Flying Fish Cove Celebrates 20 Years in the Wine Industry

Local Wilyabrup winery, Flying Fish Cove is celebrating 20 years of service to the Margaret River Wine Industry.

The Flying Fish Cove story began two decades ago. “Venture shareholders all owned vineyards in the Wilyabrup sub-region and the original idea was akin to a co-operative. This blossomed into a dedicated contract service for other brands looking for quality winemaking at a commercial price.” said Damon Eastaugh, Manager at Flying Fish Cove.

Pictured left to right - Fork Driver (unknown), Stuart Bender Wildberry Farm Vineyard viticulturist, Leo Seaward at the time proprietor of Hay Shed Hill, Peter Stanlake Hay Shed Hill winemaker, Lyn Eastaugh, Ken Miles proprietor of Minot Wines and Mark Lane original Flying Fish Cove winemaker.

“In the first year we turned an excavated building site in December into a basic winery to process fruit by February. In 2001 we only had tanks to handle less than 500 tonne. Today our capacity is 2000 tonnes or about 5% of Margaret River’s annual crush”.

“We are proud to be reaching this milestone, as one of the first dedicated custom contract crush wineries in the Margaret River region. We are now operating a facility with the best grape receival equipment available to the market.”

Damon Eastaugh, a family member of one of the founding shareholder groups, still works in the business after 20 years.

Mark Lane, our first winemaker trying to do his best when the winery was still a construction site. Lyn Eastaugh is watching on as we do our first crush.

“We have enjoyed a long period of stability with our staff, Simon Ding, our Chief Winemaker and Kerry Bennett, our Finance & Administration Manager having provided over 10 years service each.”

“We all enjoy the challenge of running a complex business and our motto has always been every year a little bit better”.