Half Century

August 2023 marks 50 years since the first vines were planted to launch the Marlborough wine industry. BRENDON BURNS looks back at some of the major challenges and monumental achievements over the past half century. These stories were first published in our Winepress Magazine in 2023.

1970’s

“THERE DOES not appear to be any likelihood of vineyards starting up in Marlborough in the foreseeable future”. That comment from Marlborough County Council Livestock Instructor, S.G.C. Newdick in 1972, citing the glut of grapes in New Zealand, was swiftly proved short-sighted.

In 1973, having been thwarted in plans to buy several farms in Hawke’s Bay, Montana Wine’s Frank Yukich engaged land agent John Marris to purchase nine farms in 10 days at Brancott, Woodbourne and Renwick. Frank took the punt on the expert advice of viticulturist Wayne Thomas, and paid twice the going rate of $250 an acre, setting in motion the transformation of a region. Fifty years on, Marlborough has nearly 30,000 hectares of grapes, accounting for 71% of New Zealand’s vineyard plantings.

One of Marlborough’s driest summers followed, and water-cart irrigation of the plantings of mostly Müller- Thurgau and Cabernet Sauvignon was not enough to get by, so that many vines had to be replanted. Undeterred, Frank trialled other plantings in 1975, including Sauvignon Blanc.

John Marris had meanwhile teamed up with Dutch migrant and energetic berry fruit grower Henk Ruesink to develop their own vineyards using trickle irrigation Henk had pioneered. By 1976, Montana had seen Ruesink-Marris vines harvesting spectacular yields compared to its average crops and began to trickle irrigate as well.

John was now Montana’s operations manager and sought contract growers. Among them were Judy and Neal Ibbotson, Chris and Phil Rose, Pat and Don Cromarty, Philippa and Neville McCallum, Kaye and Errol Hadfield, Marita and Max Gifford, David Dew, and John Lundon.

In April 1977, Montana’s winery was opened by Prime Minister Rob Muldoon and the same year the Grape Growers Association, later Marlborough Winegrowers Association and Wine Marlborough, was established.

In 1978 after battling some major objections around land use, Phil and Chris Rose finally gained consent and started establishing their vineyards. Then in 1979, Te Whare Ra was established on 4 ha at Renwick by Alan and Joyce Hogan as the first boutique Marlborough winery, with Riesling, Gewürztraminer and Chardonnay. Ivan Sutherland planted his first grapes and the same year Ernie Hunter acquired land for $3,000 a hectare on Rapaura Road.

While Montana Wines got it rolling, planting grapes in Marlborough was being discussed some years earlier. Te Mata’s John Buck was invited to speak to the Blenheim Travel Club in the late 1960s. Asked if vines could grow in Marlborough, he said if table grapes did ok, wine grapes could be grown on the Wither Hills. The Marlborough Express reportedly endorsed the idea in an editorial and John got a scolding letter from David Corban of the winemaking dynasty saying grapes would never work here.

1980’s

When Daniel Le Brun told locals that one day the whole Wairau Valley would be covered in grapes they muttered ‘crazy Frenchman’.  The winemaker, with generations of Champagne production in his veins, brought 50,000 cuttings to Marlborough in 1980, having grown them at his nursery in Rotorua, where he’d met his wife, Adele. The couple purchased 12 hectares in Renwick (where Mahi is today) for the winery, and Daniel began developing and managing vineyards for absentee owners while waiting for his vines to grow and specialised equipment to arrive.

Corbans had bought land in Marlborough in 1980 and the following year Selaks and Nobilo partnered to buy land in Hammerichs Rd for the Drylands vineyard. In the early 80s Ross and Barbara Lawson planted their first grapes on Alabama Rd, seeding the Lawson’s Dry Hills label they would launch a decade later.

In 1984, the first record of phylloxera in Marlborough occurred on a vineyard where replacement untreated plants had been brought in from Nelson. Vineyard machinery then spread the louse from vineyard to vineyard.

The same year Brent Marris, whose father John had sourced the first land for vineyards 11 years earlier, became the first Marlborough person to become a qualified wine maker, after studying in Adelaide. With sheep and beef farming suddenly marginal after the loss of subsidies, Peter Vavasour started planting 12ha of grapes in the mid-1980s, opening the industry in the Awatere Valley.

The first Marlborough Wine & Food Festival kicked off in February 1985, with visitors bussed around different vineyards. Later in the year, Rex and Paula Brook-Taylor decide to set up their own winery after being told Corbans no longer needed their Riesling grapes. David Hohnen and winemaker Kevin Judd launched Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc in 1985 to international acclaim. That significant year also saw growers paid to pull out vines, which was a game changer for Marlborough, says Ivan Sutherland (see page 11).

In 1986 – and the following two years – Hunter’s Sauvignon Blanc put Marlborough on the map with successive gold medals in the UK Sunday Times awards. This year also helped Marlborough focus on producing quality wine, notably Sauvignon Blanc, after the Government paid growers to pull out lesser varieties.

The next year, Hunter’s winemaker Almuth Lorenz established her Merlen Wines winery, Villa Maria bought land in Marlborough, and Mike and Diane Ponder secured 34ha of land on New Renwick Rd to plant Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and olives. In 1987, development of Grove Mill Wine Company began at the old Henry Dodson brewery building, led by Gerald Hope and others, with the first vintage in 1988. That year also saw the Stichbury brothers begin the planting of Jackson Estate.

By the end of the decade, Marlborough was clearly established as a wine region. John and Brigid Forrest had planted their first vines, the three partners in Lake Challis bought land in Renwick. To cap it all, as 1990 dawned, Queen Elizabeth visited Montana’s Brancott vineyard.

1990’s

THE 1990s started with a busy first year. Pioneer wine grower Bill Walsh built the Highfield winery, while Allan Scott Wines was being established amid the first wave of independent labels. Delegat’s produced its first vintage of Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay, while Montana launched Deutz Marlborough Cuvee with the help of the Deutz champagne house; all stock was sold out within weeks. In 1990 Montana won the Marquis de Goulaine Trophy for best Sauvignon Blanc in the world at the International Wine and Spirit Competition in London.

Another hallmark of the early 90s was the emergence of an industry to support wine production. This included the robust plastic Wirecare clip developed by Rex Brooke- Taylor. Meanwhile Geoff Taylor’s engineering firm was designing and manufacturing rotary fermenters, wine tanks and tipping bins.

In 1991, Babich took its first harvest from contract grower David Pigou in Selmes Road, and NMIT established vineyards to support the viticultural and winemaking courses being planned. Blenheim’s BOS Print produced their first wine bottle labels.

By 1992, Wine Marlborough Limited was being formed as the trading company for Marlborough’s Winegrowers Association, and the Rose family were building the iconic mudbrick winery that is now a restaurant and tasting room. The same year, Vavasour took three top awards at the Liquorland Royal Easter Wine Awards, sealing the Awatere Valley’s future.

A year later, Alan McCorkindale won five national trophies at the Air New Zealand Wine Show for Corbans' Marlborough wines, and Ormond Nurseries set up a root stock venture at the Marlborough Research Centre.

In 1994, Brent and John Marris established the Wither Hills label and Michael Seresin began converting his vineyard to organic practices. At a gala event, then Prime Minister Jim Bolger opened the new Grove Mill winery in the Waihopai Valley. The 1995 vintage was a disaster for Marlborough (see page 12), with too few wineries to handle rapidly deteriorating grapes in a drenched harvest. A Montana advert summed it up, saying “it rained and it rained and it rained”.

However, the vintage proved a merciful one-off and winemaking capacity quickly began to expand to meet increasing production. By the late 1990s, Marlborough’s reputation for producing a range of fine wine was confirmed. The 1998 London International Wine Challenge saw Deutz Marlborough Cuvee named top sparkling wine, Corban’s Stoneleigh Chardonnay was top white wine, and Hunter’s 1995 Miru Miru méthode traditionelle won a trophy for a wine in its first year of production.

By 1999, demand for Marlborough wine – and the land to grow it — was increasing. Villa Maria’s new winery at Fairhall was open and, after years of denying any interest, Montana began buying land in the Awatere Valley.

2000’s

AS MARLBOROUGH entered its third decade of wine, iwi were among those investing in the burgeoning industry. In October 2000, Ngāi Tahu spent more than $9 million acquiring 69 hectares of vineyards and land to supply Giesen. The following year, Nelson-based Wakatū bought 120ha in the Awatere for its Tohu label.

In February 2001, Marlborough winemakers – frustrated by increased cork taint impacting wine quality – identified the screwcap as the most promising alternative. The Screwcap Initiative they launched was adopted world-wide. The International Screwcap Symposium was held in Blenheim in November 2004, and by the late 2000s around 30% of the world’s wines were sealed by screwcaps.

In 2002, Lion Nathan purchased Wither Hills from Brent and John Marris for $52 million, and the following year Brent Marris established a large vineyard in the Waihopai Valley. The same year Peter Yealands bought 125ha in the Awatere Valley, in the first stage of what would soon become a 1,000ha vineyard.

In 2004, the Southern Valleys Irrigation Scheme began to provide water to 4,500ha to the south of Renwick, opening up new land for vineyards. Water was sourced from the Wairau River immediately below the confluence with the Waihopai River, with minimum flows established. The same year the Wither Hills vineyard at Rarangi was given consent, with conditions, to take water from the Rarangi aquifer.

In 2005, Ormond Nurseries developed a modified net winder to remove nets before harvest, able to be operated by one person. In September 2006, The New Zealand Wine Company, producer of Grove Mill wines, became the first carbon neutral certified winery in the world. The Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme began in 2007, allowing 5,000 Pacific workers into New Zealand for seasonal work, including in Marlborough’s expanding viticulture sector.

KLIMA was established in 2008 by viticulturists Nigel George and Marcus Wickham as a highly-efficient vineyard pruning system. The following year, Renwick-based Walter Langlois developed machines for stripping. By 2009 the Global Financial Crisis had seen Sauvignon Blanc grape prices fall from $2,400 a tonne to half that, or less. There were calls to reduce production amid a glut, but the alarm didn’t stop Cloudy Bay’s former winemaker Kevin Judd from establishing his Greywacke label.

In 2010, RSE worker numbers were reduced due to cost-cutting by wine companies. Some, including Awatere Vineyards Holdings and Gravitas, went into receivership. The decade concluded with new council rules in Marlborough on the location and noise levels of an increasing number of frost machines. That year Yealands was judged to have the most environmentally-pioneering winery in the world. 

2010-2020 

BY 2010, as the global financial crisis bit, Marlborough grape growers were lucky to get $1,200 per tonne, which was half of what they have achieved two years earlier. A year later, things started to pick up a little. The Brancott Heritage Centre tasting room and restaurant opened on ‘Rob’s Knob’, although it was soon followed by the closure of the magnificent facility at Riverlands, open for less than a decade. 

Also in 2011, Blenheim based FMR Group launched a sprayer that captured and recycled vineyard spray, cutting drift and reducing chemical use by about 30%. By 2012, VinLink was operating at Riverlands, offering contract winemaking services overseen by former Grove Mill winemaker Dave Pearce. 

Marlborough was rocked in July 2013 by an earthquake sequence which crumpled winery tanks. Various innovations emerged to reduce quake risks, which helped when the even bigger Kaikōura earthquake struck in 2016. 

Also in 2013, Ormond Nurseries replanted rootstock to meet demand after 90% was pulled out in 2008. Marisco Vineyards began planting the first of 800 hectares at Waihopai Valley’s Leefield Station. 

In 2014, a thousand more Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme workers were allowed into New Zealand, the Marlborough District Council issued three resource consents and 12 building consents for wineries, and WineWorks began building Marlborough’s largest building – 10,000 square metres for wine storage – at Riverlands. 

In 2015, Gerry Gregg (Mr Montana) who’d started with the company in 1976 and performed a variety of roles for differing owners, retired. The Young Winemaker of the Year competition was launched, and Marlborough Lines bought an 80% stake in Yealands, by then New Zealand’s sixth largest wine exporter, for $89m. 

2015 also saw Dr Mike Trought made a Fellow of New Zealand Winegrowers, recognising three decades of wine research. 

In 2016 harvesters started to be used to shake vines before harvest, reducing disease risk and botrytis. The Bottling Company opened at Riverlands to service the needs of the growing wine industry. 

In 2017 came a probe into various companies’ employment practices and treatment of RSE workers. MDC prosecuted five companies and individuals for grape marc leaching into waterways. 

In 2018, Seresin winery was sold to Ben Glover and Rhyan Wardman who renamed it The Coterie. The Southern Valleys Irrigation Scheme shut off in early February 2019 due to dry conditions, and some vineyards trucked in water. Hortus began building a multimillion-dollar expansion at its seasonal worker complex on Blenheim’s outskirts. 

In February 2020, the Bragato Research Institute Research Winery was opened on the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology Blenheim campus. A month later, the wine industry was dealing with closed borders, severe staff shortages, freight disruptions and staff pressures as Covid-19 began impacting on Marlborough and the rest of the world. 

Few would have predicted Marlborough’s rapid ascent to become one of New Zealand’s preeminent – and internationally renowned – wine-growing regions. From August 2023 the region’s winemakers and growers are celebrating 50 years of Marlborough’s official beginning as a wine region, and inviting the country to re-discover the depth of Marlborough wine.

Discover the history of our region’s wine brands and explore stories about our people and place that make it special here. https://www.marlboroughwinenz.com/2023