Angoves ready for the generational jump

In a time when wine company managers are compelled to spend much of their time in discourse with fund managers and share brokers, it’s a pleasure to meet a wine executive who could, quite frankly, not give a damn about them. That narrows the field, since the executive in question handles the international and key domestic business for one of Australia’s larger wine companies, one of the handful of significant family-owned businesses that have weathered the recent turmoil around the wine industry in very much better shape than some of their listed competitors.

The person I am referring to is Victoria Angove, whose company is undergoing a fairly rapid metamorphosis into a maker of smart, contemporary wines which are presented to the market with freshness and flair. I would also add from the outset that across its Long Row and Vineyard Select ranges in particular, Angoves offers exceptional value for money at some very affordable prices.

Victoria Angove, who answers to the title of International Business Development Manager and National Accounts Manager, is still figuring out that her role is to make things happen for her family’s business, no matter what or where they might be. This involves travelling internationally the way that you and I might go down the street. Last year she was away three weeks out of four, flying the flag for Angoves’ and for Australian wine in general.

I first encountered this fifth generation Angove several years ago at a wine lunch in Seoul. Speaking via a translator to a large and enthusiastic Korean audience, Angove charmed her way through her company’s profile and chattily introduced the Angove’s wine we were drinking. If the audience had been exhausted after a condescending presentation from a German Wine Queen and a highly technical dissertation from a South African who numbed them with science, they didn’t show it.

‘Apart from about six months when I thought I might become a political journalist, I have in all honesty looked forward to the opportunity to run the company’, she says, ‘to the point of driving my father insane.’ John Angove, the father in question, still calls the shots, but he’s confident the business will end up in safe hands.

Having completed a commerce degree from Adelaide University, Angove spent a year in Canada getting the skiing and white water rafting bugs out of the system. Once the money ran out, it was back to Adelaide where she filled in as a sales rep for a year. ‘It was horrendous. Our portfolio was questionable and the market was flooded with wine. It was hard work, especially for a company whose wines are based in the Riverlands’ she says. ‘Things have changed a lot since.’

Then, come the year 2000, Angove was travelling again, this time to London, where she ended up helping to coordinate the International Wine and Spirit Challenge, one of the world’s largest wine competitions. ‘We had 9,500 entries, tasted from dawn till dusk, but the experience of tasting with noted UK wine experts Robert Joseph and Charles Metcalfe opened my eyes to the international market.

Returning to the family winery for the 2001 vintage, Angove found herself as the first female ‘cellar rat’ to have worked there. Later that year she moved into marketing, and under the wine of her ‘guru’, Angove’s marketing manager Tim Boydell. Shortly afterwards the company needed someone to look after their business in Asia and mainland Europe, and you can guess who put up her hand. Since then, her roles have seen Angove travelling all over the UK and the US as well.

‘Mum and dad never made us her, her sister Sophie and Richard, her brother feel obliged to take up the family business’ she says. ‘They were much keener for us to get out and see the world. After having no interest in the business for many years, my brother Richard has switched his interest from skiing to winemaking. The light bulb has been switched on, and now he’s now a fanatic. While he’s not actively working in the business today, he is definitely part of the succession plan.’

Richard Angove worked across a range of wineries to broaden his experience. The list currently includes McPherson, Brokenwood, Domaine Carneros and Trincaro both US and Wandin Valley in the Hunter. ‘It’s important that he’s learning about large and small operations, since marrying the two extremes in critical for the future of our business’, says his sister.

There’s no hurry to change things at Angoves. ‘Dad’s still young, fit and healthy at 60 years old, so we’ll wait and see how the plan unfolds’, says Angove. ‘There isn’t a timeline.’ With the coming generation as ready as ever, it’s reassuring that the likes of McWilliam’s, De Bortoli, Casella and Angoves can continue to do what they have always done, under their own control. It’s hard to believe the customer isn’t better off for it. Please login to post comment