About Prenzels - The Company
The idea of starting a Marlborough based distillery for fruit brandies was first proposed by a French visitor to New Zealand, Robert Wuest, in early 1989. Robert was from Alsace in Eastern France which is the fruit brandy (eaux-de-vie,) centre of France. He was staying with the Steadman family at their cherry orchard on the outskirts of Blenheim when the inspiration came to him.
In Alsace, small mobile stills, had been a traditional part of village life for many generations. The French government had banned them after World War II and those which were not destroyed went into hiding.
Alouette, as she was to become known, due to her French allure, was one such political fugitive. She was discovered hiding in a widow's cellar in Mulhouse, was smuggled across the Swiss border and, from there, legally shipped to New Zealand.
Pilot trials were carried out in a shed on the Steadman's property. In June 1989, a consultant, Leon Sorg, came out from Alsace to show how it was done and later, Hugh Roberts, the first Kiwi distiller, was sent to Alsace for 6 months training.
The pilot scheme demonstrated that the high sunshine hours and the unpolluted skies and terrain of Marlborough offered the potential to produce fruit brandies of exceptional quality. This finding was confirmed four years later by the gold medal won by Prenzel's Pear William brandy when entered in the world's largest open fruit brandy distillation competition. (Destillata, Austria, 1994.)
When Hugh Steadman established the commercial distillery in 1992, it was decided to look for a logo which would connect the New World distillery with the area of Europe from where it drew its tradition. Outside every baker's shop in Alsace, a large Pretzel is hung as a tradesman's sign. It was decided to adopt this plain, but striking, symbol (which is also a medieval love-knot,) as the company logo - albeit slightly stylised.
Company Name & Logo
After various unsatisfactory company names, it was decided to call the company by it's logo. However, The Pretzel Distilling Company sounded a bit strange - anyone would think we were trying to make brandy from pretzels! In was therefore decided to customise the name by linking it directly with New Zealand - this was done simply by substituting the "t" for an "n."
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