We arrive in 1987, a year of note, not just for the wine but also for some important stories that influenced the style and quality of Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignon.

To begin with, we return to 1981, the year Francois Mitterand, an avowed Socialist, was elected President of France.  This led to wide speculation, all of it negative, about how this would impact the French economy.  In turn, the value of the French Franc slumped, making their wines more affordable than they’d been in living memory.  Historically, one Aussie dollar bought 4 French francs but after devaluation, the Aussie was buying more than twice that.  This meant the value of French wine was halved and even first growth Bordeaux wines were only $20 per bottle in the first indent offers.

The second amusing twist was the emergence of a new USA wine critic, Robert Parker, a lawyer who began publishing wine scores and commentary in his subscriber-only newsletter, The Wine Advocate.  His wine writing shook the conservative wine commentary world.  His style preferences were for ripe, forward wines, unlike those of the traditional English trade and press, not to mention the French producers themselves.  He also used 100-point scoring, rather than the traditional 20 points, making it easier for consumers to differentiate between quite similar wines.

American consumers, not previously big buyers of Bordeaux, took to his recommendations with enthusiasm, as did the Japanese.  With the weak currency and commensurately lower prices, demand for French wine, especially Bordeaux, skyrocketed.  Naturally enough, prices gradually followed suit and we’ll return to this point later in the story.

In the meantime, however, the fabulous 1982 vintage was affordable and larger than usual quantities made their way to Australia.  The significance of this should not be lost.  For the first time ever, it was possible to try virtually every wine in the 1855 Bordeaux classification and compare and contrast the styles, all from a great year.  A key lesson for us was that the Bordelais celebrated the good ripeness, just as they had with other great years like 1978, 1976, 1961 and 1959.  We needed to embrace the same ethos in Margaret River.

Back to the 1987 vintage.  This was another of the long, cool seasons, very similar in style to 1982 and produced similar wines.  Cabernet Sauvignon ripened well enough and produced reasonable red currant fruit depth but there was also a lot of leaf and cedar.  The tannins were well integrated and so the wine didn’t appear green and certainly remained in the style that was popular at the time.

The story of 1987 now takes a marketing tack.  Clare and Keith had begun exporting wine to the UK in 1984, to an import company called Peter Diplock Ltd, owned by a very English gentleman of the same name.  So began a friendship that lasted until Peter’s death, at the age of 100, in 2024.  Three years hence, sales were big enough for the Mugfords to visit the market and so with Peter and his partner Lindy Gerard, they had a stand at the London Wine Trade Fair, the world’s premier event of the era.  Amongst other wines on our table were the 1983, 1984 and 1985 Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignons.
Since it was very claret-like, we expected the ‘84 would be the wine of preference but the British trade much preferred the ‘83 and especially the ‘85.  Of course, the lesson should have been obvious.

The Brits could buy as much claret-like wine as they wanted from just over the Channel.  They didn’t want or need to import it 20,000 kilometres from Western Australia.  From us, they wanted Margaret River wine, with all its distinctive characteristics and especially the sort of ripeness on offer in ’83 and ’85.  It was a light bulb moment.  We didn’t need to fuss about elegance because Moss Wood had shown it could produce wines of balance, which had international appeal.

We have previously mentioned that the prices for French wine, and especially Bordeaux, had soared as a result of massive demand for the 1982 and then 1983 vintages, the latter also being a great year.  However, things took a different turn with the release of 1984, a year of significantly poorer quality.  It was generally accepted in the wine trade that good vintages could earn higher prices but the lower quality ones didn’t justify the same premium and were usually sold at a discount.

Demand was so high that many producers charged even higher prices for 1984 and this met with stiff resistance, especially in the British trade, many of whom expressed outrage at the temerity of the French.  Indeed, the anger was so great that they were prepared to consider purchasing wine from other sources, especially if the quality was of the same standard.  So much so, they were even prepared to buy wine from the colonies!

Australian wine had been through a quality renaissance during the decade up to and including 1985.  Advances in viticulture and oenology, plus expansion into the cooler regions like Margaret River had changed the face of the industry.  Our wines were receiving critical acclaim all around the world.

The British trade, now looking for alternative suppliers, took to us with open arms, despite years of playful enmity around cricket and rugby.  Australia virtually stormed into the UK market, eventually toppling the French as the largest supplier.  Moss Wood was part of this change.

To summarise, we had gained two very important insights.  We now had a much better understanding of what made the Cabernet Sauvignon wines so great and we also now knew we could make wines of style and quality that offered a serious challenge.