WITH wine prices rising and incomes falling, a New Forest business is launching a make-it-yourself kit aimed at helping you enjoy a good bottle for £1.80.

Grapes 2 Wine, founded by New Forest residents Mike Hobby and Doug Mahy, says the kit will allow consumers to enjoy a fine tipple without paying the heavy tax and supermarket mark-ups on each bottle.

While some may say wine kits are nothing new, Mike says his product is filling a gap in the market for producing fine wines, equivalent to good £6 bottles of Merlot, Pinot Grigio and Shiraz, for a fraction of the price.

He said: “The British public have become a lot more discerning when it comes to wine since the days of the awful 1980s home-brew kits. They are a lot more au fait with what they like and don’t like and now it’s all about quality wine.

“They want their Cabernet Sauvignons and Merlots. Now they can make those themselves at home for £1.80 a bottle and they know what went into it.”

In January this year the average off-trade price of a 75cl bottle of wine rose from £4.74 to £5.03 according to Nielsen.

And there’s more bad news for wine buffs, with a report by WineNation 2012 predicting the figure will rise to £5.10 by the end of the year.

With prices rising and tax now accounting for 60 per cent of a £5 bottle of wine in the UK, Grapes 2 Wine believes UK consumers will turn to wine kits to enjoy the same quality, if not better, for less. Mike said: “The economic crisis saw an increase in people making all manner of products at home, with manufacturers seeing increases in sales of everything from bread makers to chocolate making kits. We could very well see this with wine as even the most discerning of wine-lovers abandon the supermarket and opt for the satisfaction of lovingly crafting their own brands.”

The wine kits, which cost £19.95 for a starter kit and £54.95 for the juice kits, yield 30 bottles each time. They were launched at the Glee 2013 exhibition in Birmingham on Sunday and will then go on sale via garden centres in the first instance. They have already been shortlisted for the exhibition’s new product awards in the innovation category.