Griffith-based Casella family – makers of Yellow Tail, the biggest selling wine brand in the USA – plans to enter the Australian beer market.
They’ve built the brewery and employed former South African Breweries’ master brewer, Andy Mitchell, and Anthony Clem, veteran of South Australian Breweries, Castlemaine Perkins and Knappstein Enterprise Brewery.
Yellow Tail’s Gillian Martin says Mitchell and Clem are using consumer feedback to decide what the beer will taste like. They are gathering information through a free iPhone app (search ‘the perfect lager project’ in the app store).
Martin says around 2,000 people have already downloaded the app and provided information about what they like in beer.
The new brew, to be launched in June, will be a lager, distributed Australia-wide by a dedicated, recently recruited sales force. I’ll review the beer here as soon as it’s available.
Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2012
First published 23 May 2012 in The Canberra Times