Chinese investors buy another Hunter Valley winery
The Capercaillie vineyard in the NSW Hunter Valley has been sold to buyers from China. The 16-hectare property with five hectares under vine had been listed at $1.89 million by Alan Jurd and Cain Beckett from Jurd’s Real Estate.
It last sold for $400,000 in 1995.
It sold snappily after being listed in July. It’s the second purchase by Chinese buyers of Hunter Valley vineyards in two months. Last month a Chinese investor spent about $2.7 million on the Hunter Valley vineyard Windsor’s Edge. The 48-hectare property was also sold through Cain Beckett at Jurd’s Real Estate. The buyers were keen to shore up supplies of wine for bottle shop or liquor distribution in China.
Capercaillie Wine Company was established in the Hunter Valley by Alasdair and Trish Sutherland in 1995 when they built a small modern winery on a 20-year-old vineyard.
The five-hectare vineyard in Lovedale was originally planted in the late 1970s, mainly with chardonnay supplemented with a couple of acres of gewürztraminer.
In the 1990s Alasdair replanted a small portion of the ageing chardonnay with one hectare each of the two red varieties chambourcin and petit verdot.
Alasdair is a Scot, and his heritage is reflected in the very name “Capercaillie”. It is the Gaelic name given to the black woodlands grouse, native to the pine forests of Scotland.
To enhance the range of individual Hunter Valley wines, Alasdair has chosen select parcels of grapes from other proven regions of Australia, creating multi-area blends that highlight climatic and varietal differences.
