EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
VILLIERA SPARKLES ON INTERNATIONAL STAGE VILLIERA IS A FAMILY RUN WINERY IN THE STELLENBOSCH REGION OF SOUTH AFRICA. MANAGED SINCE 1983 BY THE GRIER FAMILY, THE COMPANY IS PLANNING TO RELEASE NEW PRODUCTS AND EXPAND ITS EXPORT OFFERING. HEAD OF SALES, MARKETING AND EXPORT AND THIRD-GENERATION FAMILY LEADER, CATHY BREWER TELLS US MORE... PRODUCTION: DAVID NAPIER
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Villiera Wines is a modern but historic South African wine producer and wine tourism destination located conveniently in the country’s wine-hub between Cape Town and Paarl, just north of Stellenbosch. The business has positioned itself among the elite of the market and produces a range of highquality wines including white, red and sparkling varieties. It exports all over the world, has won a host of different awards, and continues to develop as a business each year. For the past 34 years, Villiera Wines has been headed by the Grier family. Cousins Jeff and Simon Grier started the business in 1983 and began rejuvenating the land, planting new vines of classical local varietals. Cathy Brewer, Jeff’s sister, joined the business shortly after the family purchased the farm and today she is a Cape Wine Master along with her brother, heading up sales, marketing and exports. She tells us that, as a company, Villiera Wines has come a long way in the past three decades and is now a profitable, respected, community-driven, and environmentally friendly business creating some of the best South African bubbly on the market. “We’re a third-generation family business but the first two generations were in poultry,” she says. “My grandfather came out from the UK on a ship bound for Australia and a Dutch friend of his told him to stop and see Cape Town so he did and he stayed, going to agricultural college and starting a poultry business which grew to become one of the largest in the Western