I’ve made regular visits to see Don and Valerie, as I admire their work in bringing the vineyard up to an extremely high standard. I know I’m not alone, as I understand their wines sell out very quickly on release. I also know of their unrelenting drive for furthering the quality of the wines, and for 2016, they have made even stricter selections of their fruit to go into these labels. I’ve tasted the barrel samples and probable blends that were likely to make up these wines (click here to see my report). With their stricter selections of the existing grapes, and the eventual yielding from their newly planted wines, they have touted the idea of introducing another label for ‘younger vine’ fruit.
I should make one more observation, and that is Don and Valerie are very aware of the pricing of the wines. They have increased their RRPs to a level that puts them on par with a number of very reputable and well-established labels. This is primarily in response to the drives of the market, and the demand is seen by them as very flattering However, they also realise that their pricing can be flexible, and be modified, especially to reflect vintage quality, style and yields. In the meantime, I review the new release 2016 Devotus and Devotus ‘Reserve’ Pinot Noirs. A portion of the wines have already been sold ‘en primeur’ to mail order customers. They are due for general release on 1 August 2017. www.devotus.nz
