Perennial wine winner Villa Maria again demonstrated its dominance by taking out the top prizes at the first of the 2016 awards. A Villa Maria Chardonnay and a Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot were the champion white and red at the Romeo Bragato Wine Awards. The Villa Maria Single Vineyard Ihumatao Chardonnay 2014 won the overall trophy as well as its category and the white wine section.
In Max Allen’s latest wine column for The Australian, he reported on a recent tasting from the winemakers of Victoria’s Macedon Ranges. It was a good opportunity to catch up with the goings-on in this high, sprawling region north of Melbourne, to see what’s working well in its vineyards, planted variously on the slopes of old volcanoes, in forest-fringed gullies and on boulder-strewn granite plateaus.
CHAMPAGNE connoisseur Peta Baverstock is pitting her knowledge against some of the nation’s best as a finalist in the Vin de Champagne Awards in Sydney, reports The Advertiser.
The Robe winemaker and cellar door manager was the only South Australian named among the top six professionals in the country to face the judging panel and undergo a blind tasting at the prestigious award event next month.
A lawyer specialising in the wine industry says family-run vineyards need to have clear succession plans in place, in order for the industry to remain strong into the future. Wine lawyer Will Taylor said as vignerons aged, businesses needed to prepare for generational change in the industry.
He said there were conflict-avoiding and business-development reasons for having a proper succession plan in place.
“I see the disasters in my job when people don’t plan for succession,” he said.
Accolade Wine’s chief executive Paul Schaafsma is set to bow out according to The Australian Financial Review. Schaafsma was appointed chief executive of Accolade in October, 2015 and is pulling the pin prior to the business listing in early 2017. Accolade’s 80 per cent owner CHAMP Private Equity has anointed Michael East, a 30-year wine industry veteran who is currently the general manager of Accolade’s operations in Australia and Asia as the successor.
The CEO of Australian Vintage Limited, Neil McGuigan, has called on the Government to continue its reforms to the Wine Equalisation Tax (WET) Rebate and remove it from bulk wine immediately.
As part of his Budget in May, Treasurer Scott Morrison announced some changes to the WET Rebate, including a tightening of the eligibility criteria and a stepped reduction in the rebate cap.
However McGuigan has told The Shout, that while he supports the rebate for boutique producers it should be taken away from bulk wine straight away.
What does terroir mean in an age of big data and social media, a world awash in information yet still unable to agree on the distinguishing role of place in winemaking? When scientists from a variety of disciplines gathered in Oregon last month for the XI International Terroir Congress, the question was a hot topic. Between dozens of papers that reported results from projects around the globe that seek a better understanding of the conditions under which grapes grow and wines are made, several papers dug into the thorny issue of what we talk about when we talk about terroir.
Making wine may be one of the most romantic and evocative of all professions, but the reality is that it’s brutally difficult to earn a reliable living, and often subject to the whims of forces beyond anyone’s control. Even producers that have been crafting excellent wine for several generations aren’t immune: One or two bad harvests in a row, an ill-timed hail storm, an earthquake that topples stocks of barrels filled with aging wine—all of these can wreak havoc on even the most economically fastidious wine producer.
One of New Zealand’s largest wine companies is selling its Hawke’s Bay winery and vineyards and moving production to Marlborough. Yealands Estate Wines has put the Crossroads operations on the market, including three vineyards, the winery and the cellar door. However, the Crossroads brand, business and existing stock in bottles, barrels, and tanks, are not part of the sale. This decision comes just one year after Peter Yealands sold the majority of his company to Marlborough Lines.
The New Zealand wine industry must be ready to take full advantage of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union, says a visiting wine trader from the UK. UK Wine and Spirits Trade Association chief executive Miles Beale has been in this country for the wine industry’s annual conference which was held in Blenheim. Mr Beale said the United Kingdom’s planned exit from the EU will open up opportunities for New Zealand as the UK starts doing its own trade deals. He suggests exporters move early and start discussions with the UK.