Northern Lights Estate Winery

Northern Lights Estate Winery expands

Aug 5, 2020 | 3:34 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – The Northern Estate Winery has expanded.

It has purchased several acres of land in Foreman Flats in order to expand its fruit production.

“We will have two acres of black currant, two acres of haskap, two acres of saskatoons and, next spring, we will have an acre and a third of rhubarb,” explains Noemie Touchette, the Winery’s Director of Operations.

She says the land in Foreman Flats is ideal for growing what they need. But there’s another reason for the expansion.

“It’s difficult to source affordable haskap so we’ve decided to grow most of haskap. Also, rhubarb is the most popular fruit that we process. And it grows well and we can grow it and we can grow it and process it as cheaply as the Lower Mainland.”

To be self-sufficient in rhubarb, they will need to grow ten acres.

But with the expansion of the fruit production so will the physical winery, which is currently on PG Pulp Mill Road.

“We know that our facility on PG Pulp Mill Road is going to increase in size or we’re going to have to build more buildings to be able to produce the wine,” explains Doug Bell, Owner of the Northern Lights Estate Winery. ” Currently we are the 37th largest winery in B.C. out of 300. And we expect that to continue to go up.”

To be an estate winery, the goal is to produce as much of its own fruit as possible.