Saved by a local. One of Clare's oldest and biggest wineries has a new owner.
Feb 02 2011
It was all smiles and champers in Clare last weekend. The region's biggest and one of its oldest wineries now had a new owner prepared to buy local grapes, make and market wine and reopen the cellar door.
Leasingham's previous owner, Constellation Wines Australia, a subsidiary of Constellation Brands USA, closed the winery in August 2009, sold three of its key vineyards, then in 2010 offered its winemaking equipment and winery cellar door facility for sale.
Constellation retained the Leasingham brand. But its decision to abandon the winery deeply depressed the mood of the region. Leasingham had been the largest winery in the region since the 1890's. Its operations affected hundreds of families across the Clare Valley, especially independent grape growers. At the time of Constellation's decision, with winemaking assets already flooding the market and seemingly few buyers, locals feared the site on the edge of Clare township might be bulldozed for housing.
Constellation quickly found buyers for the Rogers, Dunns and Schoebers vineyards. Then in December last year, it offered the winemaking equipment, winery and cellar door building for sale separately.
Luckily for Clare and its grape growers, local winemaker Tim Adams and wife, Pam Goldsack, reached an agreement with Constellation to buy the winery, provided most of the winemaking equipment remained in place. Constellation agreed, and in December Adams announced details of the sale.
Adams confirmed that the price was "much less than replacement cost".
On Friday at noon, Adams settled on the deal, becoming Leasingham's first private owners since H.J.Heinz, of the United States bought it from the Knappstein family in 1971.
Adams aims to make it a "community winery" as it was during his apprenticeship to Mick Knappstein from 1975. He says "I was Mick's last apprentice - the last apprentice of the last private owner. He was a generous, community-minded man. He loved making wine for all sorts of people to enjoy. He cared for 130-odd growers, and hated it when Heinz cut back on buying. His wife Gela is over the moon about our news."
Adams says the winery contains some of the best, most efficient winemaking equipment on the planet - enough to process up to 5000 tonnes of grapes a year - equivalent to about 350,000 dozen bottles. The winery has storage capacity of about 4.5 million litres.
Adams says he'll focus mainly on Mr Mick, a new brand honouring his late mentor. But he'll also offer a badly needed regional contract winemaking facility.
The local growers have been having a tough time, he says. But he expects Mr Mick, pitched at $12-$15 a bottle, with broad appeal across the retail and restaurant markets, to bring them back into the market. "These will be wines with a real story to them." he says. He anticipates strong support from Coles and Woolworths, albeit with occasional discounts to $9.99 a bottle.
Eighteen months before buying the Leasingham winery, Adams bought its 80ha Rogers vineyard. Planted to shiraz, riesling, cabernet sauvignon, semillon, chardonnay and malbec, it was the source of Leasingham's once-legendary Bin 50 cabernet malbec.
He's been using these grapes in his own brand (made at the 1500-tonne capacity Tim Adams winery). In future, the vineyard will also supply the Mr Mick brand.
In fact, we can enjoy the first Mr Mick wines later this year - a 2010 riesling from the Rogers vineyard, and three wines sourced from grower vineyards: 2010 rosato (a dry rose style), 2009 cabernet shiraz and 2009 shiraz. These were all made at the Tim Adams winery.
Adams doesn't plan to combine the two wineries as their functions are distinct - Tim Adams to make dozens of small batches for the premium end of the market, and the Mr Mick facility for bulk production.
Tim Adams can't save the name Leasingham. But he's saved the landmark facility, given hope to local growers and kept the Clare flame burning.
The Canberra Times, text by Chris Shanahan
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