Moirae Choquette is introducing her wine brand Tomato Wheels Lambrusco to the Saskatchewan market. (submitted photos/Moirae Choquette and Lia Petrich)

By Angela Brown

Tomato Wheels Lambrusco

Battleford entrepreneur to promote her new wine brand at Top of the Hops

Jun 1, 2023 | 3:22 PM

A young Indigenous entrepreneur and marketer, originally from Battleford, plans to bring her Italian wine called Tomato Wheels Lambrusco to the Kinsmen Top of the Hops beer and wine festival, running May 5 and 6 in Saskatoon.

Moirae Choquette, founder and CEO of Tomato Wheels, is also the recipient of the 2023 Women Entrepreneurs National Aboriginal Capital Corporations Association (NACCA) Role Model Award.

She said she first tasted Lambrusco wine and fell in love with it when she visited Italy in her 20s, but she couldn’t find it here.

Today, Choquette started the Tomato Wheels brand to make Lambrusco, a sparkling red wine, designed to be sipped chilled, more readily available in Canada.

“Two years ago, I started diving into the data and the market research, and this wine is not well known in North America,” she said. “It comes from Italy [using] the Salamino grape. That’s where it’s grown, in the small town of Emilia-Romagna. I saw a gap in the market to bring this [product] in, and blow this up in North America.”

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When Choquette contacted Canadian sommelier Brad Royale, he was supportive of the idea.

“Together we found a fourth-generation owned-and-operated vineyard in the community of Romagna where the grape is grown,” she said.

Choquette pitched [the family] the idea that she wanted to create her own brand, her own wine, and bring it to North America.

Samples were shipped back and forth, and Royale, with his discriminating palate, designed the wine.

“We settled on a wine, and agreed that they would produce exclusively for Tomato Wheels,” Choquette said.

Last October, Tomato Wheels Lambrusco was launched in the Canadian market, starting in Alberta. And a few weeks ago, it entered the Saskatchewan market, through its launch-partner Sobeys. The wine is also available in B.C.

Locally the wine can be purchased in Regina, Saskatoon, and Battleford Crossing in the Town of Battleford.

“It’s very exciting for me because I’m born and raised in Battleford,” Choquette said. “To have this product in my hometown is so exciting. To have my family be able to access it now is just wonderful… 85 per cent of Canadian consumers still haven’t heard of it. But from all the market testing we’ve been doing, 99 per cent of people when they try it are surprised and delighted by it. So, it’s a really fun product to be introducing at the time.”

Next, plans are to make the wine available throughout Canada by the end of 2023, and to look at expanding to the international market by early 2024.

Choquette describes the taste of the wine as a combination of cold blueberries and a creme fraiche finish, with a light effervescence.

“It’s sparkling but it’s not sweet. It’s very well rounded with high tannins,” she said. “A lot of folks have tried it when they’ve been at different shows. They say: ‘Oh, I don’t like red wine.’ Then, they try it, and say: ‘Where can I buy a bottle?’ It’s fun watching consumers change their mind about what they like or don’t like.”

Lambrusco is a good wine to drink on the patio in the summer. In Italy people also call Lambrusco their quintessential food wine, because it goes with everything food-wise.

Choquette is excited about taking part in the Top of the Hops coming up.

“People can come and sample Tomato Wheels there,” she said. “We’re looking forward to seeing how people like it… It’s so fun watching people enjoy it. It’s so special and unique.”

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Angela.Brown@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @battlefordsnow