Brand manager for Moët Hennessy, Romain Brunot, has been jailed and fined for stealing £75,000 of Champagne and spirits. Over a four year period he appropriated 400 bottles of Krug and 400 bottles of Belvedere vodka that had been left over from events, including those held at the Dorchester Hotel and Heston Blumenthal’s restaurants. Brunot then transferred the bottles to a cellar in the east end of London and then to a storage unit registered in a friend’s name, reports The Drinks Business.

It is a later start to the grapes harvest in Gisborne but birds are attacking the grapes earlier and in increasing numbers, reports The Gisborne Herald. The grape season is running about seven to 10 days later than normal due to a typical cloudy and wet La Nina season with less sunshine hours and heat, says GroCo general manager and viticulturist Warwick Bruce. The perennial problem of birds has seen vineyards transformed into a sea of netting as growers do their best to protect their grape crops.

Victorian irrigators are banking on at least two more years of full water allocations. The rapidly filling Murray-Darling storages have coincided with optimistic forecasts for many horticulture prices which have growers talking positively with financiers for the first time in years. Irrigator leaders said confidence had returned to many industries after the sodden end to the drought, reports Weekly Times Now. “The storages are pretty close to chock-a-block, there is a light at the end of the tunnel for a lot of people,” Murray Valley Winegrowers chairman Dennis Mills said.

Derwent Valley grape-harvesting began yesterday with growers relieved to have avoided smoke taint from weekend bushfires. Derwent Valley Wines vineyard manager Andrew Hanigan said picking Pinot Noir and Chardonnay grapes for sparkling wines at their 10 hectare vineyard had begun, reports The Mercury.

Nufarm chief Doug Rathbone is offloading his family wine business which includes some of Australia’s most notable names such as Yering Station and Mount Langi Ghiran. Mr Rathbone’s personal finances have been under pressure for some time due to the falling value of his stake in the insecticide company and private investments in property and wine. The Rathbone family is examining its entire commercial asset base for potential sale options, reports The Australian Financial Review.

Over the past 150 years, the Tyrrell family have been winemakers, property owners and community members of the Hunter Valley wine region. Over the decades we have seen off a number of threats to our industry. Today we are faced with a new one: coal seam gas. Like most of the Hunter Valley vignerons, I am not anti-mining but, above all, I believe firmly in the need for food and water security, writes Hunter Valley winemaker Bruce Tyrrell in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Winemakers in Margaret River say a hotter than average summer has provided near perfect growing conditions for winegrapes this year. Vintage for white grapes in the region is expected to wrap up this week, about a fortnight earlier than usual. The Wine Industry Association’s Aymee Mastaglia says the higher temperatures have not only prevented disease, but also improved fruit quality, reports ABC News.

Grape pickers have been getting up before dawn at Coolangatta Estate this week to ensure the Shoalhaven Coast wine region’s most famous wine is not affected by heavy rain. Some NSW vineyards have lost more than 90 per cent of their crop this season so everyone was smiling with relief when the white wine harvest was completed at Shoalhaven Heads on Monday and the first of the reds were picked yesterday, reports the Illawarra Mercury.

Campo Viejo has dropped the crianza cue and opted for varietal labelling in an attempt to attract more consumers. The well-known brand from Rioja has replaced its crianza with Campo Viejo Tempranillo 2010 following research which shows that almost 70% of wine drinkers consider the grape as the most important factor when deciding what to buy. Pernod Ricard, owners of the brand, also believe Tempranillo could be a flagship for Spain, comparing its potential to New Zealand’s success with Sauvignon Blanc, reports The Drinks Business.

Appellations can force wine producers to pay membership fees, a French court has ruled. In an important test case that will have an impact across France, the Constitutional Council in Paris has ruled that it is legal for syndicates, or growers’ organisations, to make membership payments mandatory. The decision has a direct impact on the case brought against the Bordeaux Wine Bureau (CIVB) in December 2010 by a group of winemakers who were withholding their contributions, citing mismanagement and lack of transparency, reports Decanter.