Lonely Grape TV visits the Free Range Gallery.

Piazza Della Valle

James has been photographing the 'Piazza Della Valle' - Town Square in the valley project. The Piazza is a community designed meeting place for the heart of McLaren Vale. Viva Vale.

The Art of Wine Launch

Why McLaren Vale for vineyards?

The technical reasons behind the hype.

This week I have been doing some volunteer work developing some grape growing information for the McLaren Vale Visitors Centre. This Visitors Centre is staffed by volunteers who represent the region and help face the hundreds of tourists who visit McLaren Vale each day. We all recognise the value of these volunteers and the work they do on the regions behalf. It is important they are armed with information to help guide the visitors to our region.

One of the interesting questions they are often asked by tourist is ‘Why is McLaren Vale good for grape growing?’

McLaren Vale has come a long way in the last ten years. From relative obscurity the region has risen to be recognised as a producer of some of the world’s best red wine.

Why is McLaren Vale one of the new world’s best wine regions? You often hear quotes about how the quality of our wines is helped by the regions climate. This got me thinking how many people realise just how special the McLaren Vale region is? Unless we all realise how special it is there is a risk, as farming goes through some hard times, that productive and wonderful land will be chopped up for housing.

McLaren Vale wines are distinguished by their ripeness, elegance, structure, power and complexity.

This is because McLaren Vale is an ideal location. The Mediterranean climate of warm, dry days and cool nights during the growing season assists in development of intense flavour and colour in our wines. Good winter rainfall satisfies the water requirement of the vines until late in the season when some top up is made with subterranean water from our well regulated aquifer, or alternatively from recycled water.

During summer our climate is often shielded from extremely hot weather by the Gulf of St Vincent and the Mt Lofty Ranges. If it rained more in summer or if the region was hit by frosts or heat waves our grape growing would be less reliable.

The grape growers of McLaren Vale have a particular way of speaking about their produce. An old-time McLaren Vale grape grower calls their red wine making fruit- ‘my black grapes’. Modern testing techniques have shown they are right! McLaren Vale Shiraz produces some of the highest colour scores in grapes ever recorded. The grapes are not soft red like other regions. When they are ripe they leave a purple stain.

The reason is simple - small berry size. Smaller berries have a higher skin: pulp ratio. Berry skin contains flavournols (Anti-sunburn in grapes, 'flavour' in wine), Anthocynins (colour) and other complex molecules that add to wine complexity. Grape pulp contains sugar and water. Therefore the more skin to pulp the more complex the wine. Think the circumference of a circle to the area. The bigger the circle the greater the internal area.

Berry size in McLaren Vale is controlled by the vigour and nutrient status of the vine at certain specific times in the vines growth. Regulated Deficient Irrigation (RDI) is a technique to keep berry size small but not overly reduce the final yield. RDI involves placing a moderate water stress on the vines for a period after flowering has finished. This can occur naturally, and is the reason that McLaren and Barossa have been historically been areas for fortified port and table wine. The dry weather in McVale helps because low summer rainfall gives us much better control of soil moisture, the same in the Barossa, in the Coonawarra although it gets much more rainfall, the soil is shallow and runs out of water at about the right time.

While McLaren Vale is best known for producing outstanding Shiraz, the region’s ideal climate and diverse vineyard sites- ‘terrior’ lends itself to ideal grape growing conditions for producing a number of varieties which we are only just exploring.

We make world class Grenache and Cabernet Sauvignon and McLaren Vale grape growers are utilising the region’s diverse range of climates and soils has led to experimentation with emerging varieties such as the fresh whites Fiano, Savagnin, Marsanne and the strong red Tempranillo.

It would be a shame not to continue to work on our natural advantages and protect our wonderful farming land for the future.

The Art of Wine Invite

James Hook the Art of Wine 2009

The art of social media.

In 2004 I started an elaborate hobby. My hobby has become my job. Your hobby or passion could become yours. Social media can allow you to create a business from your kitchen table. It is ideal for artists, musicians and small family businesses.
I starting making wine and fortunately it proved to be good. It allowed me to continue the next year. Each release sold well and in turn I was able to reinvest each year and grow a little business. Over time I managed to drag my whole family into the wine industry. Fast forward to today and together we now run a cellar door with the full complications and workload that entails.

One of the most important things that has allowed this to happen is the new phenomenon of social media. Along the way it has help my business grow. It has become so important that social media I am not sure I would have a chance in the tough world that is wine.

Let me explain.

The burn around social media often centers on the technologies like Facebook, blogs, Twitter, etc. etc. But it isn’t all about gadgets. The power of social media is that it's about the relationships it builds and supports, not the technologies. I have been able to talk to customers all over the world from my living room. With my computer I have gained peers and supporter from all sorts of places, I can talk to them and they can talk to me at anytime.

You might think that I spend all day chatting about the weather, but in reality I am able to build awareness about my wines on no budget at all. I can find out what is happening in big markets of Sydney and Melbourne without leaving my home in Adelaide.
Usefully many wine journalist and media are online too. I don’t have to have a large marketing budget or conduct awareness campaigns. In just a few simple messages I can let them know what I am up to.

In my industry a well run marketing awareness campaign, whether it be a wine neck tag offering a prize, a celebrity endorsement, or a new cute koala label – or whatever – can do incredibly well for the wine producer. It is also very expensive and I can guarantee this, at the end of the day the wine producer (through market intelligence etc) may know who buys their wine, but I guarantee they don’t know them personally!

Well get this… the world is changing, and if you produce anything and you are not actively attempting to know your customer personally, through the tools that are now available, then you could be in trouble.

My tips to any small family business.

- Be yourself and be genuine.

- Go ahead and create profiles of yourself or your passion on all the social networks. This will give you contacts in an up-to-date list for when you have a new album out or news about your gigs.

- Take time to talk to other similar businesses or those with interest you find.

- Create a blog with an RSS feed for people to receive updates on your art directly, and create a homepage on the web you can direct traffic to through social networks.

- Take lots of photos of what you are doing. People are interested in what it takes to put that show, or art work, or wine together.

- Build a list of trade publications, blogs etc. who might cover what you make or are involved with. When you have news, organize it into a clean document for them with images and samples, and present it to them in a personal, direct manner. Publications are always looking for new stories and people to write on, you’d be surprised how responsive they’ll be for an excited, up-and-comer who is pitching them in a respectful manner.

The social media revolution is just starting and it has been a total revelation to me. I’ve not only helped keep my family business going, I have met some incredible people and they have become my friends. And yes, sometimes we do talk about the weather, but you would be surprised how interested people can be in that!

James Hook makes Lazy Ballerina -www.lazyballerina.com in McLaren Vale. He is a wine blogger and photographer on www.jameshookwine.blogspot.com and tweets on www.twitter.com/lazyballerina

Lazy Ballerina 2008 wine launch

Lazy Ballerina Release