Askerne Estate

Thirty years on, with two of their three daughters workin gin the business, Askeren Estate Winery is hitting its straps, with 10 major awards in 2022 a bustling cellar door they expanded "immensely" during the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the purchase of a neighbouring block last year.

Hawke’s Bay makes “some absolutely fantastic wines that are world class”, says John, who works outside of the business in corporate and governance roles, while Kathryn runs Askerne, named for the Yorkshire village she grew up in. “And they represent enormously good value for money,” he adds, lamenting the fact that a Hawke’s Bay wine can be fetched for a quarter of the price of comparable wines from established wine regions. New Zealand is not a cheap place to produce anything, with its absence of cheap land, cheap labour or cheap capital, he says. “So we have to find ways for people to appreciate the fantastic things we can do and pay a price that reflects that appreciation.” That’s going to require wineries to continue improving their quality and growing their marketing skills, as well as a collective effort “to build the brand and reputation, for the region and for the country”, he says.

Askerne has grown quietly and carefully since John and Kathryn arrived in Hawke’s Bay 30 years ago, having each done an extramural winemaking and viticulture course through Eastern Institute of Technology (EIT), with a “loose idea” of becoming winegrowers. When they moved from Wellington, Kathryn managed the plantings and ran the estate, while John continued to work in business governance, including six years as Chief Executive of the meat company Richmond Limited, five years as Chair of Zespri, and a few years at the turn of the century as Chair of Hawke’s Bay Winegrowers, of which he was made a life member last year.

In 2000 they bought another 9ha bare block, which grew again last year with the purchase of an adjoining 12ha. “One of the interesting things about the wine industry is you need to have a certain size to have efficiencies of scale,” John says. “But at the same time if you get too big it’s hard to have high prices. You are balancing the need to have an efficient cost structure with the ability to have a premium price . . . marketing is a key part but that’s the balance you have to strike - and it's not easy."

Askerne Estate remains “absolutely boutique”, with exports to three countries but the bulk of its sales through the cellar door. For a long time that cellar door - which opened in 1997 - was “virtually a room in the corner of the shed”, until they made expansion plans on the cusp of the Covid-19 pandemic. “We came through the first lockdown and had big conversation about whether we press the ‘go’ button or pause and see if it plays out,” John says. “We pressed ‘go’ and have never looked back.”

A great run of wines from 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 put the cellar door on a good footing, and community support has well exceeded their expectations, says John as he describes the success of supplying gourmet picnic treats at the cellar door so people can enjoy deli cheese, salami and olives with their wines. “It’s great to see international tourists, but they buy by the bottle. Locals, if you do it properly, buy by the case. So we’re pretty fond of the locals.”

To top off a year of success, Askerne Estate Winery’s 2021 Reserve Chardonnay took out the Supreme Champion Wine at the Aotearoa Regional Wine Competition, and Askerne won a trophy apiece for the 2021 Gewürztraminer and 2021 Viognier at the The National Wine Awards of Aotearoa New Zealand, also announced late last year.

It’s been a rewarding 30 years, during which time Hawke’s Bay’s wine industry has “changed immensely”. There were major plantings underway when they arrived in 1993, including the Gimblett Gravels and Bridge Pa areas, John says. Plenty of “longstanding players” remain, “but there have been an awful lot come and go over the years as well”, he adds. “People have tried in the industry and not succeeded.” Meanwhile newer entities and “fresh faces” have brought a renewed interest to the Hawke’s Bay region, and the broad range of varieties and styles made give Hawke’s Bay’s wine industry a rich character. “Most things seem to work reasonably well here and some things really, really well.”

John says the collegiality of New Zealand’s wine industry plays a big role in its success. “The collective offering from New Zealand is really fantastic, in that we can all enhance what each other does. No one lets the side down – everyone produces fantastic things that they can do consistently really well.”