Reims Management School has one very public claim to fame. Based in the heart of France’s champagne region, and with the only chaired professor of champagne in the world, it has a special reputation as the place to study the champagne industry.

But as its director, François Bonvalet, points out, this is just one of the school’s strengths. The wonderfully named “champagne chair” is one of four sponsored professorships at the school – the others are bank assurance, retailing management and social business and non-profit organisations. In 2009, Mr Bonvalet expects to announce a fifth chair in biotechnology and the industrial side of agriculture.