The price you get for winegrapes is one thing, but the other thing that really matters is what yield you get off that hectare of land. When you multiply the two together you can compare the worth of different varieties and different parts of the country.

So I recently came across a database of West Australian vineyards who are yet to sell their grapes. It includes full data on 33 blocks, including the price the buyer expected to have to pay the vineyard as well as the yield expected.

Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon are the two most lucrative crops, with Chenin Blanc close behind, because of its high yields. Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot sit at the bottom. “Can’t go wrong planting cabernet or chardonnay they told us; premium varieties…”

Cabernet and merlot also had the widest range of prices; with some vineyards prepared to sell even low yielding grapes for $700 a tonne. This includes Margaret River fruit, one of the best GI’s in Australia and internationally rated. That price is not sustainable; those people will be selling up if it doesn’t change real quick.

Looking at the different regions shows a substantial spread; Margaret River blocks ranged between $9,000 a hectare and $13,000; no better than less prestigous areas like Manjimup and Pemberton. Land cost is of course much higher at Margaret River.

I guess the only other point to make is that operating costs for a vineyard run around $7,000 a hectare. Then there are overheads and capital items… If you’ve borrowed to plant a vineyard, the interest could easily be $6,000 per hectare. You do the maths.

By the way, I know where to get 160 tonnes of quality shiraz grapes in case you’re looking…

There should be only two brands in Western Australian wine marketing. Margaret River and Western Australia. Although it is possible to market your wine as belonging to your local area (appellation/Geographic Indication/GI) this is a marketing blunder and wineries located outside Margaret River should follow a different path.

Margaret River has done a great job establishing a brand. The small number of pioneers who won international awards generated momentum and attracted a larger number of followers. These included well established West Australian companies, behemoths like BRL Hardy, a string of smaller cellar door operators and many entrepreneurs. All up, a great mix of different talents. That’s enough about Margaret River. Now I’m going to talk about ‘West Australia’, by which I mean, non-Margaret River.

West Australian wines are not going to cut it marketing themselves with their GIs. Although they make some extremely good wines, theirs are small and unknown GIs nationally and internationally. They just do not have a critical mass for marketing purposes. A different marketing strategy is needed that lets them market themselves as a coherent entity.

The Wine Industry Association of WA understands this problem and with the help of some state government funding and support from some corporates has established a brand as an export marketing tool. There are two problems with this. One: the positioning is not right. “Dominion of wine” says nothing about West Australia and frankly, is pompous. And don’t get me started on Australia-West.

Two: most of the WA wineries continue to market themselves on an appellation basis, calling themselves for example a ‘Great Southern’ wine, a ‘Swan Valley’ wine or wait for it, ‘Peel’.

These two problems have an overlapping solution. The great advantage Australia has as a wine-making culture is its willingness to innovate. The great advantage WA has as a wine-making region is terrific diversity of styles. It’s partly explained by being really old geologically and really big in area. A tremendous soil diversity exists and this has consequences for wine styles.

The ‘story’ of West Australian wines should be diversity and innovation, not life-style, beaches or natural environment. Here’s how this positioning overlaps the appellation issue: if you market yourself as ‘Western Australian’ you are allowed to blend wines from different regions and sub-regions in that wine. You can mix Swan Valley shiraz with cool climate shiraz from the Great Southern. This leads to a complexity you cannot get with a Swan Valley or Great Southern wine alone.

This should be the positioning of West Australian wines: Adventures in winemaking. A willingness to introduce complexity through regional diversity and a willingness to innovate with winemaking. That positioning works as well in domestic marketing as it does in export. It’s an easy-to-understand story and it gives people a reason to buy a West Australian wine.