Bubbles rise to top
Townsville FRESH from a $ 2 million refurbishment and attracting almost 250,000 visitors a year, the Domaine Chandon winery in the Yarra Valley has plenty to celebrate for its 30th birthday.
But when French champagne house Moët & Chandon decided in the late 80s to establish a local arm dedicated to making Australian premium sparkling wine, it was a very long way from a sure bet.
The Australian wine boom may have been underway, but would the local palate ever embrace a top- end bottle of fizz?
“Moet & Chandon came into Australia to only make high- end sparkling wine – bubbles wasn’t an adjunct for them so it was a real gamble,” says Domaine Chandon Australia’s founding chief and wine industry pioneer Tony Jordan.
“Australians were drinking up and prepared to accept that there were better wines but that hadn’t happened in bubbles.
“No market segment existed – it had to be created. It was a nervous few years.”
Domaine Chandon is these days owned by French luxury products titan LMVH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, whose stable of brands includes Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior, Givenchy and TAG Heuer.
Australia estate director Shaine De Venny says the investment here was a clear vote of confidence.
“Every LMVH property is fighting for capital,” she says.
“You’re up against proving whether your vision is going to be as successful as a new Louis Vuitton store. It’s a tough battle and they want a quick payback.”
The refurbishment has created a new upper- level space, which better separates larger tour groups from independent visitors.
“One of the key things we were really looking to address was traffic management,” Ms De Venny says.
“People were starting to give us feedback that they were not receiving the kind of luxury experience they expected because of the people crush.”
It’s a people crush that nearly didn’t happen in the Yarra Valley.
Dr Jordan scoured the cool climates of Australia and New Zealand when looking to set up the winery in the mid- 1980s.
He nearly went with Gisborne in the Macedon Ranges but was won over by the diversity of climate the Yarra Valley offered.
“I could see the Yarra offered some interesting diversity that other areas did not – there is potential for planting from the valley floor to way up high into some very, very cool climate,” he said.
“You could see it was one of the areas that would really work.” Dr Jordan has been a leading figure in the nation’s wine industry for almost four decades, collecting a Member of the Order of Australia for his efforts.
As well as launching Domaine Chandon Australia, he ran the Cloudy Bay winery in New Zealand and cofounded Australia’s first wine making university course at Charles Sturt University.
Australia’s sparkling wine industry is having something of a moment, with drops from Victoria and Tasmania turning heads internationally.
For all the growing excitement about Australian bubbles within wine circles, Dr Jordan says local drops are still not fully appreciated at home.
When it comes to splashing out on a premium bottle of fizz, the Yarra Valley local rues the fact that most drinkers insist pagne.
Sparkling wine made from grapes grown in the Champagne region of France can call itself champagne — local drops using the same grape varieties and two- stage barrel and bottle fermentation process go under the label of sparkling wine.
“Champagne above all areas of the world has achieved a brand status for the entire region that is still interpreted as ‘ this is all there is’,” Dr Jordan says.
“The upper end of Australian bubbles is still batting against this idea that the real thing is champagne and they have to continually argue and prove themselves and they have got to do it by producing top- end wines that absolutely stand up. And they exist.” it can only be cham-