With Less Than 10,000 Bottles Per Year, Chile’s Viñedo Chadwick Has Earned Bragging Rights In The World Wine Market

In 1980 Chilean wine production totaled barely 900,000 liters. In 2022, Chilean wine production totaled 1.244 billion liters, a 7.39 percent decrease from 2021. Likewise, in 2022, Chilean wine export volume totaled 833.5 million liters, a 4.0 percent decrease from 2021.

Long dominated by Concha y Toro (founded in 1883), Chile’s wines began to make fine wines for export only in the 1990s, after post-war decades of heavy taxation and lowered wine consumption. But after changes in government policy made viticulture profitable, old and new wineries began ripping out weak varietals in favor of premium grapes like Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère, Merlot, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc.

Established wine producers from Europe and the U.S. took notice and invested heavily in Chile, including Spain’s Miguel Torres and France’s Lafite-Rothschild, Mouton-Rothschild, Cos d’Éstournel, G.H. Mumm, and Grand Marnier. In the mid-1990s California wine magnate Robert Mondavi invested $12 million in Chile’s Viña Errazuriz vineyards to start up his own Caliterra brand. There’s even a joke among California winemakers that the best place to meet their neighbors is in the lobby of the Hyatt Hotel in Santiago.

This soaring growth in both volume and consistent quality has led some Chileans to aim for the same firmament and prices claimed by Bordeaux and Napa Valley. One of the leaders is Viñedo Chadwick, whose top Cabernets are selling for $350 a bottle. I interviewed by Juan Carlos Pagola, managing director of Viñedo Chadwick, as to how such success has been achieved.

How did Chadwick get such an English-sounding name?

The ancient Chadwick surname originated in Scandinavia during the Viking period. From there, it re-emerges in France and later flourished in England and Scotland before crossing the Atlantic to North and South America. Don Alfonso Chadwick was part of the third generation of the Chadwick family in Chile, descendent from Thomas Chadwick, who was a British mining engineer that headed to the new continent looking for opportunities and settled in the North of Chile in 1820. Don Alfonso was an accomplished polo player and a visionary in the modernization of the Chilean wine industry, and also considered the father of Puente Alto D.O. Viñedo Chadwick holds his name as it represents the family’s long-cherished desire to honor his memory. This unique wine showcases the family’s heritage and tradition of producing fine wines, with passion for excellence.

Chadwick began plantings in 1992 but took 7 years to produce its first vintage. Were you buying others’ grapes in the meantime? Why did it take 7 years?

Aware of the potential of the Puente Alto terroir, Eduardo Chadwick convinced his father after his retirement from polo, to transform his beloved polo field into a world-class vineyard, planting Cabernet Sauvignon vines in 1992. The first vintage released of Viñedo Chadwick was 1999. During those seven years in between, Eduardo and the team worked tirelessly to nurture and train the vines to produce the best possible wine, as it takes time and perseverance to handcraft a truly fine wine. With the great quality of this first 1999 vintage, it was clear that Viñedo Chadwick was off to a flying start.

What was the Berlin Tasting and what was the result in the world press?

On January 23rd, 2004, inspired by the Judgment of Paris, Eduardo Chadwick and Steven Spurrier invited Europe’s most highly regarded wine experts to take part in a historic blind tasting in Berlin. The challenge was to show that Viñedo Chadwick and other fine Chilean wines were at a similar level of quality as the most prestigious wines of the world. The result of this historic tasting proved to be a true eye-opener: Viñedo Chadwick 2000 was placed first, above the First Growth wines from Bordeaux of the millennium vintage, most of which had been awarded 100 points by Robert Parker, as well as the Super Tuscans from Italy. This revolutionary event for the global wine industry, known as “The Berlin Tasting”, turned out to be a milestone for the appreciation of the superb quality of Viñedo Chadwick and led to the discovery and recognition of Puente Alto D.O. Maipo Valley as a world-class appellation.

The number of wineries in Chile rose from 12 in 1995 to over 70 in 2005. What caused this enormous growth?

Actually, vines arrived in South America in the 1600s with the Spanish Missions so wine has been part of the Chilean culture for longer. Later in the 1900s some traditional Chilean wineries were established with a more modern approach of winemaking, but it was still for local consumption. And since 1983 Chile opened to exports and that also boosted the growth and modernization of established wineries, as there appeared more business opportunities in addition to the country’s economic growth and investment from abroad that started in the 1990s.

Chile was never affected by the phylloxera that devastated Europe’s vineyards in the late 19^thcentury. Do you have any pre-phylloxera vines in the estate?

In 1992, the fifteen-hectare Viñedo Chadwick vineyard was carefully planted with Cabernet Sauvignon vines from a massal selection. These were entirely ungrafted, as is still common in phylloxera-free Chile, and had been selected on the basis of their age and quality from another estate of the family. New plantings were done in 2015 with Cabernet Sauvignon French clones planted on rootstocks, to add yet more complexity to the blend.

Given that Chile’s Maipo Valley has more consistent weather than Bordeaux, do vintages differ very much at Chadwick?

Vintages do differ at Viñedo Chadwick and we obtain wines that express the terroir in those different conditions. What we have in Puente Alto that is much beneficial for the vines is that rains are concentrated in winter and summers are usually long and dry so we are able to consistently mature the grapes in very healthy conditions until picking time.

Has global warming or El Niño affected your wines?

Global warming is affecting the whole planet so in terms of winemaking and viticulture, our most important developments are focused on sustainability and water management, which today is one of Chile’s biggest challenges, so we need to be proactive and use it efficiently. At Viñedo Chadwick we recently built a water reservoir to ensure its availability.

Politics once played a decisive role in Chile’s winemaking. Does it still have a part to play?

It was more of a land reform for all agricultural purposes in the past, but it doesn’t have any decisive role in winemaking today.

Chile’s economy expanded rapidly in 2002. How did that affect Chadwick and the sales of your wine?

I don’t believe that had much of an effect. I believe the success of our sales comes from the great quality of our wine that has been recognized internationally and consistently since its first vintage 1999. Its vintage 2014 was the first wine in Chile to be awarded the perfect 100 score by James Suckling.

What are worldwide sales of your wine?

Around 9,500 bottles per year. It is a very high-end, small volume production.

How much is consumed in Chile and how much exported?

Around 7% of our production is sold in Chile.

Your prices are high compared to most Chilean Cabernets. Is that just supply and demand?

Viñedo Chadwick was born to honor a family’s legacy for excellence. In that sense, it comes from a very small world class appellation, Puente Alto D.O. for Cabernet Sauvignon. The quality of our wine has been recognized by wine critics internationally and consistently since its first vintage. With time, it has become a reference any wine collector must have in its cellar and it has played a leading role in the recognition of Puente Alto as a world-class appellation and the positioning of Chile in the world of fine wine, hence its price.

Are there plans for expansion into other regions?

No. Viñedo Chadwick is a wine that intends to show this world class terroir of Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile. So its production will always be limited to what its 15 hectares has to offer.