Accolade Wines, the owner of the Hardys wine brand, has opened its first wine shop in Surrey.
The shop - called 1853 Wine Club - is located at its head office site in Weybridge, Surrey, and is an extension of its e-commerce website 1853wineclub.com, which sells a selection of premium wines from its new world portfolio.
Well-known wines from Accolade, such as the Eileen Hardy and Thomas Hardy wines, are available for sale, as well as Flagstone, Mud House, Leasingham, Houghton, Bay of Fires, Da Luca, Geyser Peak and more. The range is complemented with a number of old world wines supplied by strategic partners Constellation Wines and Matthew Clarke.
The shop also has two Enomatic machines, with 16 wines available for customers to sample before making purchases.
“The shop was part of the strategy in the decision to relocate the Accolade Wines UK head office to Weybridge in the later part of this year,” said Rob Harrison, Accolade Wines general manager - sales, UK and Ireland. “We wanted to create a cellar door experience in the UK, which embodies our brands from Australia, New Zealand, North America, South Africa and now Chile. The 1853 Wine shop will ensure our premium portfolio becomes more accessible to the public.”
The 1853 Wine Club shop is open daily until 23 December and will reopen in January 2016.
The name 1853 derives from the heritage of Hardys Wines. Thomas Hardy planted the first vines for Hardys Wines in Adelaide, Australia in 1853. His planting included shiraz, fontignac, muscat and Mataró, grenache and Roussillon. He experimented with different types of trellising and pruning to manipulate yield. The first vintage bottled by Thomas Hardy was four years later, once the vines had matured.
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