Adelaide’s Ballast Stone Estate Wines on the market

A vertically integrated wine business encompassing a 430ha portfolio of vineyards in South Australia’s renowned Fleurieu region is up for sale.

Ballast Stone Estate Wines in Currency Creek, 80km south Adelaide, has been put on the market in a campaign that the wine industry will watch with interest.

The winery has facilities to process its own wine, allowing it to produce and release wines under proprietary brands including Emetior, RMS, Shaw Family Vintners, Stonemason, Steeple Jack, Currency Creek Estate, The Creek Station and Winery Road.

The business, trading as Shaw Family Vintners, sells around 20,000 cases within the South Australian wholesale market each year, with net sales revenue last year of more than $6.7 million.

Colliers International’s Tim Altschwager and Nick Dean have been appointed to sell the property and business in an expressions of interest campaign that ends on April 14.

Ballast Stone Estate Wines has facilities including cellar door sales.

Altschwager says the company attempted secure a partner for its business, but has now put the entire operation up for sale.

“Shaw Family Vintners have for some time been seeking an equity partner and is now offering the winery and the wine business for sale,” he says.

“The company’s wholesale presence with independent liquor groups in the South Australian market is  very strong, selling circa 20,000 cases annually. A significant opportunity exists to grow the Shaw Family Vintners brand in the Eastern States via an appropriate distributor.”

The company exports about half of its bottled wine, mainly to China via a joint venture arrangement.

Shaw Family Vintners produces wine under a host of proprietary labels.

The winery was built in 2000 and has cellar door sales, crushing capacity of more than 7000 tonnes, 1000sqm of barrel storage and a total storage capacity of more than six million litres.

Dean says the winery produced about 52,000 cases of bottled wine last year and another 1.25 million litres of bulk wine.

“Total net sales revenue in the 2015 financial year was approximately $6,707,000,” he says.