Krug Champagne

Krug Grande Cuvee champagne is the premier champagne within the LVMH wine division, along with Moet et Chandon's Cuvee brand named Dom Perignon as well as Veuve Clicquot's La Grande Dame. As a champagne, Krug is easily recognized by taste and distinctive in flavor, this is because of the house's policy of complete barrel fermentation process and very extended quality aging. For its smell, Krug has an aged nutty influence and somewhat autolytic notes as the aroma that present an oakiness. To the taste, Krug hasa raciness which is the direct result of the suppression of the malolactic fermentation process as well as a richness both from barrel and lees fermentation. It is an oaky champagne and is nearly always dry (less than 10g/l RS).

History of the house

Krug was first established in the year of 1843 by Johann-Joseph Krug. Krug was a German immigrant from the Rhine or Mainz. This therefore is a younger house when it is compared to the older houses in Champagne. Some of the older houses have been running for more than ten generations. Johann was taught his trade at Champagne Jacquesson. Johann spent nine years honing his skills prior to establishing Krug at Reims. Paul Krug, his son succeeded Johann, and his son Joseph Krug II succeeded Paul. In 1924, Jean Seydoux, Joseph's nephew took control of the company. Jean and Paul are credited with creating the Krug style of champagne using the now defunct Private Cuvee. Henri Krug assumed control of the house in 1962 and still is the primary owner of the house along with Eric Lebel. Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy (LVMH) owns the majority oshare of the house, however similar to most companies in the conglomerate, Krug has distinct autonomy.

Vineyards

20 hectares of vines are owned by the house in Ay, Le Mesnil, and Trepail. The company acquires the remainder of their grapes from long term grape growers by contract. Different than other Negociants, the growers that Krug uses see themselves as part of a long standing and very prestigious group that all openly state that Krug is where their grapes are being shipped to.

Ay provides the Pinot Noir type grapes which goes into the non vintage Rose, and Le Mesnil provides the Chardonnay type grapes which compose the Clos du Mesnil Blanc de Blancs vintage.

Oenology

All the wines at Krug undergo primary fermentation in small 205 litre oak barrels from the Forest of Argonne and Central France. The barrels are all well-seasoned and organoleptically inert. Each cru is vinified separately, with no malolactic fermentation, and the two rackings are done by gravity. Reserve wines are transferred to stainless-steel tanks.

The house's standard release, the Grande Cuvée NV is blended from anywhere between 20 and 30 crus across Champagne, with almost all being rated 100%, or Grand Cru. The reserve wines hail from 6 to 10 vintages, and not necessarily the most recent vintages, and usually including a fair proportion of declarable vintages which the company insists explains the high quality of their wine. Krug disgorges its wines no earlier than six years on lees, with the Collection series being held on lees for as long as 15 to 20 years.

Krug utilises all three Champagne varieties in their wines, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier. However, Chardonnay is the mainstay of the Grande Cuvee and their flagship single vineyard vintage, the Clos du Mesnil is a Blanc de Blancs, a wine style which is made completely from Chardonnay.

Marketing

The company produces roughly 500,000 bottles a year of mainly Grande Cuvée, supplemented by a non-vintage rosé, a vintage blanc, and a vintage blanc de blancs from the Clos du Mesnil in the Cotes de Blancs and older vintages released as Krug Collection series. The house uses as its competitive edge the fact that it does not make a non-vintage, rather a multi-vintage. Although technically meaning the same thing, Krug's non-vintage, the Grande Cuvée, is a blend of only good, or declarable vintages. The house also emphasises the fact that primary fermentation occurs completely in small oak barrels; a practice not commonplace anymore in Champagne.

Krug is sometimes considered a producer of only prestige cuvees, which is one of the tenets of the company's marketing strategy. They justify this by pointing out the large number of high-rated crus and the choices of vintages, as well as the extended lees ageing regime of their standard wine, the Grande Cuvee as being similar, if not more than most other house's Prestige Cuvees. Certainly the price of Krug wines is much higher than other Champagne, with even the Grande Cuvee being as priced as high as other very prestigious and highly regarded Prestige Cuvees such as Taittinger's Comtes de Champagne, Moet's Dom Perignon, Veuve's La Grande Dame, Bollinger's RD etc.

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