength of the euro and inflation."
She maintains the best overall value is to be had when spending between £6 and £9. "This is the point at which an appreciable slice of your money goes into the actual wine," she says.
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