Nederburg Wines Celebrates a New Label and a New Vintage Launch in US

10/05/08 NEDERBURG WINES, South Africa's most awarded wine, is introducing its new label; sleeker, cleaner, but ever classic. Along with the new label the latest vintage of the crisp Lyric blend will be introduced to the market through a series of launch parties. To celebrate, Nederburg and their US Importer, Dreyfus Ashby & Co. are hosting the launch parties around the country with esteemed South African Chief Winemaker, Linley Schultz.

Although still expressing an easily recognisable Nederburg identity, the new label is a far more accurate reflection of what is in the bottle and, in design addresses the growing sophistication of wine drinkers worldwide. The latest vintage of the crisp Lyric blend, the 2008 Nederburg Lyric, is a classic blend featuring Sauvignon Blanc (51%), Chenin Blanc (26%) and Chardonnay (23%) -- a wonderful summer wine, due to hit retail shelves early June 2008.

The launch parties will be taking place at New York City's only South African Wine Bar, Xai Xai on May 12, 2008; on Lake Erie's Tasting Boat Cruise in Cleveland, OH on June 2, 2008; and with a special South African "Wild Game Dinner" in Columbus, OH on June 3, 2008. More events are in the works.

Nederburg is South Africa's leading and most decorated winery, winner of more international and domestic awards than any other in South Africa. Through its extensive network of supplier growers, Nederburg has access to grapes from the best wine-growing areas of the Cape, where years of viticultural research have identified the best planting sites.

Winemaker, Linley Schultz has had an illustrious career, commencing at Tollanan Wines in Australia in 1980 as technical assistant. His career then took him through Australia, Europe and Argentina, as winemaker at such wineries as D&D Wines, BRL Hardy, Southcorp wines and working as an independent consultant. In 2001 Linley moved to South Africa to assume his position as Chief Winemaker with Distell. Since joining Distell, Linley has overseen the introduction or modification of many winemaking techniques including barrel and wine maturation policies, micro oxygenation, alternative oak treatments, cross flow micro filtration, new centrifuge technology, reverse osmosis technology, blending techniques and tasting philosophies which have greatly improved the international competitiveness of the Distell wine portfolio.

Distell was recently listed as the world's tenth biggest wine marketer by international beverage data specialists Impact Databank and was named Distiller of the Year in the 2007 International Wine & Spirit Competition (IWSC) coming out ahead of the world's biggest names in spirits in the US, the UK and Europe.