Uitkyk in Stellenbosch was first granted to a certain Jan Oberholzer in 1712, later that century becoming the property of self-made immigrant Martin Melck (of Muratie fame) who ceded it to his son-in-law Johan David Beyers in 1776, Beyers responsible for building the splendid manor house.
In 1929, Prussian nobleman Hans von Carlowitz purchased the property, the first to plant vines and a wine called Carlonet, originally made from Cabernet Sauvignon and Cinsault, was what the farm became best known for.
Von Carlowitz’s son Georg sold Uitkyk to Gerry Bouwer in 1963 and Bouwer’s son-in-law Harvey Illing gave up his Natal dentistry practice to become winemaker. In 1984, the Bouwer family sold to the Bergkelder, which had held a part share (Illing staying on as winemaker for a while) and it later became part of Lusan Premium Wines, a joint venture between German financier Hans Schreiber and Distell. Most recently, it was acquired by US-based Eileses Capital in 2018, its vineyards set to supply Warwick going forward.
From the depths of the late Harold Eedes’s cellar, the Carlonet 1984. The 1986 edition of John Platter’s South African Wine Guide says of Carlonet “formerly a robust, full-bodied dry red… from ’78, when rotating fermenting tanks were introduced, made in a lighter style, though still substantial”. The 1982, meanwhile, was the first vintage matured in new Nevers oak and the 1984 was deemed “extremely promising”. No indication of varietal composition provided – though labeled as “Cabernet Sauvignon”, legislation at the time permitted up to 25% of other varieties.
The wine appears quite well preserved with notes of red cherry, some herbal characer and a little oak spice on the nose while the palate is light bodied with acidity that some might consider perky and others tart, the tannins long since vanished. Very much of its era.
CE’s score: 89/100.
Check out our South African wine ratings database.
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The current conversation around Coronavirus and its effect on the South African wine industry is perhaps inevitably very emotionally charged.
We put the same set of questions to a variety of industry stakeholders with a view to obtaining a better understanding of what’s happening on the ground and also plotting a way forward. Here is how Lukas van Loggerenberg of Van Loggerenberg Wines replied:
How badly has Coronavirus crisis impacted your business?
Our main market locally is restaurants and with the whole of the hospitality industry basically shut down with no concrete idea of when it will be able to open up or if it will recover at all, it’s not a happy time. This has impacted our cash flow in a big way as it has the rest of the industry as well. We have been able to get one or two export orders out in this time but the orders are also more reserved than usual as exporters are unsure of their local restaurant trade. We have always wanted to cellar our wines for a bit longer before release so we also see this as an opportunity to do just that. We believe that if we focus on providing a quality product and actively seek new markets for our wines we will be able to see this through.
How many wineries do you foresee closing as a result of the pandemic? What future for growers?
Hopefully none. The ripple effect will be seen for a long time as wineries that have limited cashflow struggle to reinvest in vineyards and growers. I think wineries that had aggressive expansion plans and are heavily geared might have a tough time getting ahead of this crisis.
What plans do you have in place to get going again once restrictions are eased? How will doing business be different?
We are focusing on diversifying where our wine ends up to ensure we aren’t dependent on just one or two countries or just the restaurant trade. E-commerce will also be a focus going forward. We set up budgets to minimize cash outflow during this time until we have a clearer idea of when we will be able to trade normally.
What will the South African wine landscape look like after the pandemic? Will the industry recover quickly or will it be changed forever?
We don’t really have an idea of what it will look like at all. South Africans are hardworking and if our industry comes together to work as one to promote South African wine locally and internationally, I believe we will come out stronger than before.
Read other interviews:
Chris Alheit of Alheit Vineyards
Tertius Boshoff of Stellenrust
Gerard Holden of Holden Manz
Johan Kruger of Kruger Family Wines
Bruwer Raats of Raats Family Wines
Mike Ratcliffe of Vilafonté
Johan Reyneke of Reyneke Wines
David Sadie of David & Nadia
Eben Sadie of Sadie Family Wines
Michael White of Highlands Road
Hip to be square.
When Maandans 2017 from Longridge in Stellenbosch was released last year, it demonstrated that Pinotage doesn’t always have to trade off fruit power in order to impress but at R1 200 a bottle, it’s a reference point that will be beyond the reach of many. Luckily, the standard labelis also pretty convincing argument that Pinotage can be successful in a lighter style and is much more affordable, the current release selling for R190 a bottle.
Grapes from vineyards with an average age of 40 years, winemaking involved spontaneous fermentation before maturation lasting 16 months in French oak, 20% new. The nose is initially very floral before raspberry and cherry plus hints of herbs and spice while the palate has plenty of upfront fruit, bright acidity and fine tannins, a touch of intriguing bitterness to the finish. Not under-ripe at 14.14% alcohol and hence avoiding the awkwardness that some of the earlier picked new-wave wines sometimes have.
CE’s rating: 91/100.
Check out our South African wine ratings database.
Attention: Reviews like this take time and effort to create. We need your support to make our work possible. To make a financial contribution, click here. Invoice available upon request – contact info@winemag.co.za
Anyone who loves Cape wine has every reason to be anxious (if not actually panic-stricken) about the industry’s prospects as Covid-19 (and the state’s response to it) wreaks a swathe of destruction through the economy and the wine trade. If we don’t succumb to the disease, will we recover from the destruction of value which has accompanied the measures put in place to control its spread?
This is not the place to question the wisdom (or otherwise) of the way the National Command Council (NCC) has confronted a pandemic the likes of which we haven’t seen since HIV. It’s worth remembering how different that was: Thabo Mbeki and his acolytes thought that the problem would go away with a little beetroot, so nothing was done while millions went (more or less silently) to their graves. No one can accuse this government of disregarding Covid-19. What we do know is that they have let agendas other than disease-management cloud their decision-making, along the way turning their wrecking ball on the whole edifice of the drinks industry.
Locking down an economy is not something which should be undertaken lightly. Prohibiting some sectors from trading altogether requires deeper insight than appears to have been applied. It’s hard to tell how a blanket ban on wine exports when other agricultural products were leaving the country, or on liquor sales when chocolates, soft drinks and other non-essential items were freely available, helped to arrest the spread of the disease.
Anyway, it’s what our leadership decided and now we have to count the cost. What will our wine industry look like 12 – 18 months from now, given the way it was sidelined in Levels five and four? Predictions of this kind are pretty much a mug’s game, with high and low road options so far apart from each other that they’re not even in the same universe. For example, there’s an outside chance that the nutters running the show could see the error of their ways and nurture the drinks and tobacco sectors simply to raise much needed revenue. Alternatively they could continue along the same misguided way. The bookies would put their money on stupidity beating cupidity to the finish line (even though collecting excise would be the more rational option). With a spectrum of possibilities this wide, pretty much anything is possible. I’m not wriggling – I’m simply saying that predicting how the wine trade will look at the end of next year doesn’t come with the same certainty as Bafana Bafana’s chances in the 2026 World Cup.
Firstly the near certainties: the next year or so will be devastating for just about every consumer industry. Even after the disease has run its course, the economy will be gutted. Spending power will be down, and the on-trade (which is a vital component of the local market for wine producers) will be the worst hit. Reserve funds will be decimated, so cash or near cash will determine the rules of the game. Hotels and restaurant chains will battle to re-open, foreign tourism will be almost non-existent and red tape will choke the working environment. The control freaks of the NCC won’t easily give up their power to interfere.
The survival of wineries will depend firstly on their will to make it through, secondly on their lines of credit. They will need working capital just to pay for their business basics. With limited income they won’t have enough cashflow for dry goods and chemicals. Just the same, I think there’s a very low of risk of creditor-driven liquidations: there’s no point if the assets are worth next to nothing. No one will want to take over half-finished stock or secondhand equipment. The banks will avoid foreclosures for the same reason.
Those with strong export arrangements will probably have the best chance: the Rand will not recover to pre-Covid levels, certainly not in the short term and possibly never. Accordingly sales abroad will be worth more than ever before. The international markets are likely to bounce back sooner than the domestic trade, so exports will provide an essential lifeline. So will long-established relationships with distant customers. If you can’t travel to see them and they are still willing to place the orders that keep you going, your chances of making it out to the other side are vastly better than most others. Proof that you have a real business will be a prerequisite to obtaining lines of credit and working capital.
In the domestic market things will be little different: producers who have gathered data about their consumers and have engaged with them will be able to by-pass the wilderness of the beleaguered on- and off-trade and talk directly to their customers. If those on their databases still have discretionary spending power, producers will have another revenue source to tap into. Much will also depend on forming cooperative alliances: the cost of shipping small quantities to Gauteng (which will remain the largest market in the world for Cape wines) will erode margins and make cellar-door direct to customer sales unduly expensive. Aggregating efforts, use of the same courier or common distribution hubs, and packaging joint offers will all play a role.
If these predictions are even half correct its suggests that, counter-intuitively, a disproportionate number of the very small operations will survive. They have low overheads, with very few employees and lots of family participation. They have loyal customers, many in the Western Cape. They buy in fruit, so they don’t have the same debt burden as those who own vineyards. The very big business will also come out of this alive, and possibly strengthened, as long as they can maintain strong (and ideally quite personal) ties with key customers. If the banks have to decide who will live and who will go under, they’re likely to look to the established trading history and the governance practices of the operations they’re going to support.
The bloodbath will be in the middle segment, especially family-managed operations which own vineyards and are already in debt. If they haven’t modernised and up till now they’ve been ticking along only just comfortably, they won’t be able to present a compelling case for the funding they will need to trade their way out of the trough.
How will this all look on New Year’s Day 2022? Nothing like the world which went into lockdown. The “radical economic transformation” sub-text of the NCC junta will have run its course, though not necessarily in the way they had in mind. The ghosts of Robert Mugabe and Hugo Chavez chuckle every time a politician thinks that the best way to re-engineer a society is via an economic catastrophe.
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A few days ago Western Cape Premier Alan Winde entreated us to “support small businesses” and “order takeaways from your nearest restaurant”.
My husband and I didn’t need much encouragement. Our teenager won’t touch red meat. Our pre-teen likes pale, bland food. After weeks of frittatas, pastas and chicken sausages, what a thrill to place an order with The Black Sheep in Kloof Street for warthog – slow-cooked in red wine – and the restaurant’s signature Burmese pork curry.
Let’s face it, part of the joy of a takeaway is the smell of heavily-fragranced steam trapped in a brown paper bag. It’s a huge part of the appeal of Chinese take-aways, specifically. Our Black Sheep bags smelt like heaven: garlic, sweet onion, spices and fatty, roasted meat.
The pork dishes did not disappoint. The warthog was deliciously tender and moist. It had indeed been braised long and slow and the gravy of the stew was dense with the flavour of roasted vegetables, tomatoes and meat. Of course, cooking in red wine makes an impressive difference to the depth of flavour. Thank you, the French. It looked and smelt like the lamb shank dish we were all agog about in the mid-nineties – especially as it was served with mash. But the Black Sheep’s warthog is less Italian, more farm-ish. The big chunks of carrot and cabbage served with the mash were sweet and toothsome. The stew was properly peppery too, which I loved.
The Burmese pork curry is famous at The Black Sheep. Along with a chicken and pork roast, it’s one of the three meals you can now order for four on Sundays.
It’s gorgeous. It was served the way I serve curry at home – with a sambal for freshness, an atchar for chilli-heat and a cool, yoghurt-based raita for calm. To be honest, it’s a bit of a nineties way to serve curry. What really surprised me about the Black Sheep curry were the wodges of sweet, roasted butternut and the very thick, very buttery discs of soft potato. It took the curry in a roast dinner direction – and, given the sizes and intense tastes of these veg segments, very confidently too. The fact that the curry was so very generously meaty is what made this cross-over possible. This was not one of those curries in which smallish cubes float in a thick, smooth gravy. It was more like fall-apart pork in a rich, spicy sauce; more like a ladle of low-and-slow-cooked meat from a no-holds-barred Indian carvery.
The dish came with rice too – exquisitely separate and fragrant – packaged in its own container. This was a very generous meal. It was easily enough for two (and therefore excellent value at R140).
Overall, these two pork dishes represented confident, talented cooking. The Black Sheep is not intimidatingly cheffy, but it doesn’t cut corners either. You can taste that all the ingredients are high quality, and that everything has been made from scratch.
I first visited The Black Sheep in 2014 and loved it then. It’s a special restaurant that can survive two decades on Kloof Street. City Bowlers are demanding. But Chef Jonathan Japha is dedicated to the notion of gastropub food (emphasis on “gastro”) and Japha’s business partner, Jorge Silva, has a devotion to the business and its customers that has won him a following.
In case it sounds like I was in raptures just because this was the first restaurant meal I’d eaten in weeks, I can tell you that the pulled pork sandwich was served in a roll that was too bready, too hard. And the sticky toffee pudding was the worst: a passable sponge drenched in a sauce that tasted like someone had tipped the sugar bowl into a pot and stirred it to a sandy consistency before serving. Not surprising the dessert lacked any depth of taste. It’s possible that the toffee sauce was a casualty of cooking and reheating. To be fair, this is Black Sheep’s first-ever week of offering takeaways.
Here at Winemag, we are all in favour of supporting independent restaurants during lockdown. Of course it’s easy and cheap to get fast food delivered using an app like UberEats and Mr Delivery. But the big chains like McDonald’s will make it through Covid-19.
Much has been written about the Cape’s fine dining restaurants that are currently offering gourmet meals to be “finished” at home. Peter Tempelhoff is offering various eat-in as part of FYN from Home. Ryan Cole of Salsify and George Jardine of Jardine in Stellenbosch will deliver a three-course dinner for two for R395 and R295 per person respectively. Janse at Home and Steenberg @ Home are also offering “heat, plate and serve” meals. Kobus van der Merwe of Wolfgat is making up hampers for two for R800 and the acclaimed Luke Dale-Roberts is selling a weekly basket of luxury goods – including sweet and savoury items made in his kitchens – in both Cape Town and Johannesburg for R1800, R3000 or R5000.
But the restaurants that are really in financial danger are places like The Black Sheep, the stand-alone neighbourhood eateries that have been built with owner savings, hard work and the support of regulars. They have survived because staff members in the kitchen and on the restaurant floor work hard to deliver good food and good service. These are the places that actually care about your birthday dinner.
We urge you to support places like the restaurants below, many of which have been reviewed by Winemag before.
Pesce Azzuro is delivering gourmet ravioli and gnocchi. The Cousins at Home is selling its famous lasagna in a family-sized tray. Both The Woodlands Eatery and Magica Roma are delivering.
Punjab in Kenilworth, Maharajah in Rondebosch and Prashad Café are offering deliveries of authentic Indian vegetarian and meat curries.
Vegan restaurant The Kind Kitchen is delivering, as is Greek restaurant Mykonos and Mexican restaurant El Burro. The deep-fries from Monks Chinese are deeply satisfying.
For weekend family meals, try Blockhouse Kitchen in Constantia and Hamm & Uys in Stellenbosch.
Winemag recommends Jerry’s Burger Bar in Observatory; Saltwater Grill in Pinelands for fish and seafood, and both Fabrica do Prego and Vasco’s for Portuguese.
Tertius Boshoff of Stellenrust.
The current conversation around Coronavirus and its effect on the South African wine industry is perhaps inevitably very emotionally charged.
We put the same set of questions to a variety of industry stakeholders with a view to obtaining a better understanding of what’s happening on the ground and also plotting a way forward. Here is how Tertius Boshoff of Stellenrust replied:
How badly has Coronavirus crisis impacted your business?
In all honesty, it has basically brought our business to a standstill. We hadn’t even finished harvesting during the first week of lockdown and were forced to wait for permission to continue. Coming from a medical background, I fully understand the severity of this virus and its potentially devastating effect on South Africa; especially in view of our public health sector and the socio-economic reality of unemployment and poverty.
Still, some of the regulations were really not well thought through – and their implementation had little to do with curbing the spread. One example, blocking exports for about two weeks cost us an estimated 12 000 bottles worth of Chenin Blanc sales off Finnish monopoly Alko shelves. In addition to this, in any monopoly and EU or UK retail setting, the continued presence of your product on shelf is determined by the performance based on annual sales. See where I’m going with this? That 12 000 bottle sales dip is going to have an effect – long term. It is a snowball effect cutting much deeper into the South African wine industry than is immediately transparent. The after-effects are yet to be seen.
How many wineries do you foresee closing as a result of the pandemic? What future for growers?
It appears that everyone in the industry is trying to get bulk wine into the market as quickly as possible. I received a generic mail from a bulk wine dealer this week with a list of wines available at quite steep prices, but the mail stated winemakers should wait it out as the prices won’t stay that high. And this is exactly where Covid-19 is creating our secondary wine business infection. I suspect to survive, there will be undercutting and discounting – both at bulk and bottled level – just to get wine moving for SOME sort of income. It’s only natural for everyone to want to survive – from grower to bottler – but the South African wine industry (especially WOSA and Vinpro) have done a great job over the past years to improve the price points and status of South African wine. There is a reason why only about 13% of wine producers in South Africa are profitable… and it’s the result of this rotten legacy of discounting and undercutting.
What plans do you have in place to get going again once restrictions are eased? How will doing business be different?
Pretty much like everyone else, we are driving online sales at present and using more outlets than just our own online shop to reach customers. In fact, using as many routes to market as possible! Market research during recessions has proven that most people generally become less brand orientated and drink what they can afford. We’re about to hit the world’s largest recession since 2008 and probably rivalling that of the 1930s and luckily our range caters for drinking from entry level to expensive reserve wines in a portfolio of more than 30 wines. In light of that, we’re reducing the range also to focus solely on the wines that run on larger volumes but still pay the bills. You can only bet on your strongest horse to win the derby, right? Our core focus now is reaching customers with direct marketing – B2C is the new B2B and we have a mission to personify the brand through retail outlets and through direct customers sales.
What will the South African wine landscape look like after the pandemic? Will the industry recover quickly or will it be changed forever?
Confucius apparently said: ‘only the wisest and stupidest of men never change’. There’s little doubt that the wine industry WILL change – but will it be for the better or not? That question remains to be answered. With an already large amount of grape growers and wine brands struggling, it is inevitable that there will be collateral damage from this pandemic. The landscape will change. Retail and online sales will be king for the near future/short term and cash will be his queen. New developments and plantings will have to be funded from capital resources and not through debt. However heartless this may sound, it will be a situation of survival of the fittest and possibly leanest. And may God bless us all as He has blessed Stellenrust.
Read other interviews:
Chris Alheit of Alheit Vineyards
Gerard Holden of Holden Manz
Johan Kruger of Kruger Family Wines
Bruwer Raats of Raats Family Wines
Mike Ratcliffe of Vilafonté
Johan Reyneke of Reyneke Wines
David Sadie of David & Nadia
Eben Sadie of Sadie Family Wines
Michael White of Highlands Road
David Clarke of the agency Ex Animo Wine Co. provides a podcast consisting of a series of interviews with industry figures, a recent subject being Bernhard Bredell of Scions of Sinai. Listen to it here.
Read a review of the Vintage 2019 wines here.
The Cape autumn remains worryingly beautiful (just a little rain last week), but the nights are that little bit cooler. On Saturday I made my first fire of the season – and opened my first port. Two of them, in fact, as it seemed a good idea to compare De Krans Cape Vintage Reserve 2006 with the current release, 2016, to see what a decade of maturation has done for the wines.
One could start a comparison by looking at the bottles and play “spot the difference”. The 2006 is printed in white directly onto the bottle – alluding to traditional Portuguese practice and lending it, to my eye, a most appealing unpretentious element of countrified authenticity. By now, though, Boets and Stroebel Nel of De Krans have introduced a paper label, and a back-label too, continuing, I suppose the process of conventionalising which began with the renaming of the brand in 2002 from Die Krans to De Krans, presumably in deference to non-Afrikaans-speakers’ confusion over the meaning and pronunciation of “Die” in this context. (Though I dare say that most international customers are still ignorant about what a krans is – a cliff-face or crag, I can tell any of them that might be reading this). “Wine of Origin Calitzdorp” remains proudly displayed on both bottles.
The most important packaging difference, though, is the dropping of the word “Port”, in line with the agreement between South Africa and the EU. That change was rather charmingly announced by De Krans with the valedictory 2010 vintage, the wine labelled The Last Cape Vintage Reserve Port, the visually outstanding words being “The last port”.
Nor are the wines identical in make-up. There’s a preponderance of tinta barocca in the older wine (50% with 38% touriga nacional, plus souzão and tinta roriz), while the 2016 is overwhelmingly from the rather more renowned touriga (78% plus the tintas). The analyses are almost identical however, and the Klein Karoo vintages in both years were good enough to produce a Reserve wine.
That all said, what about the rather more important differences in the contents of the bottles? The colour, of course. Both are deep and opaque, but the youthful purple of 06 has radically transmuted to dark ruby. The effect of bottle age shows in less obvious chocolate, spice and, especially dark pruney fruit on the 06, which is correspondingly more savoury and interesting, with a background note of spearmint I rather like.
With a tannic, powerful wine like a bottle-aged port, structural change is of equal importance to development of tertiary characters, and here it is happening predictably: the older wine is still warmingly gorgeous, but has the refinement that comes to a fine wine with some age, with the decade in bottle taming the fiery power and smoothing the tannins, making for a more integrated whole. Though not a whole lot, really – there’s still room for positive development.
Undoubtedly it is worth keeping a serious, fine quality fortified wine like the De Krans Vintage Reserve (the other styles made, the Ruby and even the straight Vintage, are fine for earlier drinking, as is the splendid cask-aged Tawny). In summary answer to my question about what a decade has done for the Reserve, I must ruefully admit that I shouldn’t really have opened either bottle – certainly not the 2016, delicious though it is. The 2006 was certainly better for its wait in the cool darkness, but I think another five or ten years will only add layers to its flavours and further enhance its harmony.
I suspect that the 2016 has an even longer total lifespan, with a greater depth and intensity compared to what I remember of the 06 at this early stage. Its price of R325 per bottle is modest in relation to its quality – but, then, fortified wines are not fashionable. What else, though, can enliven and give warmth to winter evenings with quite such a combination of power and grace?
Attention: Articles like this take time and effort to create. We need your support to make our work possible. To make a financial contribution, click here. Invoice available upon request – contact info@winemag.co.za
Bernhard Bredell is the seventh generation of a family that has farmed in the Helderberg area of Stellenbosch, his Scions of Sinai label a project started in an effort to save old vineyards as planted by his grandfather around a particular hill known as Sinai – small volumes to date but terrifically exciting. Tasting notes and ratings for the pre-release 2019s as follows:
Scions of Sinai Gramadoelas Grenache Blanc 2019
From a 2009 vineyard on schist in the Klein Karoo . The nose shows pear, peach, citrus with some floral perfume and dried herbs in the background. The palate is intensely flavoured (despite a low alcohol of 12%) with punchy acidity and a salty finish.
CE’s rating: 93/100.
Scions of Sinai Granietsteen Chenin Blanc 2019
From a 1978 vineyard. Aromatics of stone fruit, naartjie and orange and even a little pineapple plus some yeasty complexity. Rich and deep on the palate with tangy acidity and savoury finish.
CE’s rating: 93/100.
Scions of Sinai Heldervallei Cinsault Noir 2019
From a 1988 vineyard. 70% whole-bunch fermentation. Rose, red cherry and fresh herbs on the nose while the palate is lean and energetic with lovely fine tannins. Well balanced and tightly wound with an intensely savoury finish.
CE’s rating: 92/100.
Scions of Sinai Fêniks Pinotage 2019
From a 1976 vineyard. Aromatics of red and black cherry, lavender and a little earthiness. Good depth of fruit, bright acidity and firm, slightly bitter tannins. A generous wine even though alcohol is again just 12%.
CE’s rating: 92/100.
Scions of Sinai Swanesang Syrah 2019
From a 1996 bush-vine vineyard. 50% whole-bunch fermentation. An exhilarating nose of dark fruit, pepper and spice plus violets and dried herbs. The palate is super-rich but not weighty with lemon-like acidity and fine tannins. A wonderfully balanced and very focused rendition of the variety.
CE’s rating: 96/100.
Listen to a podcast interview with Bernhard Bredell here.
Check out our South African wine ratings database.
Attention: Reviews like this take time and effort to create. We need your support to make our work possible. To make a financial contribution, click here. Invoice available upon request – contact info@winemag.co.za
Eben Sadie of Sadie Family Wines.
The current conversation around Coronavirus and its effect on the South African wine industry is perhaps inevitably very emotionally charged.
We put the same set of questions to a variety of industry stakeholders with a view to obtaining a better understanding of what’s happening on the ground and also plotting a way forward. Here is how Eben Sadie of Sadie Family Wines replied:
How badly has Coronavirus crisis impacted your business?
I think it is premature to say. Over the past two months, we’ve run at a massive loss and it will continue but what’s currently happening is not truly the concern. Fine wine is a very long-term thing – it is not about buying bulk wine and getting a marketing pitch or a “sales angle” or a “USP” and moving quickly forward with huge return. Fine wine is a matter of developing soils and their health, the carefully planting them, waiting three years to harvest them and then aging the wines for two-plus years prior to sale so a few months is only but a percentage of the true investment. The book on fine wine is much more stretched out than the quick wine in a box story.
But, yes, there’s been a major impact and it hurts. What we need to do is continue to farm and farming is a contact sport in any event and nobody at any point said it will be easy. If you want easy, go sell cellphone chargers or washing pegs.
How many wineries do you foresee closing as a result of the pandemic?
My prayer is NOT ONE! And it is completely and utterly unnecessary, and if any winery needs to close, it won’t be as a reaction to Covid-19 but rather government’s complete ignorance to facts. I think it is clear that government had to put measures into place but to stop exports has simply no thought behind it and also to stop online wine sales which has got nothing to do with the alcohol abuse sector at large was simply not with any sound reason. The Cape Winelands is a good client of SARS and one that is well controlled and the irony is that it is not SARS that control us, we pay to have ourselves controlled in order to pay government through SAWIS and ultimately through SARS and even in that regard they rather promote the illicit trade of alcohol and cigarettes. It quite frankly baffles the mind.
What plans do you have in place to get going again once restrictions are eased? How will doing business be different?
We will just simply keep on doing what has worked the past 20 years! Hard work, an honest approach and farming better for tomorrow.
What will the South African wine landscape look like after the pandemic? Will the industry recover quickly or will it be changed forever?
Unfortunately I think the wine landscape will change a lot. The sector that will be most impacted by this will be the restaurant business and all aspects of our wine business that funnel into that sector. The biggest challenge is not going to be sales and exports but for many that have made huge investments over time to regain trust in government. Our industry requires massive cash investments – the structure of wineries are very capital-intensive. It’s also labour intensive and gives jobs to so many other industries and the ripple effect is going to be massive. The one point that is positive is that some might lose their arrogance and be more humble and that is a potential plus. The second plus is when something is that broken it might very well be that the industry thinks about actually working together and stop the factionalism. It is also easy to point at our current government and their broken framework but us in the Cape Winelands have also a frame than needs reassembly. Our only way forward to success is to work together and this and this was even a pre-Covid-19 reality!
Read other interviews:
Chris Alheit of Alheit Vineyards
Gerard Holden of Holden Manz
Johan Kruger of Kruger Family Wines
Bruwer Raats of Raats Family Wines
Mike Ratcliffe of Vilafonté
Johan Reyneke of Reyneke Wines
David Sadie of David & Nadia
Michael White of Highlands Road
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