In focus: Celebrity collaborations in Aussie wine

Celebrity wine collaborations provide a golden opportunity to attract new consumers to the wine category, but, in order to succeed, there has to be a genuine purpose behind the partnership, finds Lucy Shaw.

Everyone is at it. From Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, who, despite separating in 2016, continue to make wine together with Marc Perrin at Château Miraval in Provence, to Jurassic Park star Sam Neill in New Zealand, whose Central Otago Pinots sell for £45 a pop, celebrity wines are no longer a gimmick and deserve to be taken seriously. Their pulling power was demonstrated in July when the entire run of a limited-edition charity wine released by American rock band Pearl Jam to help tackle homelessness in their home city of Seattle sold out within 15 minutes of the news being announced.

It was a similar story for Pitt and Jolie when they released the first 6,000 bottles of their debut 2012 vintage of Miraval Rosé in March 2013 via the Perrin family website. Having gone on sale at 9am, by 2pm all 6,000 bottles had been snapped up at the wallet-friendly price of €15 (£13.60) a bottle; a price the couple could have comfortably doubled and still sold out of, should they have wanted to. The rise of celebrity wine collaborations in Australia is proving a popular way to introduce a new audience to the wine category, one that might otherwise be sipping beer or downing Tequila shots.

Early to the Australian celebrity wine party was cricketer Shane Warne, as well known for his controversial antics off the pitch as his skill on it. In 2002, Warne partnered with Zilzie Wines, a 30,000-tonne operation near Mildura in northwest Victoria, on the Shane Warne Collection. The range was formed of just two wines made from Victoria fruit: a Chardonnay and a red blend made from Cabernet, Merlot and Petit Verdot. At the time of the launch, Warne was candid about his lack of wine knowledge, telling the Sydney Morning Herald: “It took me a while to understand what Chardonnay is and what red wine is. I didn’t even know what made a red and a white different.”

Former cricketer Sir Ian Botham launched a three-tier range of Australian wines this year

The paper described the Chardonnay as “resinous and a little alcoholic”, but was a little kinder about the red, which it found to be “textural and leafy, with some good tannin grip”. Proving a celebrity name is not enough to ensure success, Warne’s wines failed to bowl people over, and the brand ceased production after just one vintage.

Heavy involvement Another cricketer to have entered the wine game is Sir Ian Botham, though in stark contrast to Warne, ‘Beefy’ Botham couldn’t be more serious about wine, and is heavily involved in the blending process in his three-tier range, which recently launched in the UK amid much fanfare at Lord’s Cricket Ground.

As he told db in our exclusive interview in August, Botham is keen not to be called a ‘celebrity winemaker’, as he believes it implies he’s simply stuck his name on an existing product rather than made the wine himself.

As it happens, Botham became so involved with the production process that he ended up dictating the composition of certain blends, adding an increasing amount of fruit from Margaret River to his entry-level Chardonnay the way a chef might season his dishes with salt, taking the blend, which retails at £8, from 10% Margaret River fruit to 30% – meaning the final consumer gets a lot of bang for their buck. The Botham collection is the brainchild of former Accolade CEO Paul Schaafsma, who put his cunning plan to the former cricketer over breakfast in Sydney two years ago.

Botham’s top tier Chardonnay

Botham wanted in on the project, so long as he had final sign-off on the wines, something Schaafsma admits he “should have taken more seriously” at the time. In a similar story to the All-Rounder Chardonnay, Botham insisted on including 30% Coonawarra fruit in the final blend of his entry-level Cabernet. Developed and sold through Schaafsma’s distribution company, Benchmark Drinks, Schaafsma believes the Botham range will attract consumers who are often left baffled by the bewildering level of choice confronting them in supermarket wine aisles.

“Most UK shoppers will never meet a winemaker in their lives. When they go to buy wine, they’re looking for a cue that makes them feel comfortable and gives them confidence in the bottle they’re buying. A creek, hill or ridge they’ve never heard of doesn’t necessarily convey that,” says Schaafsma. “It’s easy to be cynical about celebrity wines but there’s definitely a place for them, as consumers are looking for brands they can trust, but it’s important that the wine inside the bottle is compelling and represents value for money, otherwise we’re misleading the consumer.”

Schaafsma believes the success of a celebrity wine depends on the star behind it and their intentions for the brand. “Ian is in it for the long haul, and wants to spend the next 20 years making wine. His passion for the project adds authenticity and gravitas to the wines,” says Schaafsma, who has a 50% stake in the Botham brand, and plans to sell it all over the world. “We’re partners for life on it.”

But does the end consumer really care whether the star whose name is on the label actually made the wine or not? Schaafsma thinks so. “When I think of Brangelina’s rosé I picture them drinking it on a terrace in Provence, even though they’re no longer together. People buy wine for emotive reasons and want to feel that the celebrity has been involved in making it,” he says.

Schaafsma’s collaboration is savvy, as he of all people knows how hard it is to create a successful wine brand from scratch in the UK, and with the Botham range he’s able to capitalise on Beefy’s revered reputation from the get-go. Celebrity wines Schaafsma is no stranger to celebrity wines, having recently worked with New Zealand producer Invivo to launch a Graham Norton wine range in the UK, which is the fastest-growing New Zealand wine brand in Britain.

He also helped engineer Hardys’ sponsorship of the England cricket team when he was at Accolade; a multi-million-pound consumer campaign that came complete with a series of tongue-in-cheek adverts that playfully questioned the capabilities of the England squad. The adverts, which continue to run ahead of the Ashes in England next year, have added nearly 50p to the average bottle price of Hardys in the UK. In May, Hardys injected a further £1 million into a new ad campaign, called The Rules According to Hardys, focusing on cricket’s quirky rules and how Brits interpret them. David White, Accolade’s marketing director, says: “We have consistently invested in Hardys sponsorship of the England cricket team over the past few years, and have established our credentials as a long-term supporter of English cricket.”

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Neil McGuigan partnered with chef John Torode on a range designed to “take the ponciness out of food and wine matching”

Another leading Aussie wine brand harnessing the power of celebrity is Jacob’s Creek, owned by drinks giant Pernod Ricard, which late last year enlisted the help of Avengers hunk Chris Hemsworth to promote its Double Barrel range, which includes a Cabernet aged in Irish whiskey barrels and a Chardonnay rested in Scotch casks.

Melbourne-born Hemsworth, who become a local star during his stint in popular soap Home and Away, and shot to international fame as Marvel superhero Thor in the 2011 film of the same name, narrates a Double Barrel advert that has so far aired in Australia and is due to be rolled out in other global markets, including the US.

In February, Hemsworth visited Jacob’s Creek in the Barossa Valley, with his actor wife Elsa Pataky, to meet winemaker Ben Bryant and learn how Double Barrel is made. During his visit, Hemsworth ‘blessed’ some of the Double Barrel vines with wine in a parcel that has since been renamed the Hemsworth Block. “As someone who travels a lot, I’m always looking for things that remind me of home, and a glass of Double Barrel does just that,” says Hemsworth.

The visit was Instagram gold for Jacob’s Creek, as Hemsworth shared a selection of pictures from his winery tour on his feed, which generated more than a million likes on the photo-sharing app. “Most of our consumers are on social media now, so it’s important to have a presence there, and very important that we talk to our community online,” says Derek Oliver, Jacob’s Creek’s global marketing director.

While he won’t reveal how much Pernod paid Hemsworth to promote Double Barrel, Oliver says the collaboration has “paid for itself’ in terms of the publicity it has provided the brand. “Working with Chris has given us a fantastic opportunity to tell the Double Barrel story to a global audience,” Oliver says. “With his distinctive Australian voice, Chris was the ideal narrator for the advert, and the perfect fit for the brand, as he embodies its values.” Being a Hollywood heartthrob, family man, and one of the most in-demand actors on the planet doesn’t do any harm either.

YellowTail was the first wine brand in the world to air an advert during the Super Bowl

Oliver views celebrity wine collaborations as a positive trend, so long as there is a genuine passion on the part of the celebrities involved. “Anything that can help stimulate the growth of the wine industry is a good thing. Celebrity collaborations are common in spirits, and the wine trade needs them for it to continue to grow. I’m all for them when the values of the celebrity and brand are aligned,” he says.

A less obvious but no less successful pairing of a celebrity and a wine brand hit our screens last year when Australian model Ellie Gonsalves appeared in a white bikini reminiscent of the one worn by Ursula Andress in the 1962 Bond film Dr. No, in a 30-second YellowTail advert that aired during the Super Bowl – the first wine brand to do so in the sporting event’s history.

The advert, which features Brisbane-born Gonsalves petting a kangaroo in yellow sunglasses on the beach, aired in 70 countries, reaching an estimated 100 million households. While some Australian wine brands are using humour to connect with consumers, others are playing on wine’s natural affinity with food to engage a new audience.

Keen to “take the ponciness out of food and wine matching”, for the past four years McGuigan Wines in the Hunter Valley has partnered with Melbourne-born, London-based celebrity chef and MasterChef judge John Torode on a bespoke range of wines, which includes a Hunter Valley Semillon launched in 2014; a Provence-inspired Pinot Noir rosé released in 2016; and an Adelaide Hills Tempranillo, which hit supermarket shelves this spring.

The collaboration came about organically in 2012, after wine lover Torode created 50 recipes to match with McGuigan wines, which appeared on a food-and-wine matching website launched by McGuigan and Torode a year later. “Following on from the success of the recipes, it seemed a natural progression to collaborate with John on wines that would be the ideal partner for food,” says Neil McGuigan, McGuigan’s chief winemaker and CEO. “The wine industry has a reputation for being stuffy. We wanted to try to break this down by making consumers feel comfortable, and giving them the confidence to ask questions.”

Torode has done more than lend his name to the wines, and, like Botham, gets involved in what often become quite heated discussions with McGuigan during blending. “John is very creative and inquisitive, and has a different perspective of the consumer to me, which leads us to come up with interesting wine styles,” says McGuigan, who is encouraging of the idea of celebrity hook-ups so long as the collaborations are genuine and add something to the wines.

“Endorsing wine is different to aftershave, watches and cars. Consumers aren’t silly – collaborations need to be real and have a genuine purpose rather than being a rebadged marketing gimmick, which can end up being detrimental to both the brand and the celebrity,” he says.

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De Bortoli has launched a wine range featuring pattern designs by Florence Broadhurst

Such is the power of celebrities, they don’t even need to be alive to help sell wine. As part of its 90th birthday celebrations, Yarra Valley-based De Bortoli recently inked a deal giving the winery exclusive rights to the archives of wallpaper and fabric designer Florence Broadhurst in Australia, New Zealand, the UK, US, Asia and the Middle East. Born in Queensland in 1899, and known for her brightly coloured, hand-printed geometric designs, Broadhurst lived an eventful life, joining the Australian Women’s Voluntary Services and offering hospitality to Australian soldiers during World War II.

Having set up her wallpaper business at 60, in 1977 the then 82-year-old Broadhurst was bludgeoned to death with a large piece of timber in her Sydney studio, and her murder remains a mystery. attract New consumers To celebrate Broadhurst’s designs, De Bortoli will be using a number of her patterns on the labels of a new range, which will launch this year with a botrytis Semillon featuring one of Broadhurst’s floral motifs.

“Celebrity collaborations help to attract new consumers to the category and bring excitement to existing customers, adding a new dimension to a wine,” says Louise Poh, De Bortoli’s marketing manager.

Chester Osborn of d’Arenberg has become an Australian wine celebrity in his own right

While cherry-picked celebrities are proving invaluable marketing tools to certain wine brands, others benefit from having winemakers at their helm that are celebrities in their own right.

One such estate is d’Arenberg in the McLaren Vale, whose chief winemaker, Chester Osborn, is as well known for his wayward blond curls, loud shirts and bulging box of props as he is for the 74 wines he makes each year for his family brand.

Playing up to his role as the wild man of wine, Osborn dressed up as the eccentric Roald Dahl character Willy Wonka in a recent photo shoot for Aussie newspaper The Advertiser to promote his ambitious new entertainment space, the Cube – a Wonka-like four-story, multi-million-dollar architectural space featuring a virtual fermenter, an art gallery, a fine-dining restaurant and a fog room.

“In the wine trade you need to be noticed and remembered – that’s the only way that you’re going to stand out. People think I’m wacky but wine is part of the entertainment industry and people going out for dinner want to be entertained alongside having good food and wine,” says Osborn.

“I’m deadly serious about my wine until it ends up in the bottle, from then on it should be fun.” As part of his role as a brand ambassador, Osborn spreads the gospel of d’Arenberg at dinners, tastings and events around the world, which, he admits, can be both physically and mentally demanding, particularly when battling jet lag.

Peter Gago of Penfolds is the recognisable face of the brand

“I was fortunate in being diagnosed as an extreme extrovert, so when I go out I gain energy, which is useful when I’m hosting these events. Part of the reason why I have all these props with me at dinners is to help me have fun, because it could get monotonous telling the same winemaking story over and over, with a couple of jokes thrown in,” he admits.

Another Australian winemaker who has grown to become a celebrity in his own right is Peter Gago, the face of Penfolds, who lives and breathes the brand. So much so, he admits, that the promotional side of the business has taken its toll on him.

“I’ve been doing this for 29 years, and the jet lag and sleep depravation can be brutal when you’re on the road. I came back half a stone lighter from a 10-week trip around the US and Canada. Business travel isn’t very glamorous, and my life would be a lot easier if I just stuck to winemaking,” he says.

While admitting to working “a ridiculous number of hours”, Gago does it out of choice. “I’m not evangelical about it but Penfolds isn’t a family-owned company, so if I don’t pass the baton on who will?”

While Gago says his role has seen him rub shoulders with “kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers”, he most enjoys sharing the Penfolds story – and a glass or three of wine – with unassuming consumers. The friendships he’s developed with the brand’s most ardent fans are genuine. “You can buy networking but you have to earn friendship. I’ve grown old with some of these people,” he says.

While wines are all made in a similar way, it’s the stories behind them that make them different and help consumers to remember certain brands. In our increasingly impatient world, images resonate more immediately than words, and so long as there is a genuine reason behind a collaboration, having a famous face endorsing your wines can be a seriously savvy way to boost sales. And, of course, the brands with bigger marketing budgets will be able to snare the biggest stars and engage with the widest audience.

With wine facing increasing competition from craft beer and cocktails, and a growing number of millennials shunning alcohol altogether, the industry needs to use every trick in the book to not only attract but keep a new generation of consumers interested in and engaged with wine. “The likes of Angelina Jolie add spice and interest to wine, which doesn’t traditionally get a lot of column inches – anything that can help put wine in front of people is a good thing,” believes Osborn. Gago agrees, and believes winemakers have a duty to entertain. “Wine should be about hedonism and enjoyment, and you have to earn your applause. People have paid money to come and see you so it’s their show.”