Big money moving into Niagara wine business

The Toronto Star (reg. req'd) has an article about some of the newer owners of wineries in the Niagara DVA:

Tawse, 48, who opened his winery this spring, estimates he spends about 35 per cent of his time amid the vines and away from his downtown office.

Others with similarly un-yeomanlike resumés include Gerry Schwartz, head of Onex Corp. and Vincor's biggest shareholder with 1.25 million shares. On Vincor's board sits former Second Cup chief executive Michael Bregman.

There's also Norm Beal, owner of Peninsula Ridge Estates Winery in Beamsville, who finally gave up oil trading this year to pursue wine-making full-time. And David Feldberg, CEO of office furniture manufacturer Teknion Corp., opened Stratus Vineyards in Niagara-on-the-Lake in June.

They're all involved in an industry that province-wide generated $450 million in sales last year on volume of 44 million litres and employed more than 5,000, according to the Wine Council of Ontario.

I'm agnostic on the question of whether this is a good thing or not: that successful businessmen are moving into the industry shows that there is definite chances for profits. But some of the very best wine is produced by tiny micro-wineries, where the profit margins are very, very thin. The big wineries are still trying to be all things to all drinkers: provide tony, high-quality wines for the premium market, and still produce mega-lots of cheap plonk. Calfornia seems to be moving away from that model, so it will be interesting to see if Niagara will emulate them.

Hat tip to Jon for the link.