Take the overground train to Dalston in East London on a Thursday night, make a beeline for any candle-lit bar, push through a swamp of mullets, denim jorts and pink lemonade vapes, and you will likely bear witness to a chalkboard scrawled with a crash course in organic wine.
Spanning skin-contact orange to spritzy pét nat, au naturel wine, produced without synthetic chemicals or artificial fertilisers, is hot right now. IWSR data shows organic wine sales have risen in most markets over the past five years – by a CAGR of 14% in Australia, 2% in Canada and 1% in the UK. Voyage outside those natty city-centre wine bars into vineyards and you’ll find waves of winemakers sporting organic credentials in a bid to champion sustainability and keep up with climbing demand.
As with every revolution, there are cynics. They are not quiet about it, bemoaning unpredictable vineyard yields, inconsistent taste profiles, disease susceptibility and confusing certification procedures. Despite this, more and more producers around the globe are continuing to convert.
One in four of Austria’s vineyards is now certified organic, with France and Italy boasting 21% organic vineyards in 2025. At db, we’ve asked winemakers around the world why they chose to dedicate themselves to the church of organic viticulture, how they’ve surmounted the associated challenges and, for the aspiring organic winemaker, where to begin.
Natural protection
Let’s start in Chile, a country particularly suited to organic wine production, thanks to its unique geography providing natural protection for vineyards. The Andes Mountains, the Pacific Ocean, the Atacama Desert, and southern glaciers act as barriers against pests and diseases, including phylloxera, reducing the need for chemical interventions. In addition, Chile’s diverse range of climates and soils provides ideal conditions for producing distinctive wines that reflect their terroir.
Cono Sur, founded in 1993 in the Colchagua Valley, has used sustainable practices in Chile for more than 30 years. In 2003, the winery scored its first organic certification, followed by its Wines of Chile Sustainable certification in 2013 and B Corp in 2021. Organic winemaking, according to the winery’s viticultural and winemaking team (who jointly responded to db), must come from the heart. “Successful conversion is not simply about changing practices, but about embracing a different production mindset,” they say. In this way, being such a young winery has been advantageous for Cono Sur, which has dared to do things differently through integrating organics into its practice from day one.
But it hasn’t always been easy: there are plenty of things the team wish they’d known from the outset. Firstly, they would have liked to have had a deeper understanding of the entire organic conversion process, plus greater knowledge of certification requirements and traceability systems. As well as this, a greater grasp on the fertility of the vineyard sites would have helped, alongside the specific conditions of the vineyard – from climate to soil characteristics and the monitoring of pests and diseases.
Despite this, Cono Sur has learnt a lot along the way, ultimately spurred by the belief that healthier, balanced vineyards lead to a more authentic expression of terroir. “Throughout the transition process, motivation came from the conviction that organic farming creates a more sustainable and responsible production model, benefitting the environment, vineyard workers and future generations,” the team say.
Despite hurdles, making tangible progress drove them to keep going. “Seeing positive results in the vineyard validated the effort invested in the transition and built confidence in the process.” Elsewhere in Chile, the 100% organic and biodynamic winery Emiliana, which also claims to have the world’s largest organic vineyard, operates with the philosophy of creating high-quality wines while respecting people and the environment.
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Government buy-in
In the US, where the organic wine market is expected to hit US$38.89 billion by 2028, supportive government regulations and financial assistance programmes help drive the growth of organic grape cultivation. Initiatives such as the Organic Certification Cost-Share Program reduce certification costs, while conservation programmes provide growers with funding for natural protective features, including windbreaks, shelterbelts, filter strips and pollinator habitats that support organic farming practices.
Spottswoode Estate, a family-owned vineyard in Napa Valley, was one of the region’s earliest certified vineyards – gaining organic certification in 1992. Under the leadership of second-generation president Beth Novak, the winery also became one of Napa Valley’s first certified biodynamic vineyards, as well as achieving Regenerative Organic Certified (ROC) in 2022, B Corp certification, and earning additional recognition through Napa Green and International Wineries for Climate Action. According to Spottswoode, when transitioning to organic winemaking, you don’t have to do everything alone, but you also don’t have to do everything at once. “Many growers become excited about the possibilities and immediately want to change every aspect of their farming programme,” says Aron Weinkauf, Spottswoode’s winemaker and vineyard manager.
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