Virginia Wines Continue to Impress with 11 Decanter Awards

Coinciding with the opening of the London International Wine Fair Decanter has announced the winners of the Decanter World Wine Awards 2012 and Virginia claimed 11 medals!

Surprisingly, this number is down from previous years, but there were also fewer submissions. As you can see from the chart below in 2011 Virginia Wines won 14 awards and in 2010 they won 20. However, that coincides with a big push by the State of Virginia to get the wines recognized on the world stage, so there was a bigger push to submit wines.

The truth is many Virginia Wineries are not interested in selling outside of the sate, so there is little incentive to submit to award competitions like Decanter, especially with the much-improved Virginia Governor's Cup carrying so much more weight locally.

That being said, it is certainly a great honor to win the award and it is a sign that Virginia Wines continue to impress.

Justin Bogarty, owner of Veramar Vineyards, posted the following to Facebook:

This marks the fourth year in a row that Veramar Vineyard has received medals from Decanter magazine. “For us this is like the main attraction at a title boxing event! We may be consider the underdog wine region taking on the Champs – France, Italy and California. Not that we can deliver a knock-out blow, to someone that is 100 times, 200 times, or even 1000 times our size…but it is like getting a split decision from the judges .” said Justin Bogaty Winemaker Veramar Vineyard.

Equally we are also extremely pleased that other Virginia wineries like Breaux, Barboursville, Boxwood, and Williamsburg Winery were able to deliver glancing blows as well.

The Virginia Wines that won metals are:

• Barboursville Vineyards Octagon 2007


• Barboursville Vineyards Viognier Reserve 2010


• The Boxwood Winery Topiary 2007


• Breaux Vineyards Meritage 2007


• Breaux Vineyards Viognier 2010


• Veramar Vineyard Cabernet Franc 2010


• Veramar Vineyard Rooster Red NV


• Williamsburg Winery Adagio 2009


• Williamsburg Winery Gabriel Archer Reserve 2007


• Williamsburg Winery Vintage Reserve Chardonnay 2010


• Williamsburg Winery Virginia Trianon, Cabernet Franc 2007

5th Straight Year Virginia Wine Represents at London Wine Fair

Once again, Virginia Wines are taking their place on the world stage at the London International Wine Fair and this year they have a bigger presence than ever before.

Virginia Wines are located at Booth Q20 and this year they are featuring representatives from 9 wineries pouring 31 wines.

The wineries represented this year are:
Barboursville Vineyards
Boxwood Winery
Breaux Vineyards
Keswick Vineyards
King Family Vineyards
Michael Shaps Wines
Veritas Vineyard & Winery
White Hall Vineyards
Williamsburg Winery

This is the 5th year that Virginia Wine has been represented at the London International Wine Fair. Breaux Vineyards is one of the wineries that has been there all five years, I asked Jennifer Breaux her thoughts on the event:

We're proud to be on the worlds stage at the London International Wine Fair and grateful that we have the following in the UK that demands our presence there. With gratitude to our distributor to the UK, Chris Parker of New Horizons Wines, we're proud to say we are not only selling our wines successfully but also getting recognized by world-renowned writers and critics. This is the 5th year we've attended the fair and the 4th year we've entered the Decanter World Wine Awards, also held in the UK with results being given at LIWF. We've medaled each year and hold those decorations in the most high regard. It's a different market; it's the worlds most competitive wine market. If we succeed there, we consider ourselves successful overall

Congratulations to all of the wineries represented and if you are at the LIWF, stop by booth Q20 and say hi!

Update:
Lawrence Camp, who is representing Breaux Vineyards, added this quote:

This fair is unlike any other opportunity for Virginia wines... We are able to put our wines up against the best in the entire world and hear specific feedback and reactions to the products from some of the best palates in the business. We are hearing over and over again that our booth is all the "buzz" around the fair. The word is getting around the globe on Virginia wines - they are world-class, they are surprising expert drinkers regularly, and they are only getting better with each passing vintage. I'm incredibly honored and proud to have the chance to represent our state and it's wines in this amazing and exciting time for our industry.

(photos courtesy Lawrence Camp, Breaux Vineyards)

Notaviva Hires Local Radio Personality as Tasting Room Manager

In a move that I would normally consider odd, but in this case it makes perfect sense, Notaviva Vineyards has hired 92.5 WINC-FM radio personality Paula Kidwell, as their tasting room manager.

Notaviva, who's tag line is Wine paired with music. Pour. Listen. Believe.®, has always been as much about great music as great wine. It makes sense that they would want a tasting room manager who is well-connected in the local music scene. It also helps that Paula has been working in the tasting room since 2011.

From the press release Notaviva distributed:

"This is an exciting time for Notaviva Vineyards," says Stephen Mackey, co-founder and wine composer. "With our globally unique brand identity of pairing wine and music, Paula's vast experience and talent brings an entirely new dimension to our operation. In addition to managing the tasting room, Paula will oversee our wholesale and restaurant sales channels as we aggressively expand those opportunities."

More from the release:

"Most encouraging however," Stephen continues, "is the potential that Paula brings as Notaviva strategically pursues new media initiatives with our other company, creative agency Mesh Multimedia. The wine industry is rapidly embracing social networking and multimedia technologies to build brand loyalty and create differentiation. With our in-house audio and video production capabilities we are well positioned to exploit cutting-edge technologies for enhanced customer experiences."

Congratulations to Steven, Shannon and the whole team at Notaviva.

Friday Night #vawine Homework

Nominations opened today for the 2012 Wine Blog Awards. Looking over the categories Iwas struck by the lack of nominations for best winery blog (full disclosure: I nominated the Boxwood Winery Blog).

I truly believe Virginia has the best wine bloggers. Not just in terms of quality of writing, but the people behind the blogs are great people.

However, our winery blogs leave a lot to be desired. I know part of that comes from the fact that you have mostly family run wineries who don't have time to take care of the wine and blog, but it would still be nice to see more pop up. I have already mentioned Boxwood, some of the other good Virginia Winery Blogs that I know about are:

Notaviva Blog
Virginia Wine Works
Pippin Hill
Keswick Vineyard
Veramar
Rappahannock Cellars
Annefield Vineyards

These are not updated frequently (ahem, Jordan and Sebastien):
Sebastien Marquet (winemaker at Doukenie)
Tarara
Naked Mountain

Your homework assignment, dear readers, is to tell the world what other Virginia Wnery Blogs are out there that everyone should be reading. If you know of one, post it in the comments!