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The Puddleduck Podcast
Puddleduck_conversation_part1.mp3	In this part of the conversation we get some background on Darren and Jackie,  we tackle the curious attitude Tassie people have about travel times to work, we find out what Darren does when he is bored, we quiz Darren about vine 'clones', we discuss the fame juggernaut that is Basil the wine dog and finish by spending a bit of time discussing all things 'bubbleduck'.
Puddleduck_conversation_part2.mp3	In this part of the conversation we spend a bit of time discussing cellar door do's and don'ts.  We chased up an answer to a question a punter asked us at the white wine weekend,  we find out whether Jackie married Darren for his wine cellar, we discover how soon after purchase the majority of wine is drunk, Darren big notes his wines, we find out how he gets his grapes picked for free and to finish off we unleash Michelle who get personal.

Darren Brown - He knows Basil the world famous wine dog!

Darren and Jackie. What's in a name?  Well, in some cases it's everything.  In response to the age old question - how does my vineyard stand out from the crowd? - Darren and Jackie, like many in the wine industry, agonised over what to call their vineyard.  They went through the usual options something rise, something vale or view and so on.  Then they had an inspired moment and came up with probably the most memorable and recognisable vineyard name in the world. Not content with that, they went further and made it an integral part of their business identity.

The name "Puddleduck" comes from the behaviour of the ducks that live in the vineyard dam. When they want to eat something below the water they up end themselves and show their bums to the world.  (if people did this it might make dinner parties at lot more interesting - Ed).  Jackie's family referred to this behaviour as "puddling" and the rest, as they say, is history.

Darren told us how successful the Puddleduck name had been at raising the profile of the vineyard and in attracting people to the cellar door.  He mentioned that the first thing nearly everyone says is "had to come here, loved your name".  We have to confess that we were a little dubious about this at first but as we were packing up we heard the first 6 people who came in to the cellar door say exactly that so we have to admit that Darren and Jackie are on to something.

Of course it's not just the name that attracts the 'punters'.  Puddleduck is also the home of one of the 'Wine dogs'.  You have probably seen this book which contains the photos and profiles of the dogs who help their owners to produce grapes and wine here in Australia.  Basil was the Tasmanian wine dog of the year and has been known to provide signed postcards of himself upon request.

Polly plays hard to get

Basil's fame has spread overseas as Darren explained. "Two Americans came into the cellar door and said to me we are here to see Basil.  No problems I said and I went to the back door whistled and yelled Baz!  The second American looked at me very strangely and said our friend from California told us we had to come to Puddleduck and meet Basil.  The look on their faces when they realised they had come half way around the world and asked to meet a dog rather than the owner was priceless!"

Darren and Jackie also now have 'Polly' who is quickly establishing herself as the new Basil.  She is a delightful 10 month old pup who is very welcoming and doesn't christen your car tyres like big bad Basil.  

A catchy name and a world famous dog will only take you so far.  Ultimately you have to produce a quality product and you have to run a successful business.  We asked Darren about his background and discovered that he is a 23 year  industry veteran and that his wife Jackie is equally experienced.  This and the fact that they have an ability to relate to people has resulted in them selling some of the most popular wines in Tasmania.

Having understood the background to the vineyard we wanted to discuss the wines.  Trying to look professional, we took our resident sparkling wine expert to Puddleduck to apply the questioning blowtorch to Darren about puddleduck's sparkling wine.  Interestingly, the name of this wine came from a competition run by Darren and Jackie which involved asking 'punters' to name their sparkling and one of them thought of "bubbleduck".  As Darren said "we had 60 entries but once I saw that name the competition was over" and, for the record, we want to say to that unnamed punter you are an absolute genius in our opinion.  Disappointingly for PJ his entry of "I can't believe it's not Champagne" was too late and just not funny.

If you have had trouble actually getting your hands on a bottle of the bubbleduck don't be surprised, we have experienced the same thing.  In fact it is so hard to get that we started to wonder whether it exists at all.  Michelle had christened it the "snuffaluffagus" sparkling.  The reality is that the wine is just too damn popular (sorry no CIA plot, still with us conspiracy theorists? - Ed).  The problem is that after winning a gold medal with their first vintage the bubbleduck has consistently sold out in record time.  Darren told us they can barely keep up the demand from the people on their cellar door mailing list let alone have any left over for general sales.  

The good stuff.

One of the reasons we wanted to talk to Darren and Jackie was because we knew that they do not sell their wine to restaurants or wine sellers.  Instead they sell all their wine through their cellar door.  Given the fact that a number of people had told us how important their wholesale sales were to their business we wanted to know how you could run a successful wine label without them.  The answer was that Darren and Jackie have decided to concentrate on producing a small volume of high quality wine. As a result they have no wish or need to enter the highly competitive wholesale market.  To do so would require that they expand their vineyard which is something that they believe would be detrimental to both their lives and the quality of the wine.

Update for the second part of our conversation

The second part of our conversation with Darren Brown revolved around the Cellar Door end of his business and since Puddleduck wine is sold exclusively through their cellar door we started by quizzing them about cellar door etiquette. As it turned out it wasn't as exciting as we had hoped.  We were looking for lots of stories about outrageous behaviour maybe the odd fist fight but it wasn't to be - sigh (and this is bad because ....? - Ed).  The trouble was that Darren and Jackie are very relaxed and welcoming people who want 'punters' to enjoy themselves while trying the wine and the 'punters' who do come in are, regrettably, very well behaved.  This meant we had to provide our own 'horror' stories of spittoons used as rubbish bins and people having to be told not to bring their own 'Rum and Cokes' or Beer into the cellar door.

Puddleduck Cellar door.

Actually, talking about visiting cellar doors.  In the past Darren and Jackie were paid, yes paid, by their employer to go to other wine regions within Australia and New Zealand to inspect cellar doors (how in the name of all that is holy do you get that job? - Ed).  They were asked to bring back 'exciting new ideas'.  As Darren said "we could have saved them a lot of money if they had listened to the ideas we already had - we just used them in our own business".

When we talk cellar doors we always seem to get around to discussing the quaint practice of tasting.  Here at Winepunters, aside from being huge fans of it,  we find the whole business of wine tasting endlessly interesting.  As we said to Darren there aren't many industries where you get to waltz in and try a product for free.  It is very rare, for example, to see 'samples' being offered in supermarkets and go to any restaurant and ask for a sample before you order off the menu and be 'excited' and 'amazed' at the response (There's something for you brave people to try - Ed).

We have heard vineyard owners referring to 'punters' who come for the tasting and then don't buy as 'quaffers' or 'tyre kickers'.  If you over hear yourself referred to in this way, particularly when leaving a cellar door, immediately turn around and buy a bottle or your reputation will be forever tarnished.  One way the industry is tackling this issue is to charge a tasting fee which is refundable or waived on the purchase of a bottle of wine.

We believe this is the best solution as it removes the pressure in situations where you like the person but not their wines or where you are the only person in the cellar door and you can't sneak out.  Alarmingly Darren told us some places are going too far.  He mentioned hearing from some American 'punters' that in California some wineries are charging up to $US25 (that's around $40) to taste wines (outrageous, someone call the police! - Ed).  All we can say is hey Australia, let's not adopt that particular aspect of American culture.

Not puddling ducks.

After exhausting all things cellar door we moved on to questions about the Puddleduck wine.  We asked Darren what wine best introduces the Puddleduck vineyard and he replied "our dry Riesling". Darren then suggested we cellar a dry Riesling for 10 to 15 years which he believed would result in a truly amazing wine.  When we pointed out that we can't seem to manage that sort of feat he told us how he used to be 'paid' in wine when he started in the industry and because he didn't drink wine at the time his wine cellar built up.  With all due respect Darren if you don't drink it then yes it is easy to create a great wine cellar.  We felt a lot better about our inability to cellar a wine when Darren told us that 91% of wine in Australia is drunk within 3 hours of it being purchased.  God bless you all.  

What interested us was how successful their Rosè has been.  As Darren stated it is the only Rosè to have won a gold medal in a Tasmanian Wine Show and it is rated as number 2 in James Halliday's 'best of the best' section of his 2008 wine companion.  This may be well known in the industry but I think this success has flown under the radar for most punters.

The vineyard.

We finished the conversation with our patented personal questions.  For the record Darren's theme song is a reworking of rubber duckie so it says Puddle duckie - no real surprise there.  He wants to share a wine with Jancis Robinson, although he did agree after some prompting it has to be said, that Jackie would be in the top ten of people with whom he wants to share a drink.

On a personal note, we really enjoyed our time at Puddleduck and watching Darren and Jackie relate to other punters we saw that the 'friendly cellar door' isn't marketing it's what actually happens. We believe Puddleduck is worth a bit of a look, not for the name but for what really matters - the wine.

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