Graham Norton backing triples Invivo wine sales

Invivo co-founders Tim Lightbourne and Rob Cameron.

Kiwi wine business Invivo has tripled its monthly sales after launching its latest Graham Norton Sauvignon Blanc into Ireland.

Invivo is backed by the UK personality, Norton, who owns two per cent of the company and as part of this, produced his own limited edition sauvignon blanc last year.

According to co-founder Tim Lightbourne the success of the specialty wine, which was only sold in New Zealand, led to the decision to expand the reach into Norton's home country of Ireland.

"Last year we did a small run just for New Zealand, but then there was a bit of media over in that part of the world when Graham had the wine and was taking photos on his social media with it, so we got a lot of approaches but we just didn't have enough then to sell it outside New Zealand," Lightbourne said.

"But then Graham also featured the wine in his book which has become a best seller so Rob and I went up to Ireland and the UK in May and met with the retailers there and it was kind of a no brainer for them," he said. "There's already a bit of built up anticipation for it to come over there and now we can bring in the volumes to support nationwide Irish and UK launches."

Pre-orders for the specialty line reached 4,000 bottles per day last month with the wine being launched in Australia, the UK and Ireland in October. Norton is donating all of his proceeds from the line to Dogs Trust - the largest dog welfare charity in the UK.

Invivo have secured Musgraves, one of the largest retailers in Ireland with more than 500 stores, to stock the wine, as well as nationwide distribution in the UK through Majestic stores.

Graham Norton.

Lightbourne said he was pleased with the success of the wine but it had been a busy period for the team.

"We've got containers going out every week, it's just been going off the hook," Lightbourne said. "We've ramped things up a lot which is good because we took in a lot more grapes this year and increased volume and things like that. We are still promoting it and having to manage logistics so it's full on but we did anticipate that."

The company also won the tender to sell its sauvignon on Qantas flights from next month. Invivo now sells into 17 countries worldwide including Australia, Canada, through Asia and the UK.