"It’s encouraging to see many restaurants, clients, suppliers, and individuals working together to find solutions and a future where we’ll all survive. We remain very optimistic!"
Nestled against the NSW border, in Queensland’s Granite Belt wine region, is the Bent Road Winery, established by partners, Robert Richter and Glen Robert.
Robert was originally a commercial photographer and Glen a medical research scientist. After a period running a small property development business, a tree-change in 2000 led them to establish vineyards in the Granite Belt, near the village of Ballandean. Glen went back to university, attaining a degree in Winemaking and worked in many wineries in the USA and Australia.
Robert Richter (left) and Glen Robert (right). Source: Glen Robert
Robert and Glen established Bent Road Winery in 2006, and their wines have been served in high end restaurants including Blackbird, Gerards, Crubar, Rick Shores, Rosella, and Emporium Hotel in Queensland, while in NSW their wines have featured on winelists at Quay, Red Lantern, Opera Bar, Automata and Franca.
You can find Bent Road Wines in good bottle shops like Cru, Craft, and Emporium, in Brisbane and Native Drops, Paddington Fine Wines, Winona, Annandale Cellars, in Sydney, as well as Black Hearts & Sparrows.
Even the Japanese market has had a taste, with exports to Japanese restaurants and retail store via KP Orchard.
Bent Road Winery's “Qvevri” amphoras. Source: Glen Robert
Robert and Glen's brands include Bent Road and La Petite Mort - Bent Road wines tend to be more mainstream styles while La Petite Mort highlight more experimental wines.
Flagship La Petite Mort wines focus not only on unusual varieties, such as Saperavi, but unconventional winemaking techniques such as fermenting wines in authentic Georgian terracotta amphoras known as “Qvevri” and producing textural, prolonged-skin contact wines, reminiscent of the traditional wines of the Caucasus region of Eastern Europe.
WILLIAMS MEDIA spoke to Bent Road Winery's Glen Robert about the impact that COVID-19 measures are having on the winery and how the business is continuing to connect with its community during lockdown.
How has COVID-19 impacted Bent Road Winery?
COVID-19 has had a huge impact. Our wines are found in many upmarket restaurants and independent wine retailers. Due to the lockdown, demand has died in restaurants, but sales remain relatively strong in bottle shops. Events, such as our online wine tastings and interest in our social media feed on platforms such as Instagram and Facebook have boosted online sales. Our club members continue to be loyal supporters.
In disastrous times of social and economic hardship such as now, it’s encouraging to see many restaurants, clients, suppliers and individuals working together to find solutions and a future where we’ll all survive. We remain very optimistic!
Bent Road Winery tastings are usually held in this former church, which was moved to the site for that purpose. Source: Glen Robert
What made you decide to conduct online wine tastings?
Online wine tasting is a great way to connect with our wine community in real time. We’ll be streaming live on Youtube. When we talk about reaching out to “our wine community”, it’s not just the Bent Road Winery fans. Anyone who has heard about the tasting, through word of mouth or social media can tune in, in real time and get involved with the event, commenting or asking questions in real time or just sitting back and seeing what develops.
We (Glen and assistant winemaker, Andrew Scott) aim to talk about the wines and answer any questions.
How do we find out more?
Announcements and links to online wine tastings and news of other events can be found when following any of our social media accounts:
Similar to this:
Bernadette O’Shea and chef Josh Lopez bring the taste of a champagne lifestyle into Brisbane homes
How one of Brisbane's iconic restaurants, Moda is operating during the current COVID-19 restrictions
How Byron Bay icon Raes on Wategos is adapting to covid-19 measures