Domaine de Grand Pre, Nova Scotia Wines, Tourism
Interview Discussing Grand Pre Wine, Le Caveau, Food and Drink
Aug 17, 2009
S101 : Mr. Stutz, can you tell me a little bit more about Domaine de Grand Pré, what is the history behind your vineyard, restaurant, and winery – and how did you choose this location?
Domaine de Grand Pré : Grand Pré Wines / Domaine de Grand Pré is the oldest winery in Atlantic Canada. I was here in Nova Scotia on the request of a customer of mine in Switzerland; he had asked me to come to Nova Scotia to give him my opinion on a large farming project. I heard there was a winery for sale, and I was astonished. Wine in Nova Scotia! Wine in Canada! At the time Niagara was not on the radar, and neither was the Okanagan Valley.
I brought a friend of mine with me to view the premises and had three main points to consider.
The first is location – it's always about location. The slope of the land was perfect, an hour from Halifax and Dartmouth, an hour away from the Halifax International Airport, directly off Highway 101, minutes from a National Historic Site – Grand Pré Park, minutes away from a vibrant, beautiful university town, Wolfville. The gateway to the Annapolis Valley. All of these really solidified my decision with regards to location of the winery.
The second point to me was very interesting, it has to do with wine, wine drinking, wine culture, food pairings, and the culinary aspect of wines. I saw a huge gap at the time between the image of wine and wine culture here in Canada and in the rest of Europe that was just starting to change – I saw that the people were starting to think more about pairing, matching food and wine, gaining a hunger to learn more about winemaking, varieties, and the culture of wine.
I also saw the potential of a restaurant, which we opened, Le Caveau. I see a perfect synergy between a winery and a restaurant.
Finally I saw the potential in tourism, and agritourism. The consumer wants top quality, top level product. Last year we had 25,000 visitors at Domaine de Grand Pré – it's a tourist destination at this point. I think there is a definite potential to go even further, and there is a beautiful future in Nova Scotia for agritourism.
S101 : A combination question : Do you feel that Nova Scotia and the Annapolis Valley is becoming more attractive to vintners and winemakers, and also to wine connoisseurs and agritourists?
Domaine de Grand Pré : We've seen a great increase in interest from both casual and connoisseurs with regards to tourists. I believe it's because we are the older established winery and that we produce top quality products and services.
As a European, and as a wine lover and expert as well as a student of culinary products, we brought a whole new standard of quality to the area with our arrival and continued presence.
Years ago our situation was very favourable to us; our competitors were not using proper pruning techniques or even installing the vineyards correctly to ensure a good yield and high quality grapes. The beauty of bringing our expertise to Nova Scotia and the Annapolis Valley is that it has encouraged new competitors to increase their standards all around. In essence, we all win and the market is very healthy now.
It was a perfect situation for the whole industry, and if you see now, we could go around in the Annapolis Valley and taste some wines and it is incredible what the fellows are doing! In turn that hands the pressure back to us – that's very healthy.
It's not time for us to lay down and say that, well, we've made it. That pressure placed on us means that we have to be innovative, still have to be creative – because we still want to be the leader in quality in Nova Scotia.
S101 : And continue pressing forward...
Domaine de Grand Pré : Grand Pré Wines has created a lot of buzz in Canada, we recently won absolutely gorgeous awards in the All Canadian Wine Championship. If you perform as well as we have in tasting competitions, the results follow. People are now reading articles, following reports of these wine competitions, and so on.
That means that slowly but surely, Nova Scotia is showing up on the radar screen as a Canadian wine destination. As a result we are now thirteen wineries strong here in Nova Scotia and we expect to have twenty or so by the end of the next decade.
Competition is never a bad thing but it does bring dangers. Nova Scotia is not a large province and we do not have the population of Ontario, so our market is smaller. It means that we also have to focus on niche products to sell internationally at this point as well, though that may change.
The largest risk to us, however, is the weather. I always say that you can't defeat mother nature. So if you try to grow very specific varieties in Nova Scotia – the last winter showed these fellows that it's not possible. Producers have literally nearly 100% winter damage in Pinot Noir and we have some winter damage in our hybrids located in the Gaspereau Valley.
Our approach to this is to approach scientists and commission them to produce a hybrid, or a cross -breeding, between winter-hardy varieties and very traditional wines such as Cabernet Sauvignon. Cabernet Sauvignon is a beautiful red wine that we could never grow here. But this breed, this hybrid of both, as a plant gives us a huge and attractive opportunity to grow beautiful varieties.
The Interview Continues
Mr. Stutz continues in this interview, discussing first L'Acadie Blanc as well as "Martini Nights" and the local economy, and continuing on to discuss vineyard walking tours, crush wine clubs, and his personal inspiration.
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