Grover Group to celebrate 300th Anniversary next year

Grover Zampa bought through its investors VisVires, a 300 year old Domaine Protheau in Mercurey in Côte Chalonnaise in South Burgundy  and renamed it as Château d’Etroyes. The winery is now producing several existing labels and also La Reserve de Bourgogne, a label named after its world famous Indian La Reserve brand and exporting wines to India and the countries where GZV is already exporting wines, as reported earlier in delWine.

The website of the group , https://chateau-etroyes.fr/en/ says that the roots of Château d’Etroyes were planted in the soil of Mercurey in 1720, when the Protheau family began to grow vines there. Over the generations, the estate expanded, in a spirit of determination and perfectionism. In 2018, the partners in VisVires, a group of individual wine lovers with strong winegrowing links, took over the estate. Their aim was to carry on the historical work of the family and continue producing high-quality wines for traditional markets, both in France and for export.

Those who might snigger at the concept of celebrations will do well to understand that it has been a global trend for a couple of decades to link the wineries and areas to their past. As an example, say someone sets up a winery in 2012. But his father, grandfather or even a great-grandfather grew a few grapes in 1929 on a small patch. Then the winery would boast of an experience of 83 years of winemaking.  There are areas where the wineries were supposedly existent 3000 years ago with a few centuries devoid of any winemaking due to Muslim rule or other edicts. But you will hear the reference to the winemaking for 3000 years only. Israel is a perfect example. Never mind that the wine produced over 60-70 years ago was generally not even drinkable by today’s standards. In their case, Viswanathan claims the winery had been making wine continuously for generations and in fact one member of the Protheau family is still working with them in Chateau d’Etroyes.

Ravi Viswanathan corrected me for the first time by saying that his legal name is Viswanathan only as depicted on his passport. Born in Pondicherry, he had been given Ravi as pet name. ‘Call it stage name, if you will,’ says Ravi rolling his eyes mischievously; while talking to him it had suddenly occurred to me that I had seen the name Ravi Viswanathan in Singapore linked with P. Chidambaram, former Minister and a Congress stalwart who is cooling his heels in Tihar Jail in Delhi due to his possible involvement in alleged illegal deals. The complex arrangements involved a linkage between one family-member with one ‘Ravi Viswanathan in Singapore’. He says this is a common name in South India and he has never met Chidambaram in his life.

Grover Zampa also bought three barrels of Meursault Premier Cru wines this year at the annual auction of the very prestigious Hospices de Beaune , a charitable hospital owning prestigious vineyards and produces its own wines which are auctioned off at high prices for the good cause of running the hospital. ‘Grand Crus were too expensive for us to buy’, admits Viswanathan. (Meursault wine is produced in the commune of Meursault in Côte de Beaune of Burgundy. There are no Grand Cru vineyards within Meursault, but several Premier Crus are highly regarded). We bought 1 Meursualt Charmes and 2 Beaune 1er cru Cuvee Guigogne de Salins (the most prestigious one).’

‘We will do the ageing and give finishing touches to these wine and bottle and store them for our clients.’ Thus the Indian aficionados of Burgundy will be able to buy top quality wines for their cellars in India or anywhere in the world and also contribute to charity –we will provide global shipping facilities. We will even store them and the clients may hand- carry to India 3-4 bottles legally from their foreign trips each time,’ he says. Three barrels means only 900 bottles from the current purchase stored at Chateau d’Etroyes.

The Bourgogne white and red have been dispatched to India already and should be available in the market next month for around Rs. 3000. He plans to have cross-exchange of winemakers and other key personnel with this winery to improve the wine knowledge. In fact, the winemaker from Grover was already in Burgundy for the harvest when I met Viswanathan on October 6, a day after the India Wine Awards at the Leela, Mumbai where both of us were staying. Winemaker from Charosa/4 seasons was also in burgundy for the harvest from mid September to mid October approx

Celebrating with wine tourism facilities open

The plans for celebrations have not been finalised yet but there are several possibilities, by using the new wine tourism facilities coming up in Bangalore and Nashik. The Bangalore Tasting Room has been ready and the restaurant will formally open either today or on 21 October. Nashik facilities including their own restaurant and a bigger Tasting room should be ready by December with a gazebo on the terrace with an excellent 360° view of lakes and hills around.

‘We are building a road all the way to the top of the hill-even beyond the  One Tree. There is a plateau where cars can be parked and we build a hanging Bar. In any case it will be available for the celebrations next year. There will be Presidential villas on top too. We will have a complex of 70 rooms ready in two phases-the first one will be ready by Diwali 2020 and second one in 2021,’ says Ravi.

Those of you who have been to the winery and to the barrel room which is nice but has been a bit dingy and at times claustrophobic, would be happy to see it made bigger with a glass enclosed wine library alongside. There is going to be a separate amphora room with about 7 of them in use for fermentation and storage of all quevries from Georgia (for details on quevries, please read an earlier Article in delWine:

It looks like exciting times are ahead for the Indian wine industry, especially Grover, if their plans fructify as expected, minor delays due to bureaucracy notwithstanding.

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