Viticulture and VinPro

Viticultura, a diverse viticulture consultancy and contractor in Central Otago, is looking to diversify sales of local Pinot Noir into high quality low alcohol wine for an increasingly health-conscious market, and into Buyer Own Brand wines for non-wine companies wanting their own label. Their vineyard operations rely heavily on Pacific Island workers with whom they have developed valuable and mutually beneficial long-term relationships.

The Central Otago region has a reputation for producing excellent Pinot noir wines, in part because of its soils and climate. Its typically warm days and cool nights tend to slow the increase in grape sugar content, allowing the development of characteristic flavours.

Since the early 2000s business partners Jason Thomson and Timbo Deaker have established “Viticultura” as a consultancy based around vineyard management, viticultural machinery contracting, brokering fruit from local vineyards for supply to wine producers elsewhere in NZ, and arranging the seasonal labour supply for vineyards.

Nearly 80% of the region’s production is Pinot noir, and Viticultura has several initiatives to diversify export opportunities for local producers.  In his travels to the USA Jason Thomson has noticed the increasing popularity of NZ’s low alcohol sauvignon blanc wines – consumers are becoming more health conscious and want to reduce calorie intake while still being able to enjoy high quality wines.  Viticultura is now working on the production of low alcohol, high flavour Pinot noir. 

However, high quality low alcohol reds are hard to produce because keeping the grape sugar content (and therefore the wine alcohol content) low usually means harvesting early before the desired red flavours have had time to develop, says Jason. “In this region we have the advantage of cool nights, which means sugar production is slower than other regions, but this is not enough. We are looking at reducing the leaf area of vines after the fruit is set or spraying the canopy with oil. These actions slow sugar production and allow greater development of the desired aromatics, tannins and colour compounds in the mature fruit,” he says.

“The key to this market is creating a full-bodied red wine that is less than 100 calories per 150ml glass, which will appeal particularly to the baby boomers and others who are substantial wine consumers and have become more health conscious. We call it ‘low alcohol’ but in fact it’s attraction is also ‘low calorie’.”

The company has three trial areas in different locations in Central Otago to see if there are local differences in the grape qualities they are looking for, and is working with VinPro, a local wine maker, to produce the wine.

Austin Black, senior wine maker for VinPro, says that by using a yeast that produces less alcohol from the grape sugar, along with fermenting techniques that evaporate off some of the alcohol, they hope to end up with a wine with the right flavour profile and an alcohol content of 9% or less.

A second initiative is the development of markets for “Buyer Own Brand” wines.  This is where established non-wine businesses want their own branded wines that they can give to clients as gifts or promotions.  It would also be ideal for restaurant chains and others in the alcohol business to have their own label red wine with an authentic story behind it.

Jason says that Central Otago wines have a very good reputation, and Viticultura is currently negotiating with a large Asian company. VinPro is also involved in this venture. Jason sees both low alcohol Pinot and Buyer Own Brand initiatives being highly successful locally because of the high tourist activity in the region and strong interest in the region’s wines.

Growing and harvesting grapes is labour intensive, and having sufficient labour at the right time is critical to the success of NZ vineyards. Central Otago is no exception, but there are few locals available for such work.

For several decades Viticultura has employed men, mainly from Vanuatu, typically around 60 in summer and 40 after harvest, and around 100 during harvest.  Jason says that over the years they have established very good relationships with these men and put a lot of effort into keeping them happy, healthy, comfortable and entertained.

“It’s a real pleasure to have them. They are reliable and become very experienced, some have been coming here for a decade or more and have earned money to put into schools or to establish their own businesses back home. We are now seeing their sons arrive to work here,” he says. “It’s very much a win-win arrangement.”