British to get a taste of Margrain

Martinborough's Margrain Vineyard has been toasting its success of late, having secured a major export deal with British wine distributor Oddbins.
Winemaker Stratford Canning travelled to the New Zealand wine trade fair in London this year hoping to woo potential distributors with the Margrain range, but came back with a deal that exceeded just about everyone's expectations.
Oddbins, one of the UK's most progressive and visible high street wine shop chains, is set to take 900 cases of wine off Margrain's hands to sell in its 250 stores across the country ? almost a quarter of the vineyards 2004 stock that includes chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, gewurztraminer, pinot gris and pinot noir.
The deal is a first for the vineyard, which before being approached by the distributors was represented in the competitive British market by a small family firm.
"We've been expanding since 2000 and we had made the decision to get serious about marketing and view what we're doing as a bit more of a business, so this deal is pretty much ideal," Mr Canning said.
"The comments we were getting over there about the wines were all pretty supportive and positive, it's hard to impress in London and there were about 97 producers with 500-odd wines."
Mr Canning said the vineyard had to price itself competitively to get a look into the British market which will soon see the vineyard's pinot noir on the shelves for ?13 - ?14 and their sauvignon blanc for ?8 - ?9.
"In the old days you could price Martinborough pinot noir what you liked," Mr Canning said.
"But now the squeeze is on and over there no one really knows where Martinborough is ? it's all just New Zealand pinot noir to them so we've had to drop our ideals from the past five years."
With the first shipment of wine set to leave the vineyard this week the problem Mr Canning said the vineyard now has is being able to supply enough stock to meet demand.
"We'll eventually get up to 5500 cases a year, definitely not this year with such a low yielding vintage, but we've also got a distributor in Melbourne who has taken on our wines so we have to be careful we have enough wine for our New Zealand distributors as well."
However, one of the most challenging factors for the small vineyard according to Mr Canning has been dealing with the cold economic reality of marketing themselves to the export market.
"Like a lot of wine-making companies we're pretty good at growing grapes and making wines, but in terms of the marketing, while we've learned a lot, we still have plenty to learn."