2020: lockdown stories
Peter Richards MW finds out how winemakers around the world have coped this year
As our lives and horizons suddenly closed in around us, growing more limited in the year of Covid-19, it was perhaps difficult to appreciate what other people ‘out there’, elsewhere in the world, were experiencing and feeling. Peter Richards MW spoke to winemakers in six different nations to find out how they and their teams coped as events developed
Surreal. That’s the word many winemakers use about lockdown, a stark new reality that defined 2020: the year that Covid-19 struck. ‘It was like floating in a bubble – your world feels undone, uncoupled’, is how Californiabased flying winemaker Paul Hobbs describes it. Given the unfolding pandemic and mounting death toll, some even started to question their profession. ‘Working in a winery felt perverse, almost devoid of reason at times,’ recalls winemaker and writer Oliver Styles in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand.
When things kicked off, harvest was underway in the southern hemisphere. Most governments deemed wine an ‘essential business’, thus exempt from shutting down. An historically early vintage in areas including South America proved a godsend logistically, as fruit was already largely in wineries come the start of lockdown.
South Africa proved to be an unenviable exception in many respects. Initially, harvesting and winemaking was banned, though this was soon reversed. But then a crippling export ban and longer-lasting restrictions on domestic sales ravaged the industry. Financial losses are estimated at billions of rand, and generic body Wines of South Africa thinks that anywhere up to 80 wineries and 350 growers may fail. Nonetheless, producers have reacted with typical brio – the likes of Bruce Jack (HeadStart Trust), Dirk Human of Black Oystercatcher winery and Rollo Gabb ( Journey’s End Foundation) have provided vital food and support for thousands.
Around the world, wine flowed into Zoom and Instagram Live as travel and events petered out. A flurry of re-bottled samples winged their way to becalmed tasters. Bordeaux managed – somehow – to make a decent fist of the 2019 en primeur campaign (‘It pushed us to reinvent ourselves,’ notes Véronique Sanders of Château Haut-Bailly. ‘Its success was a breath of fresh air in this difficult period.’) With bars and restaurants shuttered, consumption fell dramatically, despite the well-publicised sales bonanzas for some retailers (in the UK, overall alcohol consumption nearly halved during lockdown, falling from 2 billion litres to 1.3bn litres from April 2020-July 2020 versus the same period in 2019).
The following stories provide some insight into the realities of winemakers’ lockdown experiences. Challenges? No shortage of those. But positivity, supportiveness, hope, creativity, humour, resilience – and, yes, joy? That too. As Styles says: ‘You realised how significant a good meal or glass of wine actually was.’
into the winery, so I’m reliant on lots of smallbatch fermentations.’ Wilson plans to make 2,000 bottles of wine from 2020 under the Gutter & Stars label, including some barrelfermented Bacchus, orange Pinot Blanc, barrelaged Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.
My final question to Wilson is: why the mill? ‘Cellar door sales are an important part of my business model, so it helps being in a characterful building that’s 15 minutes’ walk from the town centre.
‘I hope people will enjoy visiting to see the windmill and taste the wines. It makes my commute very easy, too: just five minutes by bike. And who wouldn’t want to set up a winery in a windmill!’