The British, those gourmands who celebrate Marmite and relish anything served with chips, are apparently a bit more hesitant when it comes to drinking farm-made wine.

That’s one of the reasons Southbrook Farms’ wine labels are being changed.

It’s not that the company’s wine’s aren’t doing well in Britain. The Maple, Ont. farm, which makes food products along with wine, exports a good one-third of its wines to the u.k., according to Southbrook co-owner Bill Redelmeier.

And last year, its framboise dessert wine became the first Ontario wine to be sold at the prestigious London department store, Harrod’s.

It’s just that a recently signed deal, which will take Southbrook wines into 600 Victoria Wines outlets across England in August, bringing with it a much broader audience, meant that the ‘hokey image’ of the farm had to go, says Redelmeier.

‘You don’t want to think of farms producing wines. You want to think of vineyards and estates.’

So, Onyx Marketing Group of Toronto has been working on redesigning the farm’s entire selection of wine labels for all 13 varieties. But Redelmeier, who still hasn’t chosen the final label, says it’s not easy re-defining the entire operation which, only eight years ago, was a dairy farm with a sideline in fruit and produce. (An unseasonably damp summer in 1992 translated into 2.5 extra tonnes of raspberries and the birth of Framboise.)

‘What we’ll do is become two different identities,’ he says, adding that the site, popular with Toronto area residents for its fresh food and pick-your-own produce, will still be called Southbrook Farms whereas the winery will be called Southbrook. ‘I don’t have a real problem with that,’ he says.

Southbrook’s specialty is its production of dessert wines ­ unique and much-lauded ­ which don’t have to fight for attention against wines from all over the world as do the farm’s regular varieties, says Redelmeier. ‘It hits a smaller niche.’

The dessert wines sell for $14.95 a half-bottle (375 millilitres). The wines are available only in what Redelmeier calls a ‘dinner party’ size because, that way, the price appears more reasonable than a full-sized bottle.

Southbrook also sells its own preserves, mustards, sauces, oils and vinegars ­ about 90% are sold on the premises, according to Redelmeier, with Toronto-area specialty shops accounting for the remainder. The food items will keep the Southbrook Farms moniker and original labels featuring gentle pen and ink sketches of the farm.

Redelmeier says he expects the company’s specialty food business to grow as well, thanks to a deal struck last month with the Liquor Control Board of Ontario where the board will allow Southbrook to package food products and wine together in gift boxes.

Last month, 10 lcbo outlets tested the gift box idea. For example, Framboise fortified wine and Raspberry Vinegar were paired in a wooden box and sold for $24.95 as part of a Mother’s Day promotion.

As well as advertising in food and wine magazines both here and abroad, Southbrook relies heavily on pr, and generally delivers 10% extra product to its distributors for in-store sampling programs, which Redelmeier says are integral to trial.

With Ontario, b.c., Alberta, New Brunswick and the u.k. markets under its belt, Southbrook’s next target is the u.s. The key there is to find the hidden Londons ­ large, sophisticated cities where there’s no local winery. Boston and Chicago fit that description, says Redelmeier, adding that the farm has signed on wine agency Vineyard Associates of Boston, Mass. to market Southbrook wines in Massachussetts and Vermont in the next few weeks.

Redelmeier d’esn’t expect to have the new labels ready in time for Southbrooks’ introduction to the u.s. market, so makeshift labels ­ ‘quick and dirty’ with whatever health warnings are necessary, according to Redelmeier ­ are being slapped on the older gold-embossed bottles for the first shipment.

For the time being at least, Southbrook Farms will remain just that for American wine-lovers.