Part-time job, full-time passion

By ELLEN READ

Part-time Auckland accountant and Marlborough vineyard owner is an unlikely combination but it works for Takapuna's John Buchanan.

Buchanan's love affair with winemaking began when he worked for a British vintner while travelling overseas in the 1970s. Now he is a medal-winning winemaker in his own right.

After returning to New Zealand, Buchanan worked as an accountant for Corbans Wines before setting up his own accounting firm in the late 1970s. But he kept in touch with his wine industry contacts, to the extent of being appointed to the board of one Marlborough vineyard.

In 1994 he decided winemaking was something he wanted to do for a living so, in a partnership he has since bought out, Buchanan purchased some land and set about planting grapes.

The Marlborough property now extends to five vineyards, covering 102ha of the Wairau Valley and Seventeen Valley.

Mt Riley - from which Buchanan's winery takes its name - is the dominant peak in the Richmond Ranges which overlook the Wairau Valley. It's an area Buchanan knows well as his mother is from there and he used to spend summer holidays with his grandparents there as a child.

"So it's a bonus that I get to go down there once every two weeks these days," he says.

Unable to find the root stock he wanted, he established a nursery at the vineyard as the first part of a plan to own the whole winemaking process.

While the wines were originally produced at a shared winery, Mt Riley now has its own facility, and it also owns the machinery needed to care for and harvest the grapes.

Buchanan says this improves quality as he is no longer reliant on fitting in with other vineyards.

"To reinforce the quality, we now have vertical control over our operations," he says.

The vineyard produced its first wine in 1996 - a gold-medal-winning sauvignon blanc. The awards have kept coming and the most recent vintage was named champion wine of the year in the food and beverage magazine F&B.

Buchanan says the key to his success is aiming to overdeliver.

"We've got to deliver wine that's better than the price," he says. Most Mt Riley wines cost less than $20.

This is important in the New Zealand boutique wine industry, where consumers have a wide choice.

"In order to stand out above the crowd we needed no compromise on quality strategy and so every wine we make is exposed to the show system," says Buchanan, who is himself a senior wine judge.

Another thing he's learned is that, while a marketing and sales manager is needed to look after the domestic market, Buchanan can handle overseas sales himself.

"People like being able to talk to the vineyard owner," he says.

While New Zealand remains Mt Riley's largest market, the company now exports its wine to a range of countries including the UK, United States, Australia, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Hong Kong, Singapore, Germany, Russia, Holland, Tahiti and the Cook Islands.

Mt Riley wines come in screw cap bottles, something Buchanan says was a gamble as people used to associate the caps with inferior quality.

Buchanan's training and experience as an accountant helped him establish the business and keep it running.

But conscious of extending his knowledge he studied at Icehouse, the University of Auckland business school's accelerator programme. He attended the first owner-managers programme, which he says gave him an idea of direction, development and influenced his corporate strategy.

"Thirty-four of us did the course and we're all a great group of mates. The talking and networking is the best thing," says Buchanan.

Surrounding himself with good people is important and Mt Riley has a small, long-serving staff.

Contractors are brought in to help at busy times but winemaker Bill (Digger) Hennessy has been with Buchanan from the beginning.