The maker of Australia’s number one selling bottled red wine, McGuigan Wines, has reached number four global wine brand by volume in the United Kingdom. Figures released last month by Nielsen demonstrate a +22% YTD volume growth for McGuigan in the UK (week ending 28 March 2015), making it one of the fastest growing brands in the past twelve months and the second most popular Australian brand in the UK. McGuigan Wines’ strong performance comes on the back of an improved half year profit of AUD$4.4million for parent company Australian Vintage Limited (AVL).

Smaller harvest in the Southern hemisphere are set to boost demand for bulk wine, the latest report from Ciatti has said. Volume estimates for the harvest across the Southern hemisphere are expected to be down on last year, the update said, with Argentine and New Zealand set to see the biggest declines. The Australian harvest is broadly in line with last year, but the average price for bulk wine has decreased however, down 4.7 per cent, largely on the back of increased demand at the lower level.

Researchers from the Australian Wine Research Institute are warning grape growers they must adapt to warmer and drier conditions leading to earlier harvests. The institute reported wine grape harvests had on average become eight days earlier every decade since the 1980s due to warmer weather. Dr Paul Petrie, viticulture scientist, said there were things growers could do now to delay harvest and make sure grapes were not being picked in hot weather.

One of wine’s chief attractions is its astonishing diversity. The drink may come in only two colours (well, three if you count pink), but beneath that there are hundreds – nay, thousands – of subsets and possibilities that imbue the act of opening a bottle of wine with a sense of adventure. Different vintages, different countries, different vineyards, different winemakers… all play a role in giving a wine its own personality. And then there’s grape variety. Here we find a breadth of vocabulary few other plant species can match. There are more than 10,000 known varieties of Vitis Vinifera in the world. Of these, around 800 are made into wine.

If you’re looking for a new favourite wine, you needn’t look any further than your local supermarket.
For the second year in a row, Marks and Spencer have topped the medal chart at the International Wine Challenge. The retailer received 169 accolades in total, including 12 gold, 52 silver, and 102 bronze medals. The IWC said the retailer “continued to prove it is at the top its game when it comes to selecting exceptional wines for consumers”, adding that their Mount Bluff NV Sparkling Chardonnay is “expected to be a particular favourite with customers.”

Aucklanders will soon no longer be able to buy their bottle of wine or box of beer from their local supermarket before 9am or after 9pm following the Provisional Auckland Council Local Alcohol Policy being passed at the Regional Strategy and Policy Committee today by 14 votes to one. “Going back to the old days when wine sections were roped off is definitely a ‘back to the future’ step. I don’t believe penalising early morning mum or dad grocery shoppers or the likes of shift workers in the evening will make any difference whatsoever.”

Great Southern wines have experienced record growth in export sales in the past 12 months with export wine volumes growing by 90 per cent and export wine values up 95 per cent, bringing in about $2.2 million to the local industry. Peter Bailey, Australian Grape and Wine Authority analyst, said this was great news for Great Southern wine. “The other point is that it’s coming at a relatively high average value of $8.42 per litre which reflects Great Southern’s premium offering,” Bailey said.

Since establishment of the business in 1979 boutique Australian producer Maxwell Wines has been building a following in Australia and around the world. The brand has seen steady growth in all markets since its launch except for the United Kingdom. Maxwell Wines saw firsthand the catastrophic decline of Aussie wine in the UK as their distributor went out of business in 2005 leaving the brand without representation at a time when Aussie wine was on the nose.

The NSW small business commissioner says she is appalled by the way some wineries are treating grape growers in south-west New South Wales. This week Robyn Hobbs joined state and federal business agencies in Griffith, including the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the Australian Taxation Office and Rural Financial Counselling Service. They met with grape growers and small businesses in response to concerns from the Riverina Winegrapes Marketing Board.

DEALS have now been completed with Australia’s “big three markets” after years of negotiations, says Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) assistant secretary of the free trade agreement (FTA) division, Michael Growder. “The basic point is; tariffs are going and they’re going in a big way,” he said. “The countries themselves are the economic powerhouses of Asia growing five per cent per year, dozens of times the size of the Australian economy – 14pc of our investment is from these three countries, but it’s growing really quickly.”