Some Eponymous Wines from Champagne

No other wine region in the world has had eponymous wine names for as long as the wines from Champagne.

You are undoubtedly familiar with some of the names; Veuve Clicquot, Moët & Chandon, Dom Pérignon, or even Krug and Louis Roederer. But it less likely that you know their stories. Who were the people behind the famous names?

The most commonly known of these champagnes are Veuve Clicquot and Moet & Chandon. In many circles, Moët’s flagship wine, Dom Pérignon, is hyper familiar, but with its current Ontario price tag of $350, it is certainly not as ubiquitous as either Veuve Cliquot or Moët & Chandon in the LCBO.

Moët & Chandon at $80 and Veuve Cliquot at $86 are far more accessible Champagnes and have deeper market penetration than other brands such as Taitinger or Laurent Perrier have in others major markets like London or New York.

Moët & Chandon initially began as Moët & CO in 1743 after the wine merchant, Claude Moët started shipping wines from Champagne to Paris. In 1832 his grandson, Jean-Rémy Moët’s son Victor, took over the business, at which time he was joined by his brother-in-law Pierre Gabriel Chandon de Briailles, and the brand became Moët & Chandon, as it has been known ever since.

Any brief overview of Champagne would not be complete without the mention of Napoleon Bonaparte. Napoleon had met Jean-Rémy Moët at school and Napoleon’s love of bubbles before every major battle helped solidify its reputation as a wine that “in victory one deserves it, in defeat one needs it.” A quote attributed to Napoleon. Tune in to a later column for more on Napoleon and his “contribution” to the world of wine.

Prior to the French Revolution in 1772, Philippe Clicqout, a textile merchant by trade, decided to start a wine trading business. In 1778, he and Nicolas Ponsardin, another successful textile businessman, chose to consolidate their textile businesses and arranged a marriage between their two children, François Clicquot and Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin to solidify their succession planning.

François took his father’s wine business seriously and expanded its reach within Europe. But in 1805, at the age of 30, he died leaving his wife Barbe-Nicole wondering what to do with the success of her husband’s business. Her father-in-law Philippe was going to liquidate the wine company but Barbe-Nicole was not having it.

At that time women were forbidden to work or vote and were barred from entering schools or universities without the consent of their husbands or fathers. However, widows were the only women in French society freely allowed to run their deceased husband’s business.

So at the young age of 27, Barbe-Nicole Clicquot started the Veuve Clicquot-Ponsardin company. Veuve is French for widow.

Today both the Veuve Clicquot and Moët & Chandon brands are folded into the global luxury company Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy, or LVMH, and the wines can be found in bars and stores around the world.