Suspicions that the 2008 Mouton-Rothschild label would be designed by a Chinese artist were confirmed last week.
Prices have been creeping up in the past 12 months amid the speculation. Since Xu Lei was announced as the artist, prices went up 20% overnight. According to Fine & Rare Wine’s market data tool (frw.co.uk), a year ago, you could pick up the 96 Parker point wine for £2800; now you’re looking in the region of £8750. A 211% rise in value.
The Mouton move followed Chateau Lafite’s announcement that the 2008 vintage would feature the Chinese number eight symbol on the bottle. The wine’s value has since surged. In the past twelve months, the price has increased from £4857 to £15,303– a rise of 215%.
Which brings me to ask the question – why aren’t other producers doing the same thing? A New World producer with some traction in Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai would be pretty smart to follow the likes of Mouton and Lafite. If a Kiwi winery – say Craggy Range, Te Mata or Villa Maria employed the services of a Chinese artist or designer for their top Bordeaux blend (Sophia, Coleraine and Twyford Single Vineyard respectively) it woud be incredible PR - increasing awareness, sales and possibly prices. Surely, it couldn’t be that difficult and a cost benefit analysis would no doubt conclude benefit benefit benefit.
Ben Glover, winemaker at Wither Hills, has his turn on Unfiltered - on a very windy day. If he wasn’t making wine he’d be milking a cow and would go gay for Hugh Jackman….nice choice.
Entries for the Air New Zealand Awards were down from 1665 in 2009 to 1586 this year. Why the fall in entries? Is it the economy? Or is it the new sustainability rule that came into force this year?
One disgruntled producer complained it was not able to enter its new release 2010 wines along with a number of other wineries as the organisers had introduced a stipulation that all 2010 wines must be ‘sustainable’.
“Post harvest they decided you had to sustainable if we wanted to enter our 2010 wines. So there’s a number of wineries that could not enter even if the vineyard was certified sustainable,” the producer said.
So, I gave Chris Yorke, global marketing manager at generic body New Zealand Winegrowers a call and asked him what had happened. “We set out the policy that we wanted to be sustainable by 2012 back in 2007. What is happening is that we are being quite strict - I think 93% of vineyards and 85% of production are already sustainable,” he said
“It’s a very ambitious goal and it’s amazing how the industry has responded. Some may not have made it this year,” he added.
Consumer research
While I’d got Yorke on the phone, it was a chance to ask him if sustainability is as fluffy as it sounds. Funny I should mention it, New Zealand Winegrowers has just commissioned research to find out what people think sustainability is in its main markets – Australia, the US and the UK.
Yorke said: “We want to understand how they rate what we are doing in terms of sustainability. It’s quite a complex thing and it’s difficult to communicate it and in different countries sustainability means different things.” The research won’t be ready until the next Exporters Forum – which is July 2011 – so I guess we’ll have to wait to find out if the consumer thinks it’s all fur coat no knickers.
Amid tales of falling profitability, receiverships and deep discounting, it’s interesting to see a winery expanding with the aim of increasing its production by 150%. Wither Hills in Marlborough currently has the capacity to process 6000 tonnes of grapes, which is fairly significant, but building work has already started on increasing that volume to 15,000 tonnes in the coming years. The local council is expected to give resource consent to Wither Hills to do this in the next few days.
The banks are not lending money at the moment and most companies simply don’t have the money to be able to expand on small scale let alone 150% but that’s where being part of a multinational corporation, Lion Nathan (owned by Japanese brewer Kirin), helps.
The expansion will rejig the company’s varietal mix. Ben Glover, winemaker at Wither Hills since 1998, says: ‘We think we are at risk if we are selling 80% Sauvignon Blanc. We need the facilities to drive Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.’
But Pinot Noir often lacks something in Marlborough – often it’s juicy, sweet and not particularly structured. Glover claims: ‘It’s quite difficult here because we have got people making lolly red wine to pigeon pair it with Sauvignon Blanc.’
‘I think Marlborough should have more kudos. We are a big region and I think Pinot gets missed but there are six or seven producers who make great Pinot Noir.’
With more vine age, and experimentation with stems in the ferment, the structure is starting to come but there are still plenty of ‘Wimbledon wines’, as Glover calls them - that’s strawberries and cream.
Twitter has been a-flitter with the Air New Zealand Awards today. It’s been all go following the media release announcing there was a record 107 gold medals awarded this year.
The press got a glimpse of the new winners today at a gold medal tasting. There were plenty of worthy winners and some wines that were questionable but overall it was quite pleasant to go to a tasting where the wheat has been sorted from the chaff.
The worst part of the tasting was not the wine but one mature male journalist revealing his recent intimate operations to the New Zealand Winegrower staff. I almost choked on my Riesling.
Anyway, back to the wines. Why so many Pinot gold medal winners? Well, there were plenty of entries, which helped. However senior judge and winemaker at Coopers Creek, says, ‘It’s a product of two really good vintages in 2008 and 2009.’
One nice surprise was the Villa Maria Single Vineyard Keltern Chardonnay 2007 (NZ$36.99). It’s easy to become snobby about a successful, large company but they do do some things very well. It is elegant and tight on the finish, had a lovely creamy leesy texture, nutty notes and a fresh finish.
My standout wine of the day, despite talk of the gentleman’s operation mid slurp was the 2009 Greystone Riesling from Waipara. It’s a spatlese style with green apple, citrus and violet aromas. Fresh, mouthwatering and delicious. For those of you going to the Air NZ Awards (not I), get your penguin suit on and seek this gem out.
