Canada’s Okanagan and Similkameen valleys (2) Spearhead
Website: https://www.spearheadwinery.com/
Spearhead is a boutique winery based on the South East Kelowna slopes, which is a recently established Okanagan sub-GI. This is a cooler-climate part of the valley where Pinot Noir and Chardonnay do really well. The site here is a little further from Lake Okanagan, so it can get pretty cold here in the winter.
I met with winemaker Grant Stanley, who was born in Vancouver, and then learned his craft as a winemaker with 8 years at one of New Zealand’s leading producers, Ata Rangi, in Martinborough. He then moved back to Canada to work at Quail’s Gate, one of the Okanagan’s leading wineries, from 2003-2013. After this he worked at 50th Parallel, also in the Okanagan, before moving to Spearhead in 2016. He built a purpose-built winery to focus mainly on small lot Pinot Noir. They make 5000-6000 cases a year, with 6 different Pinots plus Chardonnay, Pinot Gris, Riesling and Rosé.
A short interview with Grant:
We chatted as we walked through the home vineyard. It’s 14 acres and has all been replanted after the cold spells of the last couple of years. Originally the vineyard was planted to Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Riesling in 2008. They’ve replanted with four clones of Pinot Noir (118, 943, 777 and 828), as well as some own-rooted Riesling, some Chardonnay, and Marquette (a hybrid) for the most troubled areas of the site (hybrids can usually tolerate the winter cold better). As well as sourcing from their own vineyards, they have growers locally as well as in Naramata and Summerland. So it’s not a complete disaster that they’ve replanted everything here. ‘It’s a really positive thing to have a reset,’ says Grant. ‘We got over the sad part pretty quickly and looked at it as an opportunity to renew.’
‘We’ve had decreased production the last few years and now we are about 95% direct to consumer,’ says Grant, ‘so it’s a good position to be in.’ They have a 1000 member wine club.
Like many wineries in the Okanagan, in the absence of any grapes in 2024 they bought some grapes from Washington State, the nearest wine region to here in the USA, and also Oregon. ‘It was easy to get grapes from the US because they are having real problems selling their wine,’ says Grant. The grapes come in refrigerated trucks, and the journey time is 14 hours.
The rules are that they have to sell this wine within three years: if this doesn’t happen, then you have to sell it at the extra mark-up for imported wine, and it is no longer very profitable! The amount you are able to make from foreign grapes depends on what the production was (an average of five years).
Not everyone has brought in grapes: many have chosen to ship juice in tankers, presumably because it costs less to transport and the journey through customs is simpler for juice than it is for grapes. The Washington-sourced grapes make a line of wines that Spearhead have called ‘dual citizen’.
Grant says that across the whole valley, the surviving vines (around 80%) have bounced back strongly in 2025.
THE WINES
Spearhead Dual Citizen Pinot Gris 2024 Washington State
From a vineyard near Prosser in Washington State. Label design is like the page in a passport, and it has an extra sticker with ‘made before the madness on it. This is textured and fresh with nice pear fruit and some subtle spicy citrus. Has depth but also freshness with mid-palate weight. Lovely stuff. 91/100 (CA$24)
Spearhead Dual Citizen Carousel Vineyard Riesling 2024 Washington State
Lively, bright, pure and crystalline with lovely sweet citrus fruit. Dry but textured with nice mid-palate depth. Really nice depth. 92/100 ($26)
Spearhead Dual Citizen Sauvignon Blanc Den Hoed Vineyard 2024 Washington State
From Prosser in Washington State. Nicely textured with pure citrus fruit and a hint of melon, showing nice focus and depth. There’s some elegance to this wine, with lovely texture to the fruit. 91/100 ($29)
Spearhead Dual Citizen White Pinot Noir De Vries Vineyard 2024 Washington State
2 h skin contact. Very appealing with some nice texture, showing primary pear drop flavours and a bit of melon. Really nice texture, with a touch of cherry, too. Broad and appealing. 91/100 ($29)
Spearhead Dual Citizen Pinot Noir Rosé De Vries Vineyard 2024 Washington State
2 days skin contact. Nice depth here with sweet pear and spice notes as well as some cherry. Very appealing with lovely texture and a fine spicy finish. This is all about textured fruit. 91/100 ($26)
Pinot Noir winemaking: lots of cold soak, lots of whole berry, all spontaneous fermentation, 25 days on skins, pressed to barrel and malolactic in the spring. No fining, no filtering.
Jagged Ridge Pinot Noir 2023 Naramata Bench, Okanagan, Canada
Small 2 acre vineyard, young vines. This is supple, sweet and textural with some spicy detail. Warm strawberries and cherries with some fine spices, showing depth, richness and purity. Lots of pleasure here, and also some complexity. 93/100 ($39)
Braided Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir 2023 East Kelowna Slopes, Okanagan, Canada
Young vines. Juciy, fine and spicy with lovely red and black cherry fruit. Shows nice energy and also good structure, with nice acidity. Fruit purity, great elegance. This is really fine and expressive. This is lovely. 94/100 ($39)
Spearhead Pinot Noir Cuvée 2023 Okanagan, Canada
This is a blend, and it’s the top wine. This is quite bold, but it has lovely floral detail as well as good structure. This is textured with some spicy detail and a bit of grip, and a slight hint of cola and tar on the finish. Impressive stuff with some density and some spicy detail. 94/100 ($46)
Spearhead Pinot Noir Pommard Clone 2022 Okanagan, Canada
This is from Golden Retreat vineyard in Summerland. This is light, elegant and refined with some savoury gravy and meat notes as well as a bit of spicy oak, showing a savoury twist on the finish. Nice tart cherry and plum fruit with a long, juicy finish. This has a lot of potential. 93/100
