Portavin turns 21

Welcome to Portavin’s new look e-newsletter, launched in the year that our integrated wine services business turns 21.

The concept for Portavin began back in the early 1980’s, when founder Mike Davies was studying winemaking at Roseworthy College. He wrote his thesis on the viability of a mobile bottling facility for the Australian wine industry and in 1989, turned words into reality, when his first mobile bottling facility in Australia hit the road. And so Portavin was born.

Since then, Portavin has grown to five static wine bottling facilities and two mobile lines. The business has increased its services over the years to include supply of packaging materials, laboratory services, dry goods supply, bulk wine storage, warehousing, distribution and export container packing.

With eight qualified winemakers in the business, Portavin has the experience and expertise to help you package and protect your most important asset, your wine.

We asked Mike Davies how it felt for Portavin to “come of age” this year…
“By the age of 25, I realized the only way I was going to hold down a job would to be self employed! Since 1989 when I started Portavin, alot has happened in the wine industry and we have been very lucky to have been able to grow and change with it.

At our 21st birthday celebrations held in Margaret River earlier this year, it became even more obvious to me that Portavin is all about people and how great it is to work with such a variety of friends – be they partners, staff, customers or suppliers. Many of our staff members have been with us for over 10 years, and many of our customers have used our services for the life of the business.

Our celebration was also a great opportunity to see some past employees and there was also a healthy representation from the “Old Guard” of the Margaret River wine industry

Thanks to everyone who has been a part of the Portavin story to date. Bring on the next chapter!”
 

…and PET turns 5

This year is also significant for PET, the popular lightweight bottles, which has now been available through Portavin for 5 years. PET is an abbreviation for polyethylene terephthalate, a light weight plastic which is increasingly in demand from airlines seeking to improve their environmental credentials.

Amcor, the leaders in PET technology, approached Portavin in 2004 to trial to run of 187ml PET down the bottling line, which until then, had only handled glass. After certain modifications were made, Portavin developed a method of successfully filling PET bottles, which if not done correctly has the bottles behaving like ping pong balls.

The first commercial bottling into PET took place in 2005 – being wine from both Zonte’s Footsteps and Nepenthe, destined for Qantas. These wineries were directed to Portavin by the airline, as Qantas was confident that Portavin could deliver on the project.

At the same time, other airlines were looking at ways to save money and weight across their logistics chains. Given the 187ml PET bottle weighs five times less than glass – saving almost 3kg per case - packaging in PET is a “no brainer”.

Portavin is a logical company for an airline to deal with because of our independence and our strong contacts with the boutique wineries of Australia as well as the medium and large producers.

Five years on Portavin has successfully bottled 21 million PET bottles for wineries around Australia. The list of customers for PET is growing – both in terms of wineries and airlines using the technology.

For wineries considering the move to PET, Portavin is the nation’s specialist.

To find out more, contact Ian. Ian.matthews@portavin.com

Wine drinkers prefer PET

PET bottles are now the preferred alternative to glass in the all important UK wine market. The following article by Carol Emmas appeared on Harper’s Wine and Spirits website on 20th October 2010.

“The PET bottle has edged in front of the Bag-in-Box (BIB) and Tetrapak in popularity according to Wine Intelligence research.

A consumer survey of UK monthly wine drinkers, conducted in June 2010 showed that 40% of respondents said they would be likely to buy wine in a PET bottle in the future, compared with 37% for BIB and 21% for a pouch, although the scores still lagged a long way behind glass.

The report confirms that consumers still overwhelmingly back the 75cl glass bottle for almost all wine drinking occasions, particularly in social settings. Alternative packaging has more relevance in outdoor settings, or when carrying heavier glass bottles are inconvenient.”
 

Stelvin Agents

In 2010, Portavin was pleased to be appointed exclusive agents for printed Stelvin caps in WA and Tasmania – and agents in all other states.

Speaking on the appointment, Gerlinde Watson, General Manager for Portavin WA said “Stelvin are the market leaders in terms of the finishes they can produce, decorating options and the quality of the product at the point of application. Stelvin, like Portavin, are here for the long run and we are delighted to be working with them in servicing the wine industry.”

For more information, contact bo.zacharchuk@portavin.com in VIC.
 

Very large format

Earlier this year, Portavin Melbourne was approached by Handpicked Wines to bottle 3, 6 and 27 litre bottles. The 3 and 6 litre bottles were easy enough but the 27 litre bottle? Well, that is the sort of challenge Portavin relishes! Known as a “primat” the empty 27 litre bottles were imported from Italy. Ten primats were hand filled with Barossa Shiraz, hand corked then sealed with wax. That was the tricky part...since it takes several people to lift the filled bottle, there was no way of inverting the bottle to dip in wax. Portavin devised a collar to protect the bottle, while wax was incrementally poured and allowed to dry.

Portavin is now even more confident of meeting your large format bottling needs, we’ll give anything a go…and don’t forget we supply wooden boxes as well.

For any large format or wooden box requirements, contact tim.ross@portavin.com 
 

Meet Gavin Wade

Gavin Wade, Portavin Melbourne’s Production Manager, has been with Portavin for nearly 15 years, making him the longest serving employee at Portavin Melbourne.

Gavin was born and grew up in Adelaide, so apologies – he is a keen Port Adelaide supporter. Straight out of school, Gavin worked for a contract bottling company Regal and Ross. He then moved onto Southern Beverage, before accepting the job with Portavin’s mobile bottling line in the mid nineties.

In 2002, Portavin Melbourne set up its static bottling line in the southern suburb of Cheltenham and commenced offering integrated wine services. Gavin was offered the role of Production Manager, along with the chance to commission the new facility and relished the chance to be involved from the ground up. In 2004, the second bottling line was installed and machinery has been upgraded over the years to create a state of the art bottling line.

For Gavin, the most exciting challenge has been to develop the bottling lines to handle the PET bottles efficiently to the point where Portavin has become the leader in this area. He loves the constant challenges thrown his way, “It’s never boring. It’s good hard, challenging work and I am part of a great team. Our production staff members are committed and work hard to ensure our customers are happy, which in the end is why we are all here.”

Favourite wine: Shiraz Viognier
Favourite food: Anything that is put in front of me. Have to say my favourite is corn beef with mashed spuds.
Footy team: Port Adelaide
Favourite film: Star Wars, the original three.
Favourite book: Stephen King “It”.

No job too hard

Portavin recently handled a large order from a retail chain for 64 000 cases to be packed on Chep D pallets. These are smaller than standard, measuring 775mm by 595 mm and used so that the whole pallet can be unloaded onto the shop floor and goods sold straight from the pallet.

The initial difficulty was that these pallets could not be handled by machinery designed for standard pallets. Portavin overcame this with modifications to the line and extra staff who manually stacked the pallets. We were able to do the job at the usual maximum line speed – bring on the next challenge!