Please let me know your opinions:

How important is regional identity in the Australian wine industry?

For producers from such regions as Barossa, Padthaway and McLaren Vale I'm sure their vineyards and sense of history and terroir are very important to them as they have alot of family wineries.

Thanks for your reply. Can you say a little more about the wines that represent their regions of Oz? I am pretty new to this part of the world. Thanks mate!

For Padthaway I like Henry's Drive Shiraz. For Barossa I like Glaetzer shiraz wines. And for McLaren Vale I like Mitolo and d'Arenberg shiraz based wines.

Long Flat wines have rested their whole philosophy on the "proper varietal from the proper location"....

http://www.opiciimports.com/portfolio_product.asp?Product_ID=390
The Eden Valley Reisling got a WS 90 pt rating
So...... naturally they changeed it to Clare Valley Riesling!!!!
Tough sell without proper press...

Please share your thoughts on this essay:

How important is regional identity in the Australian wine industry?

Regional identity in the Australian wine industry is of ever increasing importance in the world marketplace. While each Australian region has offered unique wine styles for many years, the high volume production of Brand Champion types of wine has overshadowed the regional dimensions. There are over sixty wine regions with a large diversity of terroir that impacts the wine styles produced.

According to the Wine Australia, the foreign market had, up until recently, perceived Australian wines as “wines from anywhere” as opposed to “wines from somewhere.” While some popularly sought after good quality wines continue to be produced from grapes cross-state, other quality wines come from individual regions whose climate and topography are most conducive for producing specific grape varieties and wine styles.

Wine Australia has established a marketing campaign that categorizes the wines, of which several would support the importance of regional identity:

Regional Heroes are wines that are produced in one specific region. These wines are marketed to the public with specific interest in the correlation between the area they are produced and the grape variety or wine style. Some examples include Pinot Noir from Mornington Peninsula, Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon, Hunter Valley Semillon, Eden Valley Riesling, Chardonnay from Margaret River or Yarra Yarra, spicy style Shiraz from the Grampians, and Grenache/Syrah blending from McLaren Vale.

Landmark Australia wines come from highly distinctive soils within micro climates conducive to producing some of the finest wines. The vines are low-yielding and the wines are typically made from the varieties classic for their respective regions. The wines have high intensity in flavor concentration. These are typically based on “regional heroes” as well as on endorsements by wine writers who give high ratings. Some examples include Henry’s Drive Shiraz Padthaway Reserve, Wolf Blass Shiraz/Cabernet blend from South Australia, Leeuwin Chardonnay Margaret River, and Ninth Island Pinot Noir Tasmania.

Generation Next wines are made by winemakers who innovate wine styles with creative blending. Generation Next wines are also made with some new international grape varieties that are being planted in wine regions whose terroir is suited for growing these respective varieties well. These wines are geared toward an audience who drink primarily for the social occasion rather than for specific wine attributes. While regional identity is not as dogmatic with this wine category, there is still an interconnection of terroir and grape in that today’s Australian vine growers are planting varieties like Tempranillo and Sangiovese in soils that the growers know will support this new growth.

While Landmark Australia and Generation Next wines are not mandated by law to be 100% from one specific region or grape variety, many producers are more region specific as part of the way to educate the public and gain loyal followings. Further, vineyard owners are not legally limited to specific grape varieties for specific regions. In addition, winemakers are free to blend their varietal wines as long as there is at minimum 85% of that one variety. Irrigation is permitted which allows for better vineyard management control during drier vintages.

The less astringent Australian wine laws compared to those of the European regions have allowed the winemakers to become more innovative with their blending. This leniency also allows vine growers to plant grapes appropriate for the respective regions. Many wine educators and trade associations have successfully raised the status of Australian wine and continue to raise consumer expectations about the various wine regions. This country’s success is substantiated by the fact that Australia is the fourth largest exporter of wine, selling wine to over one hundred countries, all of which bring over 5 billion dollars to Australia’s economy.

"Brand Australia" was seen as a cheap and cheerful range of wines and was represented as sunshine in a bottle. "They are all taste the same to me" was one of the unfortunate consequences of the successful brand Australia campaign.

Brand Australia worked extremely well up until the start of this decade, when it slowly started to become tired. Competition in both the UK and the US markets increased. Many of the newer wine drinkers in the US found their palates were maturing and that many of the wines that they had initially liked, many of which had been recommended by Parker, were no longer as attractive to them.

The Australian wine industry had to try and change its image because sunshine in a bottle was becoming a problem. The larger producers like Hardys/Constellation finally realised the race to the bottom of the market was a race to disaster. There is no point in selling a gazillion million trillion bottles a month if you lose 10 cents on every one of them. Given Australia's overheads, there is no way we could ever continue to be the low-cost producer. The situation has been made increasingly more difficult due to the drought. We have gone from having a huge wine lake, to having a shortfall of a number of varieties of grapes; to the point that we are now importing some bulk wine.

For the long-term survival of the Australian wine industry, the price per litre of wine exports has to increase. The only way of doing that is to give the market a higher quality product that can be differentiated from its competitors. That differentiation has got to be able to stand up to both external (overseas) and internal (other Australian producers) competition.

Over time, you will see more about "regionality" emerging in relationship to Australian wine. The world needs to know that a Yarra Valley Shiraz tastes absolutely nothing like a Barossa Shiraz; and a Margaret River Cabernet Sauvignon bears no relationship to the same grape variety branded as "product of South East Australia."

Will it work? Only time will tell, but the old sunshine in a bottle philosophy had been dead for years before the Australian wine industry finally decided to bury it. And like anything that had been dead for a while, it was starting to smell.

Two weeks ago, I had diner with John Larchet, president of the Australian Premium Wine Collection export group, and we talked at length about his commitment to working with producers that are committed to creating wines that really showcase the terroir of the far-flung winegrowing regions of Australia. I was also fortunate enough to sample a few dozen of his wines at one large tasting, and I can now tell you from personal experience that ‘regional identity’ among Australian wines is not just some marketing scam.

Of course, Napa pinot is distinct from say a Sonoma Coast product. Why, then, would one expect a Frankland River riesling to taste like one produced in the Clare Valley?