Category Archives: People

Maurice O’Shea’s remarkable Hunter heritage

11 June 2006People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

A tasting of wonderful Hunter reds last week brought home what an amazing winemaking heritage we have in Australia. It also served as reminder of how terribly slow we’ve been at taking this message to the world.

As we reach the end of a tremendous boom that took our wine exports from a few hundred million dollars to about $2.8 billion in a little over a decade, our winemakers now face the reality that few of the millions of people enjoying Australian wine have any awareness of our wine-growing regions.

Even less known are the intriguing wines made from small plots of very old vines sprinkled throughout our best wine-growing regions.

Some of these date to the mid nineteenth century – the surviving free settlers or, perhaps, refugees if you like — from the great vineyards of Europe that perished in the phylloxera vine louse invasion of the 1870s, 80s and 90s.

These vines and the wines made from them have a fascinating story to tell and will hopefully play an important part in the next phase of marketing Australian wines as we take our individual regions to the world.

Phylloxera-ravaged Europe has few stories to match the 1840s vines shirazes of Langmeil and Turkey Flat in the Barossa; of wines from Tahbilk’s and Best’s 1860s and 1850s vines in Victoria’s Goulburn Valley and Great Western region, respectively; or of McWilliams Hunter Valley 1880s vines Maurice O’Shea Shiraz or Brand’s Coonawarra Stentiford’s Block 1890s vines shiraz.

And these are just examples of wines drawn from individual vineyards. So much of the best material coming from, say, McLaren Vale and the Barossa, and going to high quality blends comes from extremely old vines dating from the nineteenth and earliest twentieth century.

How each of these vineyards survived across a century more has its own story. The common thread, of course, is that the soil and climate proved hospitable. Then come all the variations based on successive owners, economic swings and suitability of the grapes to wine styles.

That so many of the oldest vines are shiraz may owe more to versatility – it makes good fortified wine as well as good table wine – than to the durability of the vine itself.

In the case of McWilliams 1880s Old Hill Vineyard, ownership passed through two generations of the King family before Maurice O’Shea bought the vineyard, at Pokolbin, in 1921. Shortly afterwards O’Shea planted nearby the still-surviving Old Paddock Vineyard.

Who knows what may have become of the vineyards had O’Shea been forced from the land following financial difficulties. Fortunately, the McWilliam family bought an interest – and later full control — of Mount Pleasant and encouraged O’Shea, a brilliant winemaker, to remain for the rest of his working life.

Upon O’Shea death in 1956, his assistant, Brian Walsh assumed control. And Walsh, in turn, passed the mantle to current winemaker, Phil Ryan, in 1978.

Though winemaking practice has changed considerably since O’Shea’s time, Ryan still relies on fruit from those old vineyards – one selected by O’Shea the other planted by him – to make McWilliam’s Mount Pleasant property’s flagship shiraz, named after O’Shea.

It’s a great example of the idiosyncratic regional style – rich and earthy, but refined and soft, with tremendous ageing ability. When we drink these, we savour a little history. And, as the 1957 vintage showed in last week’s tasting, it’s a pleasure we might share with our grandchildren.

McWilliams Mount Pleasant Maurice O’Shea Shiraz 2003 $60
As a taste of history or simply as a Hunter red, O’Shea Shiraz offers fair value at around $60. Sourced principally from McWilliams Old Hill Vineyard (planted 1880s) with a component from the Old Paddock vineyard (planted 1920s), it’s a higher alcohol, oakier red than Maurice O’Shea made from the same vines from the 1920s until 1956. However, with a few caveats about the oak and alcohol, the heart of this wine remains the very concentrated fruit flavours delivered by these old, low-yielding vines. Over time these should assert themselves as the wine reveals its mellow, soft, idiosyncratic Hunter character.

Tim Kirk drives Clonakilla success — how quality, persistence and pressing the flesh built a brand

4 June 2006People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

We could be forgiven for thinking there were no happy stories in the wine industry. The well publicised grape surplus and a Deloitte survey indicating that forty per cent of Australia’s two thousand winemakers operate at a loss tell of the pain out there.

But within our own backyard we have one example of a tightly run small maker thriving in the most competitive wine market ever, rejoicing in a record 2006 harvest and willingly paying grape growers above market price.

Clonakilla’s success carries a message not just for local makers but also for all small makers. And the message is that commercial success comes from making wine that becomes a benchmark of its style.

And that requires vision, commitment, time and patience; continuing (and frank) benchmarking against the rest of the world; attentive, uncompromising viticultural and winemaking practice; a tight business structure; and clever, consistent marketing.

Few businesses could tick all those boxes. But under Tim Kirk, Clonakilla has done so and emerged as Australia’s most talked about shiraz viognier producer – both here and in major export markets — and one of our most respected viognier producers.

While the shiraz viognier blend, especially, has emerged as a regional specialty, Tim’s other wines, too, benefit from what you might call the halo effect – not to forget the same scrupulous attention to detail that produces flawless wines across the board.

And if Clonakilla’s tiny Murrumbateman vineyard limits production of its flagship red, Tim added commercial strength to the business by sourcing shiraz from the nearby Hilltops Region, Young.

And in Clonakilla style, this is another no-compromise wine. Tim pays over the market price for top-notch fruit from which he makes a slightly more robust red than the flagship shiraz viognier, albeit still in the graceful, savoury cool-climate style.

Even at a retail price of $25 to $28 a bottle, production of Clonakilla’s second-tier red has grown from 26 thousand bottles in 2004, to 31 thousand in 2005 to ‘probably 45 thousand bottles’ this year, estimates Tim.

Having worked in retail and media over the last thirty years it has been interesting to see Clonakilla’s emergence, initially under Dr John Kirk and now under Tim.

The wine styles emerged gradually from the early seventies before taking shape – based both on vision and what could be achieved in the district – in the mid nineties.

Even as the wine styles emerged, and particularly when shiraz viognier crystallised as the flagship, the least commented on aspect of the success – and of critical importance – has been Tim’s persistent, relationship-based marketing.

Few winemakers work media and trade relationships as personally, constantly and cleverly as Tim does. A phone call here, a sample there and press releases whenever there’s a little news all add up over the decades – especially when there’s fact and substance – rather than cant – at the heart of the contact.

What Tim has done over time is to create a global network of influential wine people who believe in what he’s doing. And consumers have responded with equal willingness to what is, finally, an exciting wine offering.

This direct access to opinion makers and consumers by the person who grows the grapes and makes the wine is one big advantage that small makers have over larger ones.

Thanks to Tim Kirk, Clonakilla has exploited this advantage to the hilt. Anyone growing shiraz in Canberra should be extremely grateful for the platform he’s built.

Ravensworth Canberra District Shiraz Viognier 2005 $30
Winemaker Bryan Martin works at Clonakilla Wines, Murrumbateman, helping Tim Kirk with the Clonakilla products and making his own wines under the Ravensworth label. Bryan’s first Ravensworth Shiraz Viognier blend improves significantly on the very good straight shirazes of recent years. It’s a seamless, seductive drop squarely in the highly aromatic, savoury, refined style pioneered by Clonakilla and glimpsed in several others from the Murrumbateman and Hall sub regions. Ravensworth is another significant wine for Canberra, cementing shiraz as the district’s great specialty. It’s wine of this calibre that’ll put Canberra on the map. Available from Bryan via ravensworthwines.com.au

Wolf Blass Black Label — rebuilding an icon, part 2

12 March 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

Each of Australia’s icon reds has a unique story – from the clear-sighted vision that sparked Grange’s steady march to international renown; to the brick-by-brick building of elegant classics like Cullens Margaret River Cabernet Merlot; to the bumpy, variable quality route traversed by Wolf Blass Black Label Cabernet Shiraz.

Blass’s flagship arrived with a thump and a bang – and serendipitously it turns out — in the mid seventies. Boldly labelled and boldly priced — at $4.80 it was second only to the $6 a bottle Penfolds Grange Wolf recalls – Black Label became the trophy wine of the punter through the seventies and eighties.

That serendipitous start, Wolf says, began when he won the 1974 Jimmy Watson Trophy. Although the victorious wine became the first Black Label, it had, in fact, been intended for the existing Grey Label red blend.

But with good supplies maturing in barrel, Wolf recalls blending and bottling under both labels. And winning Jimmy Watson Trophies again in the following two years, 1975 and 1976, provided all the inspiration he needed to put both the then unknown trophy and Black Label on the map.

A good part of Blass’s success grew from valuable insights that are as pertinent today as they were thirty years ago: firstly that wine should be delicious and easy to drink upon release; and that because most people don’t know or understand grape varieties all that well, labels ought to provide clues other than wine language – something that drinkers might understand and relate to.

Hence the birth of what Wolf calls ‘sporting colours for a sporting nation’ – the strong colours that you might see on footy teams or racehorses – topped off by Blass’s famous soaring eagle.

Thus the opulent and oaky cabernet sauvignon and shiraz blend that appealed to the Melbourne Wine Show judges, won the palates and comprehension – as Wolf Blass Black Label – of non-wine-buff drinkers.

As we saw in the Melbourne tasting two weeks ago, there was much more than easy drinkability to those early Black Labels. Many of the older vintages — particularly 1975 and 1976 — continue to drink well.

And the style changed with the introduction of heavily toasted oak from 1980 and then suffered, in my view, from the use of poorly seasoned oak that dominated fruit flavours. Nevertheless, the 1981, 1983 and 1987 still drink beautifully and only the 1984 and 1989 would I call disappointing.

If 1990 and 1991 seem a little oaky, they still show the strength of those two outstanding vintages. 1992 is gentle and soft and still going and precedes the dull and disappointing 1993 and 1994 vintages – victims of a bungled bottling and poor cork respectively.

While there’s signs of a bounce back in the1995 vintage, it’s the Black Labels from 1996 on that show increasingly seamlessness, power and taut structure.

Wolf’s original winemaker, John Glaetzer, attributes the arrival of high quality oak to “when the winemakers got money”. And Chris Hatcher, chief winemaker for Foster’s Group, says that after the compromised vintages of the mid nineties, a new commitment was made to putting Black Label amongst Australia’s best reds.

With help from Glaetzer and new Blass maker, Caroline Dunn, the opening of a small-batch fermentation cellar in 2001 and access to the very best fruit, there’s no doubt in my mind that Wolf Blass Black Label – exemplified by the 2002 vintage reviewed last week — is more polished, enjoyable, complex and potentially long lived than ever. It’s been a long journey. The reputation will follow.

Wolf Blass Black Label — rebuilding an icon, part 1

5 March 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

If we are to believe the market, then it’s a big thumbs down to Wolf Blass Black Label red – a wine that bounced onto dinner tables in the mid seventies priced at a modest discount to Penfolds Grange, the most expensive Aussie red of the time.

It was a bold statement by Wolf Blass. Some said it was outrageous. But it worked and through the seventies and eighties Black Label became the wine to be seen drinking. It meant something to have Black Label on your table.

But sometime in the late eighties or nineties, the gloss wore off and the price gap between Grange and Black Label widened – so that Grange now fetches about $400 on release and Black Label around $125.

Since marked prices don’t necessarily reflect what is paid, the real value that drinkers put on elite wines is, perhaps, more accurately gauged by actual prices realised at auction.

By that measure Blass has a long way to go to restore the prestige of its flagship red. As the new release 2002 vintage hits retail shelves, the latest auction prices of earlier vintages — measured against a current replacement cost of $125 – show serious value declines.

The most recent price reported by Langton’s Auctioneers on last year’s 2001 vintage is $84 – a discount of thirty three per cent on the current release. And the picture seems no brighter for the 2000, 1999 or 1998 vintages, registering discounts of fifty-seven, fifty-six and thirty-seven per cent respectively.

Even the inaugural 1973 vintage languishes at $67 a bottle – a little over half the asking price of the current release.

Using the same replacement-value model, Grange fares somewhat better: last year’s 2000 vintage – a tiny release – recently fetched a premium of thirty-seven per cent on the assumed $400 release price. And while the highly regarded 1998 vintage traded at a premium of seventeen per cent, the 1999, 1997, 1996 and 1973 showed discounts of thirty-two, twenty-nine, ten and thirty-seven per cent respectively.

While the general trend suggests that it’s cheaper to buy Grange or Black Label at auction rather than retail, some of the older Granges do trade at stellar prices. For example, 1955, the oldest recorded in Langton’s current price realisations, recently fetched $4613.

There’s no such joy, however, for the Wolf Blass flagship. And that prompts the question as to when and why Black Label fell behind Grange and other top Aussie reds, and what sparked a remarkable quality rebound in the late nineties.

Insights into the origins and style of Black Label came from Wolf Blass himself at a tasting of the 1973 to 2002 vintages in Melbourne last week.

Wolf, a German immigrant, recalls the Australia of the sixties and seventies as a land of ‘hillbillies’ where men drank beer in the garage while women watched black and white television in the house.

Easy to drink, strongly brand wine might be the catalyst to bring them together, Blass believed. Hence, Wolf’s boldly labelled 1966 Yellow Label Rhine Riesling became the first of a phenomenally successful line, and the model for all the colour coded reds and whites that were to follow.

As we’ll see next week Black Label emerged, albeit serendipitously, in Wolf Blass’s quest to make “sexy wines… that make strong women weak and weak men strong”.

Wolf Blass Black Label Shiraz Cabernet Malbec 2002 $125
Black Label’s renaissance seems to have begun in about 1996 and to have gathered pace with the arrival of winemaker Caroline Dunn, the opening of a new small-batch cellar at the Blass winery in 2001, the encouragement of Fosters’ chief winemaker, Chris Hatcher, and the co-operation of John Glaetzer, Wolf’s original winemaker. From the great 2002 vintage, this one has the succulent depth of superior fruit and the tight structure to evolve for many years. Unusually for Black Label it contains more shiraz than cabernet – a vintage aberration, says Hatcher, as subsequent vintage return to cabernet predominance. A stunning wine.

Lovedale Semillon and the emergence of a Hunter specialty

26 February 2006People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

The release this week of the magnificent McWilliams Mount Pleasant Lovedale Semillon 2000, reminds us that greatness is often accompanied by idiosyncrasy.

And in the case of Hunter semillon, idiosyncrasy begins with a paradox. How can a comparatively delicate wine style emerge from such a warm, humid and wet climate? Haven’t we been told for decades that elegant wines come from cool regions?

The answer appears to lie, say McWilliams, in “the humidity, afternoon cloud cover and gentle sea breezes [that] temper the summer and afford excellent ripening conditions”.

Unquestionably, something is up as warm-climate semillon tends to make clumsy wines smelling and tasting of wet hessian.

But the peculiarities of the lower Hunter allow vignerons to harvest semillon at very low sugar ripeness without suffering the green, tart, unripe flavours that generally accompany such early harvesting.

True, very young Hunter semillon has an austere acid edge, but the ‘lemongrass’ and ‘lemon’ fruit flavours underlying the acidity have a sweet, delicious core. While the bone-dry austerity of young semillon may seem at odds with prevailing Aussie wine styles, some makers, like Brokenwood and Margan have succeeded in tempering the austerity without losing the distinctive regional flavours.

Others, like McWilliams Mount Pleasant Elizabeth and Lovedale and Tyrrell Vat 1, persist with the more austere styles that age so beautifully. This style emerged close to its present from in the 1960s.

According to the late Murray Tyrrell, Ray Kidd of Lindemans put modern Hunter semillon firmly on track with the introduction of protective winemaking technology — principally through the use of temperature controlled ferments and inert gas blanketing.

Great and age worthy Hunter semillons preceded Lindeman’s initiatives – the first from the Lovedale, for example, was made in 1950 – but the introduction of protective winemaking enabled the style to flourish.

McWilliams introduced the technology to its Mount Pleasant winery in 1967 and for decades the delicate, lively and long-lived Elizabeth Riesling (as Hunter semillon was often called in those days) became one of Australia’s most popular wines.

Elizabeth’s popularity waned during the eighties and Hunter semillon, despite its extraordinary qualities, appeared to be marginalised: loved only by wine experts, aficionados and part of the Sydney market.

Whether or not there’s widespread commercial hope for the genre, it’s hard to tell. But the core of makers attending the classic style, sourcing small parcels from the Lower Hunter’s great old vineyards, appears to be growing.

And that’s a trend fanned by aficionados and leading wine shows where judges regularly reward the classic long-lived styles.

But is it a style that only the initiated can love? Definitely not. The popularity of Elizabeth in the BC era (before chardonnay) suggests otherwise. And, of course, the sheer glory of drinking a mature Tyrrell’s Vat 1 or Lovedale is the most convincing argument of all.

Given semillon’s waning popularity in the eighties and nineties and the poor returns enjoyed by most makers, we should be thankful that McWilliams persevered with the low-yielding Lovedale vineyard and the stunning wines from it, crafted since 1978 by Phil Ryan.

A wine of Lovedale Semillon’s calibre is rare: it develops slowly in bottle, gradually building richness upon richness as it unfolds over the decades from lean and lemony in youth to honeyed and toasty with age. It sits squarely in the Lower Hunter mould, yet has a unique intensity and power attributable to the drab-looking, sandy site earmarked for semillon by Maurice O’Shea half a century ago.

McWilliams Hunter Valley Mount Pleasant Lovedale Semillon 2000 $45
One year before Max Schubert created Grange Hermitage, Maurice O’Shea made the first semillon from the Lovedale vineyard – a flat, sandy and unprepossessing site, planted in 1946. Known variously, over the years, as Lovedale Riesling, Anne Riesling and, finally, Lovedale Semillon, the wine has become a long-lived benchmark of the unique, idiosyncratic Hunter style. This new release, from the very cool 2000 vintage, seems to be particularly slow maturing. Less than a year ago it showed the grassy, sauvignon-blanc-like character of the cool year. It’s now slipped into a more lemony, taut, typical and glorious Hunter semillon mode with decades of life ahead.

King Valley Australia — Pizzini leads the Italian charge

29 January 2006People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

Grape production figures for Victoria’s King Valley (stretching thirty kilometres northwards up the King River roughly from Milawa at 170 metres above sea level to the Whitlands plateau at 800 metres) reveal the tiny scale of some the most interesting wines in the valley – tiny plots of Italian varieties like sangiovese, nebbiolo and arneis.

In the King Valley, as in virtually every region in Australia, some, or all of, shiraz, cabernet, merlot, pinot noir, chardonnay, riesling, sauvignon blanc and semillon contribute the majority of output.

But because everyone, everywhere grows these varieties, we might be excused for not hanging a King Valley sign on any one of them – as we do, say, for Hunter semillon, Clare riesling or Coonawarra cabernet sauvignon.

No, the King Valley’s specialty, to date, lies in Italian red and white varieties even though these make up only a small portion of its annual fifteen thousand tonne grape crush.

Although Brown Bros pioneered some Italian styles in its ‘kindergarten’ winery — designed for small, experimental wine batches — Mornington based Gary Crittenden took Italian diversity and quality to another level before local Italian-descended small growers made the transition from grape-growing to winemaking.

During a downturn when Brown Bros reduced its grape intake, cousins Fred and Arnie Pizzini and another grower, Guy Darling, established King Valley Wines at Whitfield. Fred says they built the winery because, “We all wanted a winery, but thought, why build three? We didn’t want our grapes going to distant places. And we wanted to maintain the premium image of wines, mostly whites at the time, coming out of the area”.

Today, KWV is a major contract winemaking centre for the district and includes its local shareholders — Pizzini Wines (Fred Pizzini), Chrismont Wines (Arnie Pizzini) and Darling Estate Wines (Guy Darling) – as customers.

During a half day visit to the King Valley last week, Fred Pizzini said that when his father, Roberto, arrived from Italy in 1956 the area grew mainly tobacco and hops.

In 1976, Roberto and Fred planted riesling – for Brown Bros — on the river flat beside the family tobacco crop. Over time, tobacco disappeared as the vines spread along the river and westwards up the gentle slopes of the valley.

The first Italian varieties arrived in the 1980s and today the red sangiovese and nebbiolo occupy plum spots on the estate near the white arneis and verduzzo and all those other more familiar varieties.

As well, the Pizzini’s grow the white pinot grigio and red brachetto. While these are of French origin, the northern Italians have long made a steely, dry version of what the French call pinot gris. And the obscure brachetto is cultivated more in Italy than in France. Fred says he’ll be producing a Piedmontese style, low-alcohol, sparkling brachetto from the first commercial crop this year.

Even with familiar grape varieties, it takes decades for vines and winemaking skills to mature in any new region. In the King Valley, Fred Pizzini has been steadily developing the distinctive range reviewed in Top Drops.

While each of the wines is a work in progress, there’s a delicious consistency to the arneis, verduzzo, sangiovese and sangiovese rosato — despite continuing fine-tuning in the vineyard and winery.

Nebbiolo, the noble variety of Piedmont’s Barolo, has proven more problematic in Australia, perhaps, than any of the other Italian varieties. The Pizzini’s, however, have begun to hit the mark, although the very best vintages have yet to be released.

Pizzini King Valley Arneis 2005 $20, Verduzzo 2005 $18
The 2005s, due for release in February, taste even better than the lovely 2004s. Arneis, a Piedmontese variety, can be neutral but this one’s full of character with nashi-pear-like flavour and the extraordinarily zesty, pleasantly tart bite to make a mouth-watering aperitif or refreshing, all-purpose summer food wine. Verduzzo, originally from north-eastern Italy, delivers voluptuous, apricot-like aromas and flavours and rich, silky-textured palate – partly derived from the variety and partly from fermentation and maturation of a very small component of the blend in oak barrels. The 2004 displayed more oak influence but this lighter touch works better, in my view.

Pizzini King Valley Sangiovese 2004 $24, Sangiovese Rosetta $14.50
The full-bore, red sangiovese is bright and clean and kicks off with the variety’s delicious ‘bitter black cherry’ flavour. However, a wave of savoury, fine tannins soon ripples across the palate, drying out the finish and giving the grip necessary to accompany food. This is heaps better than most of the basic Chianti’s kicking around bottle shops – although you might find it interesting to serve it alongside a decent Chianti Classico to compare the style difference. The rosé is a fresh, light, crisp and dry style, still offering some cherry-like varietal flavour – a wine to chill and quaff any time. Cellar door phone 03 5729 8030.

Pizzini King Valley Nebbiolo 2000 $45
Nebbiolo, the noble red grape of Piedmont’s Barolo region, all too often disappoints, even on its native soil. But the great examples deliver incomparable perfume and an elegance, combined with power, that belies the often light colour. In the Pizzini vineyard, wallabies love the vine shoots, often decimating a crop that’s hard to set and ripen even under ideal conditions and, even then, difficult to turn into great wine. This 2000 has the variety’s lighter colour but captures some of the aromatic magic, savoury flavours and elegant, very firm structure. I was completely happy drinking it until Fred showed me the Reserve 2003 due for release in a few years at $80 to $100.

How the Casella family built the Yellowtail brand

22 January 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

An air picture of Casella’s Yellowtail winemaking facilities shows rows of stainless steel tanks, each holding 1.14 million litres of wine! And there’ll soon be 68 of them.

Gigantic as they seem, they’ll hold less than half of the 200million litres of wine stored at this site – home to a brand launched in the USA in 2001.

Just five years later, it’s the number one imported wine in the world’s biggest wine market; the number one Australian wine in that market; and the fastest growing imported wine in US history – with annual sales projected by the owners at 8.5 million cases in the US this year and over 10 million globally.

To feed that demand, the winery will this year process 142 thousand tonnes of grapes (about 10.7 million dozen bottles) and supplement production by purchasing bulk wine.

Who is it? No, not any of the big four: Foster’s, Hardy’s, Orlando-Wyndham or McGuigan-Simeon — but Casella Wines of Griffith, owner of the extraordinary Yellowtail brand.

Yellowtail came from nowhere, overtook everyone and continues to dazzle the wine world as it achieves greater volume in five years than Jacob’s Creek, Australia’s other huge global wine brand, did in thirty.

Managing Director, John Casella, says, “I would’ve been happy with a fifteen thousand tonne winery and 100 thousand case brand”. But he and the family fulfilled the unanticipated and explosive American demand, maintained family control and leveraged the American success to launch Yellowtail domestically and in other export markets.

Casella is unrecognisable from the business founded by John’s parents, Philippo and Maria, in the 1960s. More remarkably, it’s unrecognisable from the business that exported its first wines to the USA, under the Carramar Estate label, in 1998.

Says John, “we crushed 200 tonnes in 1993 and 20,000 tonnes in 2001”.

By 2001, John perceived more scope for growth in exports than in the crowded domestic market. As part of a planned export push, in 2000 he purchased the Yellowtail brand name and distinctive packaging from Adelaide designer, Barbara Harkness.

However, with the Yellowtail due for launch in the US in June, 2001 and the first year’s sales projected at 50 thousand cases, Casella sold much of the 2001 production into the bulk market.

Just thirteen months later US exports passed the one million case mark. But there couldn’t have been a better time to misjudge sales! Rosemount’s exit from the Australian bulk wine market after its takeover by Southcorp, meant easy availability and low prices for bulk wine.

John attributes that early US success partly to the low Aussie dollar at the time but principally to the appealing nature of the wine and an outstanding partnership with long established US distributor, W.J. Deutsch & Sons.

Such conspicuous success in the US drove interest in other markets. Yellowtail is now growing in the UK, number one Aussie import in the large Canadian and emerging Japanese markets respectively, and achieved sales of 130 thousand cases in the year following its domestic release in 2003 – with compound growth since of 30-40 per cent.

Continued extension of the Yellowtail range (there’s a new riesling and other varieties in the pipeline) and the successful launch (250 thousand cases) of the Yellowtail Reserve range in the US ($US11 a bottle versus $US 6 for the standard wines) suggest further growth for this family business.

Although a weak dollar combined with low bulk-wine and grape prices helped in establishing Yellowtail, John Casella believes that the brand’s future remains bright. It continued to grow as the Aussie dollar appreciated. And with growing numbers of long-term grape contracts, John says the brand is not reliant on the unsustainable prices of recent years.

King Valley overview

15 January 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

Victoria’s King Valley stretches northwards from the sub-Alpine country around Whitlands, at a chilly 800 metres above sea level, gradually descending and comparatively narrow, before fanning out over the hot Oxley plains around Milawa at around 170 metres.

Growing conditions vary greatly in this thirty kilometre long valley. Varying altitudes, rainfall, latitudes, soils and aspects produce a correspondingly wide spectrum of grape and wine flavours.

The mean January temperature at Milawa in the north is 22 degrees Celsius; in the south at Whitlands it’s just 19 degrees. Grapes ripen in early March at Milawa but not until late April at Whitlands.

In short the area produces everything from thumping big, alcoholic fortifieds and reds, to delicate sparkling and white wines.

While the Valley’s winemaking began in the late nineteenth century, most activity remained at the warmer northern end around Milawa until the 1970s.

Milawa owes its prominence on the winemaking map to Brown Bros whose presence, from 1889, sustained the industry in the region and, ultimately, sparked the southward vineyard expansions into the higher, cooler southern end of the valley.

The spread south and upward towards Whitfield, Myrrhee, Whitlands and Cheshunt was driven by growing demand for high-quality table wines. Brown Bros led the way, developing its own high altitude Whitlands vineyard and encouraging local landowners to diversify into grapes.

The first independents — Guy Darling and John Leviny — established vines between Moyhu and Whitfield in the higher, cooler northern sector in 1970. Both sold grapes to Brown Brothers. Indeed, older readers may recall Guy Darling’s Whitfield vineyard name – Koombahla — appearing on Brown Bros labels in the late seventies and eighties, before Darling established his own brand.

During the eighties and nineties, other landowners, including several Italian descended tobacco growers, commenced growing grapes, originally to sell to Brown Brothers or other winemakers.

However, during the recession of the early nineties Brown Brothers reduced its grape intake. This shock, Arnie Pizzini once told me, was the catalyst that forced himself and other growers to adopt a broader, more independent approach to marketing their product.

During the late nineties, driven partly by the export boom, the numbers of independent growers increased, as did the number converting all or part of their production into branded product.

The late nineties, too, saw the arrival of the large independent makers De Bortoli and Miranda, both Griffith based and both Italian descended.

By this time the Valley had acquired a distinctively Italian flavour as the Corsini, Pizzini, Cavedon, Dal Zotto and other families planted indigenous Italian varietals, including sangiovese, arneis, barbera, marzemino, prosecco, barbera, nebbiolo, dolcetto, primitivo (aka, in California and Australia, zinfandel) and verduzzo.

These joined the usual mix of French and German varieties plus a sprinkling from Spain (tempranillo and verdejo), Russia (saperavi) and France’s little known petit manseng and increasingly popular pinot gris.

This diversity of landscapes, climates, grape varieties, growers and makers means that the King Valley gives wine drinkers an exceptional range of taste sensations – subtly different in the case of the mainstream varieties like chardonnay and shiraz but totally removed from our usual fare when we encounter sangiovese, nebbiolo, barbera, verduzzo and the like.

In this instance the principal driver of difference was the Italian connection – the sons and daughters of post-war immigrants. I’ll report back on what this Italian influence offers after a visit to the Valley in a few weeks.

Farmer finds independent retail niche

27 November 2005People, WineChris Shanahan

David Farmer — former Canberra wine merchant, in town last week to launch his new Barossa-based business, Glug — believes traditional liquor retailing has gone forever to Coles and Woolworths.
Even after the current margin-sapping wine glut clears, consolidation among producers and retailers virtually ensures a changing landscape.

For independent retailers that means finding a niche that doesn’t go head to head with the superior buying and selling power of the supermarket chains.

And for small winemakers it means finding outlets to complement cellar door sales. For no retailer, no matter how large (or small), can represent the thousands of labels now available from Australia’s 2000 wineries.

What we’re sure to see in the future, then, is not just bricks and mortar independents, but continuing growth in internet-based wine clubs, wine retailers and internet-based cellar-door extensions.

Farmer’s new creation takes into account thirty years’ retailing experience– from 1975 to 1994 as Farmer Bros, with stores plus mail order; from 1994 to 1996 with Cellarmaster Wines, Australia’s largest wine direct marketer; from 1996 to 2003 in partnership with Theo Karedis of Sydney based Theo’s Liquor Markets; and from 2003 to 2005 as marketing consultant to Coles Myer after its purchase of Theo’s.

What those years taught David is that even the keenest wine drinkers and collectors buy mainly in the $6 to $15 a bottle price range. They might enjoy the odd $50 or $100 bottle, but that’s not the daily tipple.
And especially through exposure to wine clubs he saw that the closer to the source the better you’ll buy.

Cellarmaster had demonstrated during the grape gluts of the eighties how profitable it was to buy direct from growers, make wine and put their own label on it. Who needed a middleman?

But Farmer had also enjoyed the pleasures of what he calls ‘the country wines’ of France – simple, tasty and generally inexpensive wines distinctive of a particular grape variety and region.

Transplant that notion to Australia and you have regional varietals – like Barossa shiraz, Clare riesling or Coonawarra cabernet.

With some of this in mind, Farmer established Glug close to the source – in an office within the Veritas Winery on the western edge of Tanunda in the Barossa Valley.

With a vigneron’s licence and the comparatively low overheads of a virtual shop, glug.com.au now offers the first of its own regional wines as well as selections from outstanding small makers – many of whom also make wine for the glug label.

Farmer says each wine will be made and sold to the slogan “from this vineyard, grown by this farmer and made by this winemaker in this winery”.

The close relationship with key growers (including former treasurer John Dawkins) — and winemakers of the calibre of Rolf Binder, Christa Binder-Deans, Trevor Drayton, Kym Teusner, Steve Hoff, Colin Forbes, Robin Day and Wayne Dutschke – means not only increased exposure for these makers, but what looks like being a flow of modestly priced regional specialties for consumers.

While David Farmer – aided by brother Richard – believes that glug occupies a special niche and will appeal to many drinkers, he also believes that success of the concept will take many years.

Looked at in the context of the battle of the retail giants, it strikes me as a highly original approach to wine selling with strong consumer appeal. And it’s unlikely to register at all on the competitor radar screens at Coles and Woolies.

Penflds RWT 1998 — is this the perfect Barossa Shiraz?

20 November 2005People, WineChris Shanahan

Australia’s great wine icon, Penfolds Grange, is in no danger of demise. But in my view it does have a quality challenger – albeit in a different style – from within its own cellar.

The challenger goes under the name RWT, originally a prosaic acronym for ‘red wine trial’ – a mid nineties project led by John Duval, Penfolds Chief Winemaker at the time.

With increasing volumes of high-quality shiraz available, Duval sought to make a 100 per cent Barossa red expressing the sweet perfume and voluptuous, juicy, soft richness of the variety, complemented by subtle French oak.

What he envisaged – and made – was the antithesis of the opaque coloured, brooding, slow-evolving power of Grange.

The first RWT – from the generally lacklustre 1997 vintage – made a big impression with its wonderful fragrance and supple, fruity palate. There never had been another Penfolds red like this. In fact, it’s hard to recall any Barossa shiraz of this calibre.

In retrospect we might conclude that Duval — like his mentor and creator of Grange, Max Schubert – successfully transformed a vision into an enduring and distinctive wine style.

Of course, reputations can’t be based on one vintage. But RWT comes from what was an already impeccable pedigree: the unique shiraz from the western and north western fringe of the Barossa Valley – a resource integral to the success of Penfolds reds and highly valued by Schubert and by his successors, Don Ditter, John Duval and now Peter Gago.

Subsequent vintages confirmed the power of Duval’s vision even if the market – expressed through auction prices – lags the opinion of experts.

Several recent encounters with RWT prompted these observations. At dinner before the Barossa Wine Show with fellow judges Huon Hooke and Lester Jesberg, we struggled to name even one truly great Barossa shiraz – until Jesberg suggested RWT 1998.

Ah, yes, we all agreed. That was magnificent. Days later, by fate, the as yet unreleased RWT Shiraz 2004 — with that same heady fragrance and lush, silkiness – romped home as top red of the show.

At a judges’ dinner during the show, a line up of red trophy winners from the 2002 show – including RWT 1998 – highlighted the sheer perfection of this wine. Huon commented that each of the reds could have been better in some way – less alcohol, less oak, less tannin – but not RWT. “There’s not a thing you’d want to change in it”, he said. And he was correct.

The same might be said of the 2004 that topped the show this year and of the current release 2002.

With a retail price of between $120 and $140 a bottle, nobody’s going to call Penfolds RWT cheap. But for a wine of this calibre I’d regard it as undervalued when compared with the other great wines of the world.

This, I believe, makes RWT good value for the collector wanting to get in early and build a sequence of what could be seen a few decades from now as one of the very finest Australian reds.

And if you’ve that in mind, do look at current auction prices. Recent sales — varying between $72 for the 1997 and $94 for the 2002 — represent a significant discount on retail price.

Unlike Grange, RWT doesn’t need 15 plus years in the cellar. It seduces from the day its released but has the depth to age well for a decade or two.