First there was Sparky Marquis. He was the “hit winemaker” for years in South Australia. His wines were highly coveted, especially in  the states. His wines  were bigger than life, bold, rich, but beautifully linear and precise as well.  Things started going sideways for him in 2005, culminating with his divorce a few months ago from his wife Sarah, who now owns all their properties, including Mollydooker.  Few people realized she, as much as Sparky, was responsible for that luxury-grade style of Shiraz that Mollydooker epitomized.

Why take that much time talking about another winery? Because the steps that Sarah walked, often in the shadow of her famous husband, made way for another female maker, who is rightfully getting rockstar-level love in Australia. Her name is Kim Jackson, and this is one of her wines.

Burnt incense, toasted allspice, and chocolate-covered cherries  bobbing in a gigantic vat of blackberry jam. Oh, and the tannins are big and round as the face of a velvet dolphin.  True hallucinatory hedonism.

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This intuitive approach to the segmentation of wine tourists adopted by wineries is mirrored in the academic literature on the topic. Hall, (1996, cited in Hall and Macionis, 1998), on the basis of discussions with representatives of the supply side, posited three categories: the ‘wine lovers’, the ‘wine interested’ and ‘curious tourists’, and provides some indicators pointing towards the profile of each. This is a useful starting point, but focuses on the perceptions of the winery owner/managers rather than the tourists themselves. European researchers have followed a similar line – in one instance proposing ‘the formal wine tourist’, the ‘tourist with an acknowledged interest in wine’ and the ‘general tourist’. However the structure of tourism in different cultures varies – for instance in Europe the ‘formal wine tourist’ is perceived to travel in an organised tour (Unwin, Schenk, Vale and Marti-Henneberg, undated), whereas in Australia and New Zealand the highly wine-educated tourist is much less likely to do this than the ‘wine interested’ or ‘curious tourist’. Little research has been conducted into the cultural differences between wine tourists and how that affects their experience and behaviour.

The Final Word: Shirvington 2010 Shiraz, McLaren Vale

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