Champagne Indage makes its third Australian acquisition; buys premium winery VineCrest

Mumbai:  India's oldest and largest winemaker, Champagne Indage Limited, has acquired Australia's VineCrest, a highly rated premium boutique winery at the Barossa valley, in an all cash transaction, for a yet to be disclosed amount, through its overseas subsidiary, Champagne Indage Limited (Australia).

In March this year it had bought over the boutique Loxton winery in Sonoma from Australian Vintage Ltd.

VineCrest is the  Indian vintner's  third Australian acquisition and helps it complement its earlier acquisition of Thachi Wines in South Australia in 2007, which helped it acquire a global foot print. Thachi has contractual arrangements for vineyards and a winery in Australia, and processes 2.7 million litres of wine a year. Its acquisition provides a ready market for Champagne Indage to sell its own brands in these countries through the Thachi distribution network and bottle its unbranded wines in India for the domestic markets as a premium product of Australian origin.

The Thachi brands include Broken Earth, Red Skies and South Bay and are being rolled out globally including India. In Australia, China and Europe it sells its wines under the Broken Earth brand name. 

The VineCrest acquisition will facilitate Champagne Indage Australia basing its operations in Barossa, the most sought after and highly awarded wine growing region of Australia, and provide a premium image to all the Thachi brands.

VineCrest, established in the late 1960's is a boutique family owned winery producing premium wines of individual character and style from their own vineyards situated in the heart of the Barossa Valley and is focused on makingFine Barossa Wine, which forms part of the winery's registered name. VineCrest has received several accolades such as that from the Winestate magazine which rated VineCrest Sparkling Shiraz with 5 stars, adding to the 41/2 star rating for its 1999 and 2001 VineCrest Semillon and 2002 VineCrest Merlot. It is a highly rated boutique winery and vineyard in South Australia.

"Our interest in VineCrest is due to the fact that they have been producing some of the finest quality of wines over the years and therefore are highly reputed all over Australia," said Ranjit S Chougule, managing director, Champagne Indage Ltd. ''The acquisition of VineCrest is yet another strategic step towards expanding our global portfolio of iconic brands. The business comes with the premium Barossa Valley vineyards and therefore all operations will take place at the estate level. Besides, their cellar door sale will ensure that the consumers have direct access to the wines, cutting down on the distribution costs to a large extent.''

Champagne Indage Ltd was established in 1982. With vineyards spread over 2500 hectares, it has its facilities in Narayangaon, Nasik and Himachal Pradesh with 20 varieties under commercial plantation and over 137 varietals under nursery cultivation. It has presence across the globe with 10 offices and more than 600 employees.
 
The company has deployed the state-of-the-art technology at its manufacturing facility with the largest wine production facility in India, with a capacity of 15 million litres at Narayangaon with a bottling capacity of 15,000 bottles per hour and multiple manufacturing facilities across India, which ensures minimal lead time and consistency in supplies across the country. It has also recently launched a domestically produced vodka brand called 'Just' and 'Carrera xxx' rum.
 
Champagne Indage is the first sparkling wine producing and exporting company of India, exporting to 69 countries across the globe. Their range of exquisite wines like Chantilli, Ivy, the flamboyant Marquise de Pompadour and many more have won flurry of awards ranging from the International Wine and Spirit Competition (IWSC), held annually at London to Wine Style Asia from Singapore to national levels at the INDY's. It also holds the honour for being listed in the world wine encyclopedia and is revered by wine critiques from Jancis Robinson to Oz Clarke.