New dawn coming for Hunter Valley wine industry
Two wine industry specialists have expressed confidence that a growing sense of pride in NSW wines will be beneficial for the Hunter Valley.
If you've wandered into a local restaurant or liquor store lately, you may have found it difficult to find and select a Hunter Valley wine to buy.
But despite the apparent glut of products on the market, industry experts believe the Hunter Valley's wines are on the verge of a fresh spell in the spotlight, with a culture shift beginning to wash over NSW.
A challenging industry
The vice president of the Hunter Valley Wine and Tourism Association, Andrew Margan agrees that in recent times local products haven't been showcased as much on restaurant wine lists.
He believes because of the amount of wine produced in Australia and imported from overseas, consumers are flooded for choice.
"Traditionally what's happened, particularly in NSW, is there hasn't been an enormous amount of parochialism towards its local wines," he says.
"You've also got to put it in perspective that the Hunter Valley actually produces somewhere around two-and-a-half to three per cent of all the wine in Australia.
"It's not a huge area, and it only makes premium wines, it can't make cheap wines. If you look at house wines in restaurants, we can't even compete in that market because it costs us too much to make [that type of] wine here in the Valley."
Mr Margan says that the 30 to 40 wholesale producers in the Hunter Valley often find it difficult to compete.
John Hart is the CEO of the Restaurant and Catering Industry Association and says that other wine-producing regions, such as South Australia, compete fiercely to have their products front-and-centre.
"[When I was in South Australia], I almost got run out of town for putting a Hunter Valley Semillon on the wine list," he says.
"There was not a better wine than the Hunter Valley Semillon that I put on the list at the time, but they have a totally different attitude.
"We don't focus on wanting to be home grown to the same extent that some others do ... What wine lists do [is] reflects what consumers want."
Change on the horizon
Mr Margan and Mr Hart believe NSW is growing increasingly parochial about its wines, which should benefit the Hunter Valley.
Mr Hart says an increase in wine-centred tourist events will help build passion for local wines.
"We really need to do as much as we can to get consumers across NSW passionate about NSW wine," he says.
"That's what builds the emotion behind wanting to 'buy local'.
"We know that the local product is of great standing, and what we need to do now is build some emotion behind wanting to consume local [products]."
Mr Margan believes that with change on the way, more local restaurants should stock Hunter Valley wines.
"I think restaurants and bottle shops that aren't getting on board with the [changing] trend are going to end up missing out," he says.
"There's a lot of fashion to do with wine, and the Hunter has not been a fashionable place for the last ten years.
"But there's [now] a sun coming up over us; it's going to shine on us, and we're going to finally have our day. I can see it happening."
Andrew Margan and John Hart spoke to 1233 ABC Newcastle Breakfast presenter, Aaron Kearney.
Source: ABC Newcastle, Robert Virtue (
