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It’s absurd to think that Trent Burge’s Barossa Boy almost didn’t exist. With very little interest in wine, and a big interest in playing professional cricket, it certainly wasn’t a given that Trent would follow in the footsteps of the previous five generations and make wine. However, following a few summers working in the family business, a passion developed for his home region and the wine produced there. Trent was hooked and cricket’s loss was the wine world’s gain!
During a recent visit to the UK, we caught up with him to find out more.
How did the Barossa Boy project come about? What’s your inspiration?
My family has always been in wine, so I’ve always been around it, and I wanted to create something special from really small parcels around the Barossa. The opportunity came a year after my parents sold our family business — there was one little vineyard that wasn’t being sold off and wasn’t being used, and I knew it made some really special Mataro (or Mourvèdre). And that was the inspiration — to really put Mataro on a pedestal, and it all started with just that one block.
How would you describe the Barossa Boy style and how do you achieve this?
It depends on the wine a little bit, but the Barossa Boy style is really approachable. For example, the GSM is super easy drinking, with minimal tannin structure, and yet is really balanced in its style. I would say the overall style across the range is approachable and beautifully drinking. I talk about drinkability a lot — I love to create wines that people can keep coming back to, that are quite moreish and are a part of people’s lifestyle, that can add to and enhance what they are doing in that moment. Then you’ve got some big, bold flavours in some of the other wines as well, but they’re still really approachable, lovely drinking wines, and they can age as well. So there’s a bit of a mixture.
Your wine labels are very distinctive. What is the story behind them?
Every single wine in our range has a small story behind it. Every wine matches the area that it comes from, and the story matches the wine that’s inside the bottle. For me, this is a really big part of the whole wine experience — if I can give you a story about the site, about my personal life, it can be really engaging, and makes the wine really exciting to drink.
Considering you are the 6th generation of your family to make wine, was there any chance of you going down a different path?
There was a huge chance of me going down a different path. When I was younger, I wasn’t really into wine. I was around wine, but I wanted to play cricket for Australia. I actually ended up coming over to the UK for a couple of summers to play semi-professional cricket in Essex. Unfortunately, in the end, it wasn’t to be. However, while I was pursuing that path, I was working in our family wine business, and I really found a passion for the wine, but also for our region and what we do. And that’s why I wanted to create the Barossa Boy brand, because I’m a Barossa boy through and through, I really love our area, and I love making wines from our area.