Andrew and Jane Mitchell

Andrew Mitchell's parents were Peter and Mavis Mitchell and they established a vineyard at Clare in 1949. Jane Mitchell nee Makin grew up in Adelaide and her great grandfather was Walter Duffield. Andrew's parents grew grapes but did not make wine. He wanted to be a winemaker and talks about the local winemaker Roly Birks. They married in 1973 and in 1975 Andrew went to Wagga Wagga to study at Charles Sturt University and Jane went to Roseworthy. Jane studied wine production and marketing. Andrew studied externally and went to residential schools. They talk about the people they studied with. They opened their own winery in 1975 and thought it would be easy. Their first vintage was only a few tons of grapes that cost less than $1000 to make. They did not invest a lot of money and only had a small operation which grew gradually from a 50 ton winery to a 700 ton crush over 29 years. They sold their first vintage for $2 per bottle through the Wellington cellars. They started with Riesling and Cabernet then moved to Shiraz as well. When they started they were the only ones in the Clare Valley not making vintage port. Now no one is. They did not export wine until 1986. Steven Walker took their wine to the UK. They sell to a few countries only through a merchant vintner group. They do not depend on other growers for grapes. They still use the same wine making methods they started with. They rarely use irrigation but use straw mulch. They do not want the winery to get any bigger as they are where they want to be and the two of them own it themselves and have 5 staff