The Incredible Story of The Grand Dame of Champagne: The Widow Clicquot

It is there for weddings and graduations, anniversaries and new jobs, shimmering and effervescent in glasses raised in the air. Champagne is the magical liquid by which we mark life’s victories and milestones. Synonymous with celebration and luxury, it is harder to find a more highly regarded drink, or one with as storied a history.

‍

Early Life

Born in Reims, France in the heart of Champagne country in 1777, Barbe-Nicole was the eldest daughter of the affluent textile merchant Nicolas Ponsardin. Nicolas had significant social ambitions and sent his daughter to be educated at a prestigious convent along with the children of royalty. However, in July 1789 the French Revolution came to Reims and the daughters of the wealthy and royal were at risk of violence. The Ponsardins were desperate to get their daughter back, but to collect her in a carriage would be to make her an even more obvious target. According to family legend, the Ponsardin’s dressmaker snuck Barbe-Nicole out of the convent dressed in rags and took her through the riot-filled streets to be returned to her parents. Perhaps because of this incident, Nicolas changed his tune and, despite being a lifelong royalist, allied himself with the radical Jacobin party that called for an abolition of the monarchy. 

Nicolas was incredibly pragmatic and after the revolution, continued to quietly grow the family’s wealth and connections while proclaiming to be a man of the people. One such connection was with the neighboring Clicquot family. Like Nicolas, Philippe Clicquot was a local textile merchant and savvy entrepreneur, with a small side business distributing locally grown wines. Nicolas had a daughter, and Philippe had a son. Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin and François Clicquot were married in 1798. Due to the Jacobins’ ban on religious practice, the families held a secret Catholic ceremony in the wine cellars beneath their homes. 

A Marriage of Flavors

Despite having an arranged marriage, François and Barbe-Nicole shared a great love and admiration for one another.

François was the dreamy idealist to Barbe-Nicole’s logical pragmatist, and in those early days of marriage, they shared their hopes and aspirations for the family business. At the time, the Clicquot family wine business was quite minor. They purchased wines from local vintners and distributed them, but did not make their own, and the vast majority of their income came from textiles. François and Barbe-Nicole wanted to change that, both through beginning to make their own wines, and by selling larger quantities internationally. François would never get to see this dream come to fruition. In 1805, facing a string of business failures, he grew bleak and despondent. François had always been prone to bursts of mania and excitement followed by black depressions, yet this was different. After weeks of sickness, he died. The family said it was due to Typhoid, yet among the workers and wine-makers were rumors that he had committed suicide. Barbe-Nicole was left widowed at only 27.

Barbe-Nicole entered her business at an inopportune time, as Widow Clicquot author Tilar J. Mazzeo writes: “A century before, it was not impossible for middle-class women to participate in running the family enterprise. Most businesses then were still family affairs, run by an extended network of close relations. No longer. In nineteenth-century Europe, the combined forces of a postrevolutionary commodity culture, the rise of international manufacturing, and a new system of modern laws–the Napoleonic Code–meant a far narrower world for women.” 

She also convinced her father-in-law Philippe to let her retain control of the business. In a tremendous show of trust, he also became her first investor. 

Wine was a surprisingly perilous industry. With the limited technology of the time, any extreme weather, from sweltering heat to severe cold, could irreparably damage the wines. This was particularly true for champagne, vintners could, and did, lose up to 90% of their stock when the pressurized contents of sparkling wine exploded. These risks were only aggravated by the significant distances wine had to travel by ship in order to reach buyers, especially for those like Barbe-Nicole who were looking to distribute internationally.

War of Wines

Added to the mix was a fraught geopolitical climate of war and revolution. In 1805 Napoleon crowned himself emperor of France and began to amass troops for an invasion of England. In retaliation, Russia, Austria, and Sweden formed the Third Coalition and joined Great Britain in declaring war on France. In 1806 Napoleon established trade restrictions designed to inflict an economic stranglehold on his enemies. Suddenly, all the countries in which the Clicquots had hoped to sell wines had become the enemy and Barbe-Nicole had to navigate a complex network of blockades in order to sell internationally. Luckily, François had left her with a gift by the name of Louis Bohne. Louis was a brilliant salesman and devoted employee. Under Barbe-Nicole’s leadership, he also became her close friend, confidante, and even rumored lover. 

Faced with nearly insurmountable challenges, Barbe-Nicole developed an incredibly risky plan that defied Napoleon’s trade restrictions. She sent 50,000 bottles from France to Amsterdam with Louis, who would bring them on to Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia. The wines arrived safely in Amsterdam, but tragedy struck in a matter of hours. The city was blockaded and the ports were closed. Nearly $3 million worth of Clicquot wine was forced to sit and wait in a humid Amsterdam basement while the bottles were slowly ruined. A Letter to Barbe-Nicole from employee Charles Hartmann upon returning to Amsterdam captures what a terrible loss this was: “I prayed to the Good Lord to let me find our wines in such a way that I could send you good news, but my prayers were not at all answered. I opened the first case with trembling hands…I took out a bottle, trembling I removed the straw and tissue paper, but rather than a clear and brilliant wine that I hoped for, I saw nothing but a deposit like a finger that I could not detach without shaking the bottle for a full minute.”

Worse news followed. Louis had set off to gather sales in Germany and Prussia only to find the entire market on the verge of collapse. He changed course to Russia but had to leave in 1807 after the Russians accused him of being a French spy. International tensions were high and by 1809 Europe would be on the brink of financial collapse. The select few who could afford to drink champagne would have been loath to consume anything French, seeing as Napoleon was largely responsible for the dire economic situation. Barbe-Nicole’s first attempt at running the business was an abject failure. She laid off every salesman save for Louis and was forced to sell her jewelry to pay the growers and field workers.

To get back at Napoleon for invading Russia the Czar instituted a ban on the importation of French wines transported in bottles. As Mazzeo writes, “Everyone knew that the target was champagne. It alone could not be transported in barrels; if it was, all the fizz would disappear. Napoleon had championed the champagne industry. Russia would destroy it.” As the war progressed, Russian troops moved into the French countryside and Barbe-Nicole had her sellers sealed up for fear of looting. Finally, in 1814, Napoleon abdicated the throne and went into exile, peace between France and Europe, and an opportunity for Barbe-Nicole to finally sell her wines, was nearly here.

‍

The Great Wine Race

 With this opportunity, however, came a new set of challenges. As soon as the trade restrictions were dropped, Europe, and Russia in particular, would be clamoring for champagne to toast the end of the war. Barbe-Nicole understood that whoever got to Russia first would be the one to corner the market, so she chose to run the blockade one last time before international trade was even restored. Working in complete secrecy, with only Louis as her conspirator, Barbe-Nicole sent thousands of bottles of the incredible vintage from the year of the comet by ship to Russia. Louis set off with the wines, and Barbe-Nicole took an even greater risk by sending a second shipment of wines before knowing if the first would arrive safely. As Mazzeo writes, “The risk of making plans to send the second shipment blind had meant that should Louis fail, her financial ruin would be compounded terribly–perhaps hopelessly. She would have to make a bargain with a sea captain before she knew exactly how she would pay his bills.”

Thankfully, Louis did not fail. He and the 1811 vintage arrived safely in Russia where they were besieged at the ports by people begging to buy Widow Clicquot wines at exorbitant prices Barbe-Nicole could only have dreamed of. Overnight, Widow Clicquot wines became a phenomenon, not only in Russia but across Europe. Her wines were used to toast the king of Prussia’s birthday, and Czar Alexander declared he would drink nothing else. 

Louis wrote home that the success was due to: “Your judicious manner of operating, your excellent wine, and that marvelous similarity of our ideas, which produced the most splendid unity and action and execution–we did it well, and I give a million thanks to the bounty of the divine Providence who saw fit to make me one of his instruments in your future well-being–and no trials in the world will stop me from doing it again, to justify the unlimited confidence you have placed in me, which has produced such happy results. Certainly, you merit all the glory possible after all your misfortunes, your perseverance, and your obvious talents.”

Barbe-Nicole would run Widow Clicquot with a steady and stalwart hand until her death in 1866 at the age of 88. Under her leadership, her wines became an unparalleled symbol of luxury and elegance. When clientele of the elite clubs and salons across Europe asked simply for “a glass of the widow” there was no question of what they wanted, everyone knew.

If all that were not enough, she became an expert blender, merging flavor profiles seamlessly and elegantly to create a champagne uniquely her own. Thanks to her foresight, business acumen, and tremendous bravery, Barbe-Nicole became the richest woman in France, and Widow Clicquot became a global phenomenon, still a staple of luxury champagne today. Next time you raise a glass of bubbly, you know the woman you have to thank. 

To learn more about Barbe-Nicole and her incredible story, see Widow Clicquot starring Haley Bennett, in theatres beginning July 19.