| In 2009, Howard Park was asked to join Australia’s First Families of Wine (AFFW), a collective of twelve multi-generational family-owned wine producers. Together representing seventeen wine-growing regions across Australia and forty-eight generations of winemakers. The aim of Australia’s First Families of Wine is to showcase a representative and diverse range of the best of Australian wine with a focus on regional and iconic drops. The collective is working to engage and educate consmers, retailers, restaurants and the wine industry across the globe about the real character and personality of Australian wine, and about the unique characters and personalities behind it. The inaugral 12 member alliance includes Brown Brothers, Campbells, Taylors, DeBortoli, McWilliam’s, Tahbilk, Tyrell’s, Yalumba, D’Arenberg, Jim Barry, Howard Park, and Henschke. Howard Park Wines is the only representative from Western Australia to be included in the AFFW. The main criteria is that the family-owned companies need to have a ”landmark wine” in their portfolios as listed under Langton’s Classification and/or 75% agreement by group that a wine is considered ”iconic”. Others are they must have the ability to do at least a 20-year vertical tasting, have a history going back a minimum of two generations, ownership of vineyards more than 50 years old and/or ownership of distinguished sites which exemplify the best of terroir, commitment to export and environmental best practice, appropriate cellar door experience, and be paid-up members of the Winemakers Federation of Australia. |
