Having 1200 leading fine wine and spirit professionals vote your winery as the most sustainable and the fourth-best fine wine producer in Australasia, Africa and the Middle East is a testament to Felton Road’s standing globally, winemaker Blair Walters says.
Owner Nigel Greening flew to Britain to accept the Golden Vines Sustainability Award unaware at the time that the winery had also placed fourth in the Golden Vines Best Fine Wine Producer in the Rest of the World (Australasia, Africa, Asia & Middle East) section.
"That was a real surprise. It wasn’t until the full report was released that we saw we were nominated in that category and were fourth place, it was a real thrill."
The only other New Zealand winery to make the top 10 was Auckland winery Kumeu River and the winner was Henschke in the Eden Valley, Barossa Valley and Adelaide Hills, in Australia whose son had done a harvest at Felton Road in 2006.
The award is not just based on the wine but the whole business and Felton Road has been exporting since 1997 and now exports to more than 40 countries around the world.
"It is a testament to our brand awareness that we have internationally, because it was such a wide range of wine industry professionals who voted."
The award recognises wineries who are taking an industry-leading position in the sustainability arena. Felton Road was a foundation member of the New Zealand Wine Growers sustainability programme — called Sustainable Wine Growing New Zealand — back in 1999 and two years ago joined the International Wineries for Climate Action which requires members to have an ISO-certified carbon inventory and show it is making genuine carbon emission reductions.
Following this path has required investment and energy and at the awards Greening, in his awards speech, was reported by Decanter magazine food and wine editor Guy Woodward on social media as telling the room full of guests who paid $21,750 to be there that they risked losing it all "not to some cataclysmic event, but to a billion trips to the supermarket in the Range Rover. To a million winter breaks in the Maldives".
"Only we can stop it. Not by waiting for somebody to do something but by doing it ourselves. All of you are innovators, leaders, people who are used to making things happen. I’m not telling you to become a monk, I’m asking you to use your talent to make it happen".
Walters says Greening thought long and hard about flying to the UK for the awards and did so with the intention of not letting the opportunity slide to encourage others along a more sustainable path.
For Felton Road that had included investing in solar panels for electricity generation, converting its vehicle fleet to electric and for the past 10 years using lightweight glass bottles for the wine.
"Because the glass bottle is the single biggest component of a vineyard and wineries. We started using lightweight bottles over 10 years ago. So we’ve saved, you know, considerable amounts of CO2 emissions by doing that."
"It was a very involved and expensive and lengthy process."
The Golden Vines also released a report into expectations for the year ahead for the wine and spirit industry showing there was rising demand for fine wines around the world and that fine wine drinkers had greater knowledge and experience.
Walters says that works well for Felton Road and Central Otago pinot noir makers as it is still a niche, high-end product.
"There’s always going to be great opportunities for, you know, the positioning and because of the quality that we achieve."
It is also showing younger drinkers are coming through with an interest in fine wines and spending money on fine wines.
"That’s what’s so important about being recognised in an award like this, particularly the Sustainability Award, that younger people are generally a lot more conscious of what’s at stake for our planet because they’re the ones most likely to endure and suffer through the worst of the climate crisis. So when they’re making choices, they’re going to support businesses that are a lot more ethical and responsible."
