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NZ wine hit with gay community

Nov 16, 2004 6:23 PM

Australia's gay community has been quick to embrace the newest pansy in town - a fruity little New Zealand number produced by winemakers Kim and Erica Crawford.

Pansy Rose was officially launched in Sydney on Tuesday and has been targeted towards the lucrative gay market, which polishes off around $A4.5 million in wine each month according to the wine's creators.

Kim Crawford Wines' husband and wife team originally produced the wine to thank their gay friends in the hospitality industry.

And while it's only a small part of their annual business - Kim Crawford Wines turns over more than 150,000 cases each year - Pansy has been popular since its Auckland launch in 2002.

"The gay community just gravitated to the brand," Crawford said at the launch.

She said crossover between the Auckland and Sydney gay communities had created demand for Pansy across the Tasman.

There had also been a small but steady flow of sales to the United States where the wine was simply labelled as Crawford's Rose and was not catered to the gay market.

In Australia, however, Crawford is confident the target audience will get the joke.

"People seem to be loving it," she said.

"It just seems to me that people are ready to have a laugh because we have had the war and the elections and winter."

Not that there isn't a serious note to the Crawford family's wine-making.

"We make some terribly serious wine," she said.

"They are really highly acclaimed wines but it is this wine - Pansy - that has bought wonderful people into our lives."