BC and two Ontario wine producers to change bottle labels after complaints

VANCOUVER, B.C. - All three of Canada's largest wine producers are working on new labels for some of their best-selling wines after complaints that consumers were being hoodwinked into thinking they were made from Canadian grapes.

The winemakers say they've listened to the outcry, but in British Columbia, they've also had an unsubtle nudge from the provincial government, which sells their product in provincial liquor stores.

"We believe in more transparent labelling," said a source at the Mark Anthony group, producer of the popular Mission Hill wines, which are made with 100 per cent Canadian grapes, as well as the Wild Horse Canyon wine which is a blend of grapes from B.C., Washington and California.

The source said no one at Mark Anthony wanted to go on the record to discuss the labelling changes because the company preferred to announce the move when it could introduce the new label design. It's not clear yet when those design changes will be done.

The three winemakers, including the Ontario companies that make Peller Estates and Jackson Triggs, have been under fire for selling wines inconspicuously labelled "Cellared in Canada" when in fact, the wine contains mostly foreign grapes.

Consumers - egged on by several high-profile wine writers - say the labels are misleading at best.

In response to the outcry, B.C.'s agriculture minister said earlier this week that wines made from foreign grapes would be moved out of the B.C. products section in government-run liquor stores.

The source at the Mark Anthony group said the winery has no problem with that, saying the winery is "talking with the province about proper signage" with the intent of creating a new section for cellared-in-Canada wines.

The issue has become an especially hot one in Ontario, where grape growers are stuck with a glut of grapes this year that aren't being sold.

John Peller, president of Ontario-based Andrew Peller Ltd., said his company has for more than a decade labelled bottles that contain import wine but appear in the Canadian section of the liquor store as "Cellared in Canada."

But Peller said no formal complaints had been registered until the past few weeks about importing bulk grapes, bottling them in this country, and marketing them as Canadian. Now that there have been complaints, the company has been forced to act.

"We will add more information to the label and we'll do it as soon as we can," Peller said in an interview.

"We can move the information to make sure it's on the front label as well as on the back label. We can make it a little more prominent and add some information."

Peller said it was never his company's intention to deceive anyone or confuse consumers.

"Please don't question our intention to be totally transparent and honest," he said.

Peller said the now-controversial labels have been in place since 1996 when they were approved by a national standards board.

"We pointed out to the government, 'We can't say these wines are a product of Canada because they're not a 100-per cent product of Canada,"' he recalled. He said the board then told them to go with "Cellared in Canada."

Peller also disputed the assertion that the import wines feature no Canadian content, estimating that the average bottle has 30 to 40 per cent Canadian grapes.

The controversy could not have come at a worse time. Peller said sales have already been slow throughout the wine industry and his company has been forced to lay off some employees.

Vincor, who Peller described as a respected wine industry competitor, has also agreed to change some of its import labels to alleviate any concern.

Lisa Cameron, general manager of the British Columbia Wine Institute which has 85 winery members, said any move that provides consumer clarity is a good one.

"(Our members) just hope that this can be used as an opportunity to educate consumers that if they want to buy a 100-per cent B.C. wine then they should look for the B.C. VQA label," she said.

VQA - or Vintners Quality Alliance - means a wine is made from Ontario or B.C. grapes.

Bob Ferguson, who owns the Kettle Valley Winery in Naramata, B.C., agreed, saying if - and only if - the labels clear things up, consumers will be the better for it.

"To date (consumers) haven't been able to make an informed choice because the labels, the way they're laid out from the larger corporations, are very, very similar to their B.C. products and they're intensely confusing to consumers," he said.

"I think any steps that are made towards clearly identifying and properly labelling their wine is a step in the right direction," though Ferguson cautioned he hadn't seen what any revised labels might look like.

He said B.C. wine growers have been working to combat the Cellared in Canada label since it came into existence.

Wine writer John Schreiner said he expects the labelling changes will help clear things up somewhat, but he said what's more likely to propel the change is a desire by the Canadian wineries to distinguish their marquee products from their lower-end wines.

"Now that Jackson Triggs is a highly respected brand - that winery has won top awards in top competitions all over the place for its VQA wines - the risk now is to have $8 or $9 wines also with the Jackson Triggs label. To some extent, it takes away from what's become quite a distinguished brand," said Schreiner.

"Mission Hill has already done this. There is now no Mission Hill brand that's not VQA."

Instead, the Mark Anthony group sells its Cellared in Canada wines under labels such as Sonora Ranch and Mission Ridge