Firstly may we take this opportunity to wish you a very happy new year, despite the circumstance we now find ourselves in lockdown 3.0 we hope you are keeping safe and well.

It has been a challenge these past months with the restaurant supply of our business being severely affected. However, we can report we had a very good Christmas trading period in the shop snd so a huge THANK YOU to everyone who either came to the shop or bought online.

We now face the New Year with an even harder challenge in this quieter trading period for us, although we remain resilient with our desire to survive on the high street of Stratford upon Avon both 2021 and beyond.

We will continue to host our virtual wine tasting events and the next one takes place on 29^th January at 6pm on Instagram Live. Do get involved if you can… as they have proved popular evenings and a fun way to start the weekend! You can find our next event selection here.

The shop also remains open, albeit on slightly reduced hours (details seen here) and enable you to either buy in person, or collect an online or telephone order.

We also continue to offer our free local delivery service for 6 bottles or more. Please note: there is the option of a £2.95 delivery charge with 100% going to the Shakespeare Hospice who, with your help, we have already donated a cheque of £1000.00 during last year and we continue to raise funds for this wonderful local charity.

Whilst stating the obvious – that January heralds the start of the New year – it is an exciting time in the wine trade. We start to see the new 2020 vintages arriving from Europe and have already had several Southern Hemisphere 2020 vintages landing.

We would of course normally be attending a plethora of trade tastings, where we get to sample the new vintages either bottled or about to be bottled next month and shipped for Spring. However, we will be bringing in some new wines that I managed to sample early in 2020. Although they didn’t make the portfolio at the time we do feel now is the time to show them:

For example, from northern Italy we have from Bottega Vinai their aromatic Gewurtraminer, Trentino (see it here). From Nimrod Kovacs wine in Hungary we for some years now we’ve listed their delightful Pinot Gris/Chardonnay and Pinot Noir – we are adding their Kefrankos red (see it here). Then from Sepp Moser in Austria we have their organic and bio-dynamic Pinot Blanc (see it here), Weissburgunder and their classic organic Zwiegelt (see it here).

Also I must mention we have some old favourites returning to help celebrate Australia day on 26th January. Knock knock who’s there? Well, it’s Knock Knock Shiraz, Clovella Mataro/Grenache (see it here) and the new Three monkeys GSM, Grenache/Syrah/Mourvedre (see it here).

All of these are now available to buy here online and in our Union Street shop.

Keep warm and safe.. with best wishes from us all at VN HQ!