Interview with Len Evans [transcript] Interviewer: Rob Linn

Len Evans was born in Suffolk of Welsh parents; educated in Suffolk; joined the Air Force to complete compulsory military service; emigrated to New Zealand in 1953 at the age of 22; developed an early interest in wine without knowing much about it; he worked in New Zealand, Mt Isa and Singapore doing a variety of jobs; started drinking at Mt Isa; his first job in the wine industry was as a glass washer, then a stocktaker where he developed a new system of residual balance control; he quickly became Assistant General Manager and had the best cellar in Australia; in 1962 he wrote the first wine column for the Bulletin which was the beginning of Cellarmaster; he joined the Wine Board as National Promotions Executive and started educational programs and a writing program; the Board was SA based and then expanded into WA; talks about some of his famous purchases; at the Board he refused to promote fortified wines and dealt with table wines; in 1967 he was earning $70 a week and in spite of huge salary increases they would not give him a pay rise so he resigned; he went independent and began to write more and released his first book "Cellarmaster"; his income increased from $7,000 a year to $19,000; he started to do congress management and was one of the first to do this; he continued to write for the Bulletin, also the Sun Herald, then the Indulgence column in 1977; in 1973 he released "The Complete Guide to Australian Wine" - it had 4 editions, 8 reprints and sold 180,000 copies; as a result of his columns many wines were sold; wine became more important in the 1970s because of the big changes in food and increased travel; he talks about the rapid changes in the wine industry; his involvement in Rothbury; people in the industry and his mentors; he started working on the export of wine in 1967 and by 1985 it reached a million cases a year at $17 a case, they became the new world wine; he formed the Evans Wine Co. with Peter Fox and they owned several wineries; Fox died and the company was reformed with Dennis Horgan and Colin Ryan as partners; the most influential people in the wine industry are Len Evans, Croser and Halliday

Interview with Len Evans

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