Shining a spotlight on the story teller
Shining a spotlight on the story teller
This story was written by Sophie Preece, for the December 2023 edition of Winepress.
Tessa Anderson at the celebration. Photo Richard Briggs
When Tessa Anderson raised the idea of a Wine Marlborough Lifetime Achievement Award, she never dreamed she would one day receive one.
“I would like to reiterate that it was for services, not for consumption,” she says with a characteristically warm laugh, having been recognised for 27 years telling extraordinary stories of the Marlborough wine industry – including as wine reporter at The Marlborough Express, a longstanding editor of Winepress magazine and Winegrower magazine, and the author of two books – Jane Hunter, Growing a Legacy, and 50 Years, 50 Stories, which was released this year to commemorate a half century of wine in the region.
Tessa shines a light on the stubborn risktakers who grew a thriving industry from dusty sheep paddocks, tapping into the soils and climate that worked magic on vines, and on Sauvignon Blanc in particular. “Who would have thought at the beginning of 1973 that the planting of a few grape vines in Marlborough would turn the wine world upside down?” Tessa asks in her book. One of her motivations for the 50 Years project was to ensure the stories of people and events that forged an industry are remembered. “That was what started it off. There are so many good stories and I will still tell them.”
People are at the heart of Tessa’s stories, and she’s always been inspired by the industry’s collegial attitude, whether it was the North Island wine community offering help after the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake, or people here putting up their hand to support growers affected by Cyclone Gabrielle in the North Island this year. “The people have been the best thing. Everyone is so supportive of each other.”
The success of the region was perfectly illustrated at the first International Sauvignon Blanc Celebration, held in Marlborough in 2016, Tessa says. “To have these amazing people like Oz Clarke and others raving about New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. It suddenly really hit home what Marlborough had done, and how unique what it had done was. As person after person kept saying, ‘no one else in the world has done this’ – not in 50 years anyway.”
The fifth chapter of 50 Years, 50 Stories, is dedicated to recipients of the Wine Marlborough Lifetime Achievement Award. “I am very happy they gave it to me this year and not last,” Tessa says. “Because otherwise I would have to have included myself.”
The award began in 2007, after Tessa spoke to the Marlborough Winegrowers Board about recognising the mammoth effort of people who’d invested decades of their lives into the betterment of the industry. Gerry Gregg became the first recipient, on retiring from 39 years at Montana, and Tessa has helped develop a list of prospective recipients ever since, with the nominee list then going to the board to make the final decisions.
So she perhaps should have been suspicious when Wine Marlborough general manager Marcus Pickens didn’t call her for the annual discussion this year.
“To me it was a no brainer that Tessa should be recognised,” Marcus says. “She has spent nearly 30 years telling the stories of our industry in a way that captures people’s hearts and minds. She’s not been scared to call the industry out, when needed. But she has also been a champion for our successes, and the people who have driven them.”
Tessa’s book was written and published during some major challenges in her own life, and is a “precious resource” for the industry, Marcus says. “It reminds us all how far we have come and how much we have to be thankful for.”