Trinchero Estates, owner of Sutter Home, sets up own UK distribution

By Gemma McKenna

Published: 27 January, 2014

California's Trinchero Family Estates, one of the state's largest wineries and owner of the Sutter Home brand, has ditched UK distributor PLB to set up its own direct distribution.

After working with PLB for 10 years, the group decide that the best way to operate in the UK's challenging market was to work directly with its customers.

The two companies are now working together in a transition period until April 1, 2014.

Since January, PLB has lost the family-run Chilean winery, Viña Montes, which moved to Liberty Wines and South African winery Vergelegen, which switched to Fells. In December PLB took on South African premium Fairtrade producer Bosman Family Vineyards.

From April, Trinchero will service its regional wholesale network directly out of London City Bond. Andrew Chapman, who will be managing the business, said: "In order to address the challenging environment of the UK market it is important for us to work directly with our customers. We thank our distributors for having maintained their loyalty to our brands and particularly Sutter Home during its 20+ year history in the UK and we look forward to reinforcing our commitment to them as we work more closely with them in this exciting new phase of our development and hope to provide a much wider offering from our extensive portfolio."

California's fourth largest winery and producer of Sutter Home, Menage a Trois and Fre dealcoholised wine brands has made the strategic move to set up its own distribution direct to Wholesale in the UK.

"We thank PLB, and particularly the Fredericks family, for their contribution towards the presence of our brands in the UK," added Chapman.

The Trinchero family will attend Prowein in Dusseldorf in March, at stand E10, Hall 1 I the California Pavilion.

Printer friendly version