From a field of 155 of New Zealand’s top Pinot Noirs, Villa Maria’s Reserve Marlborough Pinot Noir 2013 has been awarded the Platinum Medal (Trophy) for best New Zealand Pinot Noir over £15 at the prestigious Decanter World Wine Awards. Held annually in London, the Decanter World Wine Awards is widely recognised as the world’s largest wine competition and this year’s competition had 16,000 entries.
WE know Australians make better wine than the Kiwis but there could be something our New Zealand counterparts are doing better. Instead of implementing a wine equalisation tax (WET), which means wine is taxed at 29 per cent of its wholesale value, in New Zealand alcohol is taxed on its volume. This means New Zealand is protecting its high-end industry by making cheap Australian wine more expensive comparatively to New Zealand’s high-end wine.
Hunter Valley winemaker Jorg Gartelmann is concerned about the future of his business following changes to the wine equalisation tax from 2019. Wine equalisation tax is currently set at 29 per cent, and is calculated on the wholesale price of wine. For retail sales, the wholesale price is deemed to be half of the retail price. For example if a winemaker sells a bottles of wine at a cellar door for $40, they would have to pay 29 per cent tax on $20, which equals $5.80.
Madden Morris has the world at his feet and a weight on his shoulders. Newly graduated with a winemaking degree, and back in his home district of Rutherglen in Northern Victoria, the 21-year-old is the sixth generation of his family to carry on the family tradition of winemaking. Winemaking is a highly competitive career choice, but Mr Morris feels no pressure from anyone else’s expectations — he has heard the talk all his life.
Impressing guests with great wine at a dinner party isn’t always easy. It’s even harder if you’re young and only just starting to take fermented grapes seriously. Thankfully, help is at hand. Tech entrepreneurs around the world are creating apps and websites to help young people educate themselves on wine, while hopefully turning a profit for their company at the same time.
IT’S been a good week for Australian wine. On Monday, Seppelt winery announced it would keep its historic Great Western cellar door. This comes after Seppelt’s owner, wine giant Treasury Wine Estates, announced in October last year it would close the Seppelt winery and sell vineyards in Great Western and the Yarra Valley to save itself some cash on an underproductive facility.
Fusion drinks are set to soar as wine brands increasingly tap into their growing appeal amongst millennials, and start to target older consumers. Last week, three UK suppliers’ unveiled new wine-based low-alcohol fruit drinks at the London Wine Fair, noting huge potential in the fledgling category.
Dan Dunn has found a way of one-upping your wildest dreams. While many of us squares only daydream about ditching work to take a carefree road trip across America, Dunn did just that in the name of alcohol. The guy has even written a 350-page book on the whole experience. American Wino: A Tale of Reds, Whites, and One Man’s Blues is that glorious book. Of course, it isn’t too surprising.
Delegat Group, the winemaker that retails under brands including Oyster Bay, says it has completed the 2016 harvest, with yields in New Zealand up 33 percent on a difficult 2015. The total harvest was 35,837 tonnes, with New Zealand making up 33,236 tonnes of the total. The group also owns vineyards in the Barossa Valley in South Australia, which yielded 2,601 tonnes, up 56% on a year ago.
Weinlese, vendange, szuret, and there are other examples in many other languages to say the same thing … “vintage”. In a small town called Blenheim, in the South Island of New Zealand within the Marlborough wine growing region, thousands of people from all over the world come together for one thing: the systematic killing and fermentation of vitis vinifera (wine grapes).