Distinctly regal Central Otago flavour

It wasn’t just a passion for creating great wine that sent the Scott family searching for the perfect vineyard in Central Otago, it was also a longstanding love of the region.

With a climate and terrain unmatched for its rugged beauty and ability to produce excellent wines, it’s no wonder we have been enamoured with the Scott Base vineyard from the start.

Framed by the Pisa mountain range, with views of Lake Dunstan, Scott Base vineyard may only produce a limited vintage, but every bottle brims with the experience and enthusiasm that comes from many years of winemaking.

Carefully crafted to hero that distinctly Central Otago flavour, Scott Base is the classic “best kept secret”. In our Kiwi way, the Scott Family stands quietly proud of what a great wine it is. So here’s to good wine.

As one of New Zealand’s true Méthode Traditionnelle houses, we use exacting standards and time-honoured techniques to carefully craft the Scott Base Emperor Méthode Traditionnelle wine.

As summer quickly approaches, we’re excited to celebrate the launch of our latest offering, the Scott Base Emperor, and proudly share its impressive score of 93 Points from The Real Review. All of this comes with a touch of the distinctive Central Otago essence.

“Rich, flavoursome, creamy-textured fizz within a broad, mellow style. Toasted brioche, ginger and just a hint of green apple flavours with some citrus/lime characters. Quite a complex wine with a lingering finish”. Bob Campbell

Indulge in the exquisite finesse of this elegant wine, radiating sophistication. You can experience its allure by placing an order on our website, paying a visit to the Cellar Door in Cromwell, or acquiring it from Glengarry.

Allan Scott Kekerengu

Discover the coastal elegance of Marlborough’s Sauvignon Blanc

Imagine a place that embodies everything good about the Marlborough wine region, but in a little-known valley to the south. Hidden between ageless mountains and an iron sea is a place of wild beauty named Kekerengu.

Kekerengu Sauvignon Blanc

Located within Marlborough’s Appellation Wine Region, Kekerengu is untouched and unique. The soil here is different — stony and rough, with a vein of limestone carried by forgotten glaciers. The morning mist is a ghost that tends the vines, and the wind is a prevailing southerly that makes the grapes develop slower than in other places — perfect for cool-climate winemaking.

It is a lonely place, Kekerengu. You’ll find more company within the silent parts of the nearby Pacific Ocean than on any track—and you’ll receive more chatter from a Fantail than from a cellphone. And that’s what makes this place special. It’s remote and rugged.

It is here that Josh Scott first had a hand in planting a block of Sauvignon Blanc more than twenty years back. Since then this little valley has called him to return. The traditional opinion said it wouldn’t work; planting vines here was too audacious and would require too much effort. Fortunately, audacity and hard work are two things that Josh is known for—and so he set about creating something special to share with the world.

This Sauvignon Blanc is a true cool-climate wine. Unlike traditional Sauvignon Blanc, this wine gets better with age. As it matures a gentle mist gathers within—forsaking clarity for flavour. Fresh sea breezes from the nearby beach add a gentle saltiness to the grapes, which can be tasted from the glass.

Once the grapes are harvested they are immediately pressed in the cool of the night. Light filtering, and minimal winemaker intervention, allows the fruit to sing. It is a wine to remind you that there are still places in this world that are pure, and it has the flavour profile to prove it.

If you can’t make it here to experience it for yourself, enjoy it in a glass of our Black Label Sauvignon Blanc 2022 which is made from grapes grown at Kekerengu.⁠ Fresh, zesty, juicy and full, showing ripe tropical fruit, a flinty palate and a mouth-watering crisp sea-salted herbaceousness.

Vintage 2022 /  Wine Spectator – 93 Points

“Delivers a terrific, lip-smacking mix of crunchy sea salt, toasted herbs and tropical flavors that show terrific purity to the Key lime, dried pineapple and passionfruit flavors at the core. Reveals intense acidity on the long finish.” MaryAnn Worobiec

Vintage 2022 Perfecting the taste of a pure NZ summer

The vintage 2022 highlight was filmed over a period of 12 months. From the moment the vines were pruned in July 2021, to when the wine was made in June 2022. We had our camera crew follow the team across all 12 months, day and night.

The team at Allan Scott Wines would like to show you how much passion, work, love and team effort goes into every bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. With every vintage, we strive towards creating the purest, most memorable, and best possible wine out of what nature has gifted us in the form of soil, sun, water and wind.

It was a very “new” normal growing and harvesting season for a lot of Marlborough vineyards. Having secured a team of talented cellar hands, the first fruit was met with a great deal of enthusiasm and excitement. A good flowering period, steady and at times very heavy rainfall throughout the season had us employ every bit of viticulture knowledge and finesse. It was crucial to be on top of our vineyard management programme.

Fortunately, we had the ability to call on years of collective experience of growing grapes and making wine across the country. Intricate terroir knowledge and almost daily fruit assessment kept our grapes growing to their full potential.

You can expect every bit of aroma and flavour you have grown to know and love Marlborough for.

The No.1 Best Wine Value of 2021

Great wine doesn’t have to be expensive. In celebration of those wines that overdeliver on quality for the price, Wine Spectator selected the Top 10 Wine Values of 2021, with Allan Scott
Sauvignon Blanc Marlborough 2021 taking first place on the list!

The No.1 Best Wine Value / 93 Point bottle of Allan Scott Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc that you might be holding or pouring from is a warm hello and thank you from the family of innovative and adventurous winemakers — we have an unparalleled desire to let you try the best of what New Zealand has had to offer since 1975 and love nothing more than emptying a few bottles and sharing laughs together.

“Perhaps the biggest success for the business and Vintage 2021 has been its evolution into a true family business. Josh Scott and my younger daughter Sara Stocker assumed control of the company and head up the production, management and development of the company with a highly skilled operational team. They grew up on the vineyard, learned from the rest and brought their own flair into the company and wine. Vintage 2021 was their year and as the next year’s work starts now, the best is yet to come.” Allan Scott

NZ Sauvignon Blanc at its finest

Wine scores and reviews are important to us as they provide a clear indication of whether we are on the right track, and there is also the added benefit of letting you make the best choice possible by having an independent expert opinion.

With every vintage we strive towards creating the purest, most memorable, and best possible wine out of what nature has gifted us in the form of soil, sun, water and wind. It often morphs into a subtle art, with personal techniques, secrets, newest and at times most forgotten ways of making wine. This year we are celebrating with yet another recognition for what has become the icon of NZ winemaking — Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc.

Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc

“Strikes a terrific balance between mouthwatering acidity, fresh herbal notes of lemon verbena and thyme, and core flavors of key lime, meyer lemon, pineapple and tangerine. Gains momentum on the finish, where the flavors sing in harmony and complexity.”  93 POINTS / MARYANN WOROBIEC / Wine Spectator

As the cheers, laughter, smiles, hugs and glass clinking slowly faded into the background of the light lit backyard, we couldn’t help but remember the journey that led us to this moment. From vine to glass is a period of 12 months, seen in the vintage number that you see on the bottle, but for us, it has been a journey of 50 years.

A 93 Point score for wine in its purest, freshest, un-cellared form is the remarkable story of Marlborough wine — from the creation of the region’s first vineyards, to the global success of New Zealand’s Sauvignon Blanc industry — and is also the very personal story of Scott Family Winemakers. It is a story that involved a good deal of perseverance and like-mindedness, as well as some extraordinary ingenuity that revolutionised local winemaking.

True, New Zealand’s wine industry dates back more than a century, rather than a mere few decades. But we could all agree that good-tasting wine was popping up only in the late 1970s or even the early 1980s. Fast forward 40 years of hands-on work, risk, experimentation, failures, successes, endless days spent on the road and in the dirt, to elevate the image of NZ wine, all while juggling raising families.

First Marlborough vines

The 93 Point bottle of Allan Scott Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc that you might be holding or pouring from is a warm hello and thank you from the family of innovative and adventurous winemakers — we have an unparalleled desire to let you try the best of what New Zealand has had to offer since 1975 and love nothing more than emptying a few bottles and sharing laughs together.

“Perhaps the biggest success for the business and Vintage 2021 has been its evolution into a true family business. Josh Scott and my younger daughter Sara Stocker assumed control of the company and head up the production, management and development of the company with a highly skilled operational team. They grew up on the vineyard, learned from the rest and brought their own flair into the company and wine. Vintage 2021 was their year and as the next year’s work starts now, the best is yet to come.” Allan Scott

Wherever you are in the world, we would like to invite you to “visit” us by cracking open a bottle of Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, the perfect taste of a pure NZ summer, a journey of decades and a thousand words.

The Top 50 Gold medal-winning Merlot!

We are delighted to share that our delicious Allan Scott 2020 Hawkes Bay Merlot has won GOLD in the New World Wine Awards 2021 and made it to the Top 50 wines!

The wines were judged using the same internationally recognised 100-point system used at other leading wine shows, which benchmarks entries against what a perfect wine should be like. A Gold medal wine in these awards is a superb example of its type and you can hold it to the same expectations as a Gold medal wine from other respected awards.

More than 1,100 wines were put to the test and our Merlot has been recognised for its outstanding quality.⁠

Head on down to your local New World and taste it for yourself. We (along with an expert panel of wine judges) can guarantee it won’t disappoint!

Hawkes Bay’s temperate climate and plentiful sunshine make the region ideal for fruit-growing. Visit NZ Wine to learn more about the region and its wine.

2020 Merlot is a perfect accompaniment to good strong cheese or barbequed meats. Best served at room temperature and given a little time to breathe.

“It’s splendidly ripe and fragrant with Black Doris plum, sweet cherry, cedary oak, olive and subtle spice notes, leading to a beautifully weighted palate offering silken texture and finely polished tannins. Flavoursome and immediately appealing. At its best: now to 2028.”  Sam Kim

Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc of a new kind

Sauvignon Blanc has put New Zealand winemaking on the map, and we are proud of how far we have come in the last 50 years.
Back then, planting wines in Marlborough was unheard of, and today we would like to carry the legacy and let you try Sauvignon Blanc from a very unique part of Marlborough – Kekerengu Coast.

Kēkerengū is situated near the mouth of the Kēkerengū River which runs into the sea at a rock promontory north of the Clarence River, approximately midway between Blenheim and Kaikōura on State Highway One in the current Kaikōura District, within the historic Marlborough provincial boundaries. It is still part of the Marlborough Geographical Appellation. Find out more about the history.

Kekerengu Vineyard

This vineyard is located next to the sea, has a unique soil structure and a microclimate like no other in Marlborough.

Vintage 2021 was a normal growing season compared to last year’s uncertainty, except for harvest commencing early and finishing right before the Easter long weekend. Overall, great sunshine hours, low disease pressure, light crops, and ripe fruit, all come together to produce some outstanding fruit and in turn some great wines.

Allan Scott Family Winemakers Kekerengu 2021 Sauvignon Blanc is complex, crisp, herbaceous, salty and savoury Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc of a new kind. 

Our Kekerengu 2021 Sauvignon Blanc is certified Appellation Marlborough Wine. AMW certification ensures consumers of the origin and authenticity of their purchase.

Allan Scott Kekerengu Sauvignon Blanc

Marlborough Apprentice 2021

We are very excited to have entered The Hits Marlborough Apprentice competition with NMIT.⁠⁠
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We’d love for you to come to join us at Moa Brewery this Friday at 3.30 pm to cheer on our apprentice Jono and have a glass with us.⁠⁠
⁠⁠
Meet our Apprentice Jono Poswillo

Marlborough Apprentice

About the Apprentice

Some say he can drive with his eyes closed, others reckon he got his skills from playing Mario Kart, all we know is that his name is Jono and he sometimes drives colleagues crazy.

Why did you get into the role?

I was hoping to go into flying school to go down the aviation career pathway. To everyone’s surprise, Covid decided to come along and grounded those plans for me. After having a hard and long thought on what other industry I could go into, viticulture and winemaking stood out the most. I was lucky enough to have landed a job piloting the harvester for Allan Scott over vintage. This was an amazing opportunity and I suspect there are not many people that went straight into a harvester for the first vintage and first day on the job and especially being 18! This then led to a full-time apprenticeship which isn’t like any other. I get to try my hands on different aspects of operations, from dispatching of the wine, bottling, labelling anything around the cellar, vineyard work, working behind the bar in the restaurant. For me, being able to understand how everything works is a great skill in itself and that is why I am enjoying it so much. #Jonoofalltrades, master of somm.

In summary, it’s a fully hands-on role that starts from the growing of the grapes right up until it’s in my glass.

How long have you been in your industry?

I started with Allan Scott Family Winemakers mid to late February this year so it’s only been a few months.

Highlights of working for Allan Scott Wines?

The highlight would be driving the harvester. Absolutely blown away that I was given control of such a large and very complex machine! If you could imagine sitting 4-5 meters up in the air (day or night) and navigating a $500k machine straight into the row with only an 18cm margin of error, keeping an eye on the camera, getting lost in the maze of buttons (only at first of course) and your boss looking at your every move from the other side. There is a lot on the line, pun intended!

What is Rosé Wine?

Following in the footsteps of our European counterparts, New Zealand has seen a resurgence in the popularity of the Rosé style of wine. Some would say it is due to the simplicity of the wine style, and the sense of fun associated.

The majority of New Zealand’s Rosé is made from Pinot Noir, though a diverse array of other varieties are employed throughout the various regions.Allan Scott Pinot Noir

Careful planning and meticulous attention in the vineyard kept our grapes growing to their full potential this year. It has been an interesting season, with early budburst and a frosty couple of days hit Pinot Noir variety the most in Marlborough and a lower producing year was expected. As a result of lower crops, Pinot Noir have more flavour concentration. That is a win for our winemaking team and they made the most out of it.

Where does it come from?

Harvested from our Pinot Noir vineyards established in 1995 with a mixture of Dijon clones.

Within Marlborough, the Rapaura area along the northern edge of the Wairau Valley has become particularly prized. This is where we established the family’s vineyards, all in close proximity to the winery.

Location of Pinot Noir grapes used for Rosé production -41.504166, 173.854586

With its distinctive combination of cool nights, sunny days and young soils, it is recognised as one of the world’s greatest wine regions.

Omaka Vineyard Marlborough

What to expect from our 2021 Rosé?

Year on year out team tries their best to achieve and maintain the colour, aroma and flavour you come to expect of our Estate Rosé. The goal for elegant salmon pink Rosé to immediately present notes of luscious strawberries and cream. The palate to beautifully balanced with soft, ripe berry fruit flavours and a lift of acidity on the finish. The 2021 vintage is no exception, truly a touch of New Zealand summer in a glass.

Freshest Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc Vintage 2021

We would like to invite you to join the International Sauvignon Blanc Day celebration by raising a glass this weekend with the freshest drop!

We are beyond excited to share Marlborough 2021 Sauvignon Blanc straight off the bottling line. 

Winemakers have done a fantastic job over the last couple of months, working day & night. The wine is everything you come to expect of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.

Fresh, crisp and juicy herbed bouquet, with flavours of ripe tropical and citrus fruit, key lime and ruby grapefruit: the very essence of Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc.