Treasury Wine is turning things around. The company’s shares are up 15% in ASX trade after it delivered significantly upgraded profit guidance. Treasury says earnings for the first half of the financial year will be around $20-30 million higher than analyst consensus. The company, which sells some famous wine brands including Penfolds, Wynns Coonawarra Estate, Wolf Blass, Lindeman’s, and Yellowglen, increased its presence in the US market with the acquisition of Diageo Wine last October for $US600 million.

RAINFALL across many parts of the Murray-Darling wine region has created conditions for botrytis bunch rot and delayed the harvesting of early-ripening white varieties. But Industry Development Officer for Murray Valley Winegrowers (MVW), David Coombes, says growers are restricted in their choice of preventative treatments at harvest time.

It all started when I grew weary of wine culture and the experience of drinking wine in general. Drinking alcohol should never make you feel dumb or belittled. It should never make you think, What the fuck is that? You should be able to pick up a wine list and feel comfortable and find things that are relatable, regardless of your prior wine knowledge. It’s just alcohol in a glass, after all. This level of casual comfort when ordering wine is what I have achieved with my wine menu at Hatchet Hall.

Church Road’s senior wine maker Chris Scott quit his accounting degree to study wine making in the Hawkes Bay and has never looked back. His Church Road Mcdonald Series Syrah took out the Champion Wine of the Show prize at the Air New Zealand Wine Awards.

Wines from Treasury Wine Estate’s Beringer and Matua vintners will be poured at the 22nd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards® and at the Post Awards Gala hosted by People Magazine and the Entertainment Industry Foundation, SAG Awards Committee Chair JoBeth Williams announced today.

Cool climate Shiraz from Australia will be the focus of the Wine & Viticulture Journal’s next regular tasting. Producers of these wines are invited to register their interest in the tasting by emailing Wine & Viticulture Journal editor Sonya Logan (s.logan@winetitles.com.au) by no later than next Thursday (28 January).

Custodians of a vineyard once owned by a famous Barossan pioneer, winemakers Bernadette Kaeding and Sam Kurtz make a small range of hand-crafted, single-vineyard red wines. A love for the Barossa and its rich history of great, full-flavoured reds led Kaeding and Kurtz in 1996 to buy a small plot of Grenache bush vines once farmed by pioneer Elmore Schulz. They say the site proved itself to be outstanding for growing vines for red wine.

John MacKinnon, Executive Sommelier at Shangri-La Hotels, Sydney, and Joel Beerden, a freelance writer, have received recognition for their exceptional WSET examination results in the last academic year. MacKinnon, who completed the WSET Level 4 Diploma in Wines and Spirits, won the Fine Wine Partners (FWP) Scholarship and will receive a $1,000 grant towards further wine studies and $1,000 towards a cellar from FWP’s portfolio, as well as an engraved Spiegelau decanter. MacKinnon said he was “honoured and humbled in receiving this award”.

TOM Guthrie will never forget the sight of the massive wall of flames coming over the hill and realising there was nothing he could do to fight it. Only five per cent of his 1300-hectare property, Thermopylae, was untouched by the Mt Lubra fire on January 22, 2006. The 3.2-hectare Grampians Estate vineyard he ran with his wife Sarah was all but destroyed as fire swept across the property.

Treasury Wine Estates, the owner of brands including Penfolds, Wolf Blass and Rosemount, has upgraded its profit forecasts after strong sales, with the China business a standout as demand continues to rise for the flagship Penfolds brand. Treasury chief executive Mike Clarke said on Thursday after the sharemarket closed that there had been a strong first-half result across all of the main regions, which include Asia, Australia and the United States.