Georges Duboeuf, one of the great wine merchants of the 20th Century, has died at the age of 86.
He was best known for turning the release of a little-known French product – a red wine called Beaujolais Nouveau – into a global phenomenon.
By the 1980s, Mr Duboeuf’s enthusiastic promotion of the wine had led to its annual release date being known across the world as Beaujolais Nouveau Day.
It also earned him the nickname “the Pope of Beaujolais”.
Mr Duboeuf died of a stroke over the weekend at his home in the eastern village of Romanèche-Thorins.
