The Grocer – 10 August 2019

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Tamara Roberts
CEO, Ridgeview Wine Estate

There’s something to be said for sticking
to your guns. Compared with the behe-
moth Chapel Down, Sussex’s Ridgeview
is a smaller, family-run business focused
relentlessly on one thing and one thing only:
making the best fizz possible, through the
traditional method only.
Its list of accolades is daunting, and its
Grosvenor Blanc de Blancs 2009 Brut was
famously served by the queen to Chinese pre-
mier Xi Jinping during a state visit in 2015.
Talk about endorsement.
Ridgeview’s CEO, Tamara Roberts, is the
daughter of the brand’s founders, and under
her stewardship Ridgeview has mounted an
ambitious yet thoughtful expansion pro-
gramme. Most recently it has invested in
a cutting-edge £1.8m, 18,000 sq ft winery
designed to double its production capacity
to 500,000 bottles by 2023.
Further acclaim came earlier this year when
Ridgeview was the only English winemaker
named one of the world’s best vineyards by
the World’s Best Vineyards Academy, which
is made up of 500 global wine experts.
Roberts has also recently taken up a seat
on the board of the Wine & Spirit Trade
Association – the first English winemaker to
sit on its board – alongside drinks industry
heavyweights like Bibendum boss Michael
Saunders, Michelle Brampton of Treasury
Wine Estates and Mark Riley of Edrington-
Beam Suntory.

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Becky Hull MW

English & Welsh wine buyer, Waitrose

Waitrose’s efforts to bring English wine to the
masses – or at least the suburban, moneyed
masses that make up its core shopper base –
are second to none. It embraced the category
in its infancy and has been “fundamental” to
its growth, says Ridgeview’s Roberts. “They
started that journey and went beyond where
the industry anticipated – in some stores now
they even have the same number of English
wines as perhaps champagne or cava.”
Indeed, that Waitrose has a dedicated wine
buyer – and a Master of Wine at that – cover-
ing solely English and Welsh wines speaks for
itself. “They also took on board [the sector’s]

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power list english wine