'We would never dump our wine'
Pernod Ricard managing director Fabian Partigliani said it would be "naive to say everything within the industry is rosy", but Montana did not need to dump wine.
His comments came after Montana's founding managing director said many of Marlborough's wines did not age well and this needed to be addressed urgently.
Frank Yukich told a crowd gathered to celebrate the 30-year anniversary of Montana's first sauvignon blanc vintage that it was not enough to maintain the current quality of its sauvignon blanc and "believe sales will continue for ever".
"Many of our wines do not age well. After 24 months there can be an excessively pungent canned pea character, not at all attractive," Mr Yukich said.
"Economic downturns are temporary but the damage to the industry's reputation by having poor quality wines on the shelves in our overseas markets will be permanent."
But Mr Partigliani said dumping was not an option for many reasons.
"One, it's not why we go into business, two we have strong distribution networks around the world, we can find solutions, we'll do it that way. We would never consider dumping wine."
Last year some Marlborough industry leaders called for any leftover wine in tanks to be tipped rather than sold cheaply to preserve Marlborough's premium image.
On TV3 current affairs programme Campbell Live on Friday, Forrest Estate's John Forrest and New Zealand Winegrowers chief executive Philip Gregan renewed that call so the industry's reputation would not be tarnished by second-rate wine.
At Friday's celebrations, Prime Minister John Key said he was optimistic about the wine industry's direction.
"This year we think we'll be ahead of where it was predicted and wine will be a billion-dollar export industry for New Zealand. That's significant."
Mr Partigliani said Montana held no surplus wine.
"It depends on how you define it. As an industry you could say that we don't [dump wine], because we've exported bulk wine, so technically the answer is no.
"I think our long-term future is really good. It would be a naive statement to say everything's rosy within the industry ... we've got to make sure the balance between supply and demand are right and I think we'll always have pressure on us with weather conditions etc, but at the moment we have what looks like two bountiful vintages, which means we're slightly out of sync with supply and demand," he said.
With all key export markets except Australia suffering, Mr Partigliani said the industry was at a crossroads, but he was confident about the future.
"We've been very successful in the past, we've made something which is completely unique in a world where you've got to stand out especially if you're a small country like New Zealand."
The key to moving forward was to keep innovating and changing Montana's sauvignon blanc, experimenting with different wine styles and "taking it to the next level", he said.
This included looking at new export markets such as China.
"As I say, I'm very optimistic about the future, we just have to get the balance between supply and demand right."