Brace yourself wine lovers - this year's harvest could be the best you've ever tasted, as dry conditions in many regions are expected to produce some of our greatest wines yet.
In Marlborough, the worst drought in nearly 100 years has created perfect growing conditions.
The grapes have just been harvested and are now fermenting, and Kim Crawford's chief winemaker Dave Edmunds is fizzing about the quality.
"This has been one of the best harvests I've ever experienced in Marlborough, the fruit was so clean," Edmunds told Newshub.
Because of the region's historic drought, the grapes have had very little problems with disease, which Wine Marlborough's manager Marcus Pickens said is an excellent result.
"Our wines should be absolutely fantastic this year, because of weather conditions - we were blessed with lots of sun, plenty of warmth and low rainfall," Pickens said.
Edmunds said the sauvignon blanc has been "an absolute stunner".
"Everyone is smelling those beautiful characters popping out of the tanks all around the region," he said.
"This year we've had a whole lot more mango characters, really ripe tropical fruit coming through."
Kim Crawford sells at least 2.5 million cases of plonk around the world every year, and is the number-one-selling sauvignon blanc in the US and Canada.
However, Edmonds said delivering a similar product every year is a well-honed skill.
"Our job is to make consistent sauvignon blanc year after year that our fans love and want to keep buying," he said.
But while the quality may be especially high this season, the quantity is down by about 20 percent.
"We are quite a long way down, but there's leftover wine from last year, so hopefully it all balances out and puts us in a good position in the market," Pickens explained.
Marlborough is New Zealand's largest wine-making region, with 163 different vineyards producing about 80 percent of the country's wine. Last year, the industry exported $2.4 billion worth of wine from Aotearoa.
It comes from wineries of all shapes and sizes, like Astrolabe Wines in Marlborough. The Waghorn family has been making wine for decades and send 70 percent of their product offshore, mainly to the US. They're excited about this year's vintage.
"With that smaller crop and ultra-clean fruit from that dry season, it's just been a dream to handle," Arabella Waghorn told Newshub.
They've just opened Blenheim's only urban winery, and her sister Libby said it's perfect timing.
"It's pretty hectic here, our first year in the new winery. But of all the years to have, this one's been an awesome first harvest season for us, because the fruit has just been so good," she said.
From around July, Kiwis will be able to taste this season's vintage for themselves.
