The South African Premium Wines business concept has been in development for more than five years. The concept was born in 1998 when the Celliers family recognised the fact that South Africa, emerging from its apartheid past, had enormous growth potential in exporting goods and services to international markets, particularly to countries with limited historical exposure to South Africa. A love for wine and close relationships within the South African wine industry, led to the further exploration of exporting premium South African wine to the United States.

A small concept rapidly developed into a very ambitious business plan when Norman Celliers assisted his family in further developing the concept while reading for his Masters degree in Business Administration at the University of Oxford, England. As part of their studies, Norman together with the invaluable assistance of three fellow MBA students, two Australians and one American, took a fresh look at the business concept and explored its full potential. Over a period of six months, the business potential grew beyond all expectations and the team of MBA students developed a ground breaking business plan that won numerous awards at international MBA and Venture Capital competitions in both the UK and USA.

Having raised limited seed capital, the team proceeded to turn theory into practice and they immediately commenced product and brand development. Firstly, extensive negotiations with a number of South Africa’s leading wholesale-producers resulted in the structuring of comprehensive supply agreements. This gave South African Premium Wines access to sufficient quality and quantity wine supply to develop and grow high-volume brands. Secondly, a leading british design agency assisted the team in translating their vision and unique brand name into world class label and packaging designs. Thirdly, the team travelled extensively through the US to conduct focus group testing and meet with leading retailers and distributors to gauge the potential of the chosen brand, product and strategy. The reception was overwhelming.

However, due to the sudden collapse of financial markets across the globe, the team failed to secure sufficient capital to continue with the business and were forced to seek alternative career options at the end of 2000. This resulted in the unfortunate break-up of a dynamic management team as each member returned to his respective home continent. Norman returned to South Africa and joined the corporate world as a strategy consultant.

While gaining invaluable business experience through a number of challenging projects across five continents, Norman kept his vision and dream alive. He was determined not to throw away all the valuable hard work that had been done and believed that the fundamentals of his business plan were right. For the next three years he used all of his spare time and resources and tried tirelessly to raise the needed capital. He travelled to the US a number of times and had further encouraging meetings with leading distributors. In January 2003, Norman finally made a break through. He raised further equity capital from prominent South African business personalities and started negotiations with one of the world’s largest companies, BAE SYSTEMS, and the South African Department of Trade and Industry. He informed them of his ambitious plans and convinced them of the opportunity, not only for his company but also for the South African wine industry as a whole. After months of negotiations, he succeeded in putting the final piece of the puzzle in place, sufficient capital to fulfil on orders of one million cases per annum.

In September 2003, Norman signed the final agreements with his financiers and officially kicked-off South African Premium Wines (Pty) Ltd. After more than five years of hard work, the time had finally arrived…