Festivities celebrating the seventh annual International Sauvignon Blanc Day will kick off on Friday May 6 in New Zealand, home to some of the world’s most coveted Sauvignon Blanc wines, before continuing around the globe, following the sun. Wine brands, restaurants, bars, retailers and Sauvignon Blanc fanatics are encouraged to post video clips, photographs and messages on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram showing their passion for New Zealand’s most popular drop by using the “hashtags”: #SauvBlanc and #nzwine.

Family owned wine company Brown Brothers today announced it has entered an agreement to purchase the Innocent Bystander brand from Giant Steps. Based in Victoria’s Yarra Valley, Innocent Bystander has grown in popularity since its inception in 2004. Suzanne Tyzack, Giant Steps general manager, said the time was right to pass on the baton to a company who could maximise Innocent Bystander’s potential.

Deputy Prime Minister Bill English visited Babich Wines in Henderson recently to find out what it takes to keep a family owned New Zealand wine brand going successfully for 100 years. Together with Alfred Ngaro, National Party List MP for Te Atatu, English met with David Babich (General Manager), Joe Babich (Managing Director), and Peter Babich (Chairman) who took him on a tour of the winery, vineyard and bottling line.

Australian and New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc producers have until tomorrow to register their interest in a trans-Tasman tasting of the varietal being held shortly by the Wine & Viticulture Journal. Open to wines made on both sides of The Ditch with recommended retail prices of A$20 plus, the tasting has been inspired by the inaugural May 1986 issue of the Journal which featured a special report on Sauvignon Blanc.

Even the most determined shopper, with grocery list in hand, will occasionally spot something interesting on a shelf and make an impulse purchase. Few would argue that the placement of retail items in stores is not important. Which is why some eyebrows have been raised at a recent proposal by Kroger Co., the nation’s largest grocer and the dominant chain in the Roanoke and New River valleys, for a private distributor called Southern Wine & Spirits to oversee how much shelf space alcohol brands get in the aisles of its stores.

A powercut at a Blenheim industrial estate has caused disruptions to Marlborough wine companies busy with harvest. The power outage at the Riverlands Industrial Estate on Monday morning happened around 9.45am and stopped bottling at contract bottlers WineWorks. Giesen Wines was one of several wine companies based at the estate.

Once considered the scourge of the wine industry, is the lowly screw cap about to change the way we enjoy our favourite drop? Brothers Joshua and Simon Schmidt have invented a new generation screw cap that, with the push of a button, introduces flavours or gets rid of preservatives in wine. They are convinced the idea could become the next industry standard, giving consumers the ability to change their wine to suit personal tastes or match a specific dish.

Not a drop of rain fell on Hunter Valley vineyards for most of the summer and the grapes so overdosed on sun winemaker Rodney Kempe is convinced this will be one of the better harvest in his 16 years at Pokolbin’s Lake’s Vineyard. “Textbook stuff,” Kempe says. “Not a cloud, very dry, nice and warm. It’s been ideal.” The 2016 harvest has just been picked and the Hunter had its best Easter ever, with tourists flooding in, but across the world the wine industry is undergoing massive upheaval.

One of the country’s biggest privately owned winemakers De Bortoli has bought the Lusatia Park vineyard at Woori Yallock in the Yarra Valley from wine industry veteran Stephen Shelmerdine. The 18-hectare premium mature vineyard will be handed over to De Bortoli after the 2016 harvest. The De Bortoli family declined to reveal the price they paid. Lusatia Park was acquired by the Shelmerdine family for $300,000 in 1989.

South Australian winemakers the Shaw family have tipped their Ballast Stone Estate Wines onto the market after failing to find an equity partner. The vertically integrated wine business with 430 hectares of vineyards is in Currency Creek in the Fleurieu region, about 80 kilometres south of Adelaide. With vineyard values understood to be about $25,000 a hectare in Currency Creek, the vineyards alone could be worth more than $10 million.