On a visit to Australia earlier this year I had the pleasure of being entertained by the congenial folks of Orlando Wines. Now Orlando, a subsidiary of Pernod-Ricard, might not be a name immediately familiar to American consumers but their two main properties, Wyndham Estate, in Hunter Valley and Jacob’s Creek, in Barossa Valley should be as they are among the best selling brands in Australia, and the best selling Australian wines in the world.

I spent a day at each property tasting their range of wines and the experience was nothing short of revelatory.

The great Australian wine makeover of the 1970’s and 80’s when the country went from specializing, if that’s the word, in bad – and I mean really bad — “sherry” and “port”, “burgundy” and “claret” to producing cleanly made, everyday wines at ridiculously low prices has been well documented.

A Wyndham Tasting

These were the wines that stormed the supermarket shelves, first in the UK, then everywhere from Stockholm to Stockton, and shook the old wine world to its foundations in the process.

The only trouble was that much of this production consisted of wine that one wouldn’t exactly describe as subtle — sticky over-oaked whites and huge over-ripe reds abounded, and for a long time I ignored them, dismissing them as industrial cola wines.

But what I encountered at Wyndham Estate – I’ll talk about Jacob’s Creek next week – astounded me and changed my perceptions 180 degrees.

They make a dizzying array of wines but the true standouts are at lower price points like the Bin 555 range, especially the Wyndham Estate Bin 555 Shiraz 2006 ($9), and yes, it’s not a typo, that is the price.

And that is also what makes this wine so extraordinary. Yes, it shows rich, generous fruit, fine, elegant structure and harmonious balance but to achieve all this at $9 is pretty incredible. I would not have thought it possible before I tasted the wine.

I am generally biased towards small production, privately-owned, artisanal wines but the fact that a winery that bottles 2 to 3 million liters of wine a year, and that is owned by one of the world’s largest drinks conglomerates, can make a wine of elegance and style, and sell it for $9 a bottle shows that in at least case, that bias is unfounded.

It also raises the question that if Orlando can pull this off, why is there so much undrinkable plonk out there?