A Hungarian immigrant, a family company and the winery that carries his name.

Peller Estates is the namesake wine brand of Andrew Peller Limited, a Canadian wine company based in Grimsby, Ontario. Its story starts with the founder. The company says Andrew Peller sailed into Halifax from Hungary in March 1927, and the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, which lists him on its Sobey Wall of Honour, says he arrived with his wife and baby son still in Hungary, worked in breweries in Kitchener and Toronto, and later opened his own, Peller’s Brewery, in Hamilton. His grandson John told The Moodie Davitt Report in 2008 that Andrew had run a newspaper and a brewery before settling on wine.

Wine came in British Columbia. The Pier 21 profile says Peller moved west, bought a farm, planted vineyards and obtained a licence for a winery east of Vancouver, and the company says he established Andrés Wines in Port Moody in 1961. According to Pier 21, early success with the sparkling wine Baby Duck funded wineries in Calgary and in Truro, Nova Scotia, in 1964, and in 1970 the company bought a small winery in Winona, Ontario.

The business stayed in the family for three generations. The company says Andrew’s son Joe Peller, then a physician in Hamilton, left medicine to join it in 1966, and Pier 21 says Joe succeeded his father as president. Joe’s son John E. Peller joined in 1989, and Pier 21 says he became chief executive in 1995 and later renamed the company after his grandfather. A Canadian trademark record dates the change of name from Andrés Wines Ltd. to Andrew Peller Limited to September 2006.

Niagara became the centre of gravity in the 1990s. The company says it acquired Hillebrand Estates Winery in 1994, and the same trademark record shows Hillebrand amalgamated into Andrés Wines in June that year. Then, the company says, “after more than six years of planning,” the Peller Estates Winery was officially opened in Niagara-on-the-Lake in 2001, a winery it calls a testament to the founder’s vision.

A family name on the label, and icewine in the departure lounge.

The brand’s first asset is the surname. Peller Estates carries the family name, and since 2006 the parent company has carried it too. Its corporate site today presents the founder’s arrival with “five dollars and a dream” as the opening story of the business.

Icewine gave the brand its international showcase. The Moodie Davitt Report reported in November 2008 that Peller Estates Icewines were sold across Canada’s airport duty-free stores and in Canadian border shops, at Seattle airport in the United States, and, from about 2007, at London Heathrow and other European airports. The range it described for Europe included Vidal, Oak Aged and Cabernet Franc Icewines, with a Riesling Icewine due to follow in spring 2009. The same report described duty-free gift packs combining several of the Icewines.

The brand has also stretched beyond still wine. The Toronto design agency SLD (Shikatani Lacroix Design) said in August 2022 that it had designed packaging for Peller Estates Wine Spritzers, a line of wine-based spritzers.

Beneath the estate wines sit everyday ranges with the family name too. The company lists Peller Family Vineyards among its popularly priced varietal brands, alongside Copper Moon, Black Cellar and XOXO, and lists Peller Estates first among its premium brands, ahead of Trius, Thirty Bench and Wayne Gretzky.

Design and documentation.

The seven brands in this group are all Canadian wineries: Inniskillin, Jackson-Triggs, Peller Estates and Cave Spring from Ontario’s Niagara Peninsula, and Mission Hill, Quails’ Gate and Burrowing Owl from British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley. Some still carry a founding family’s name or are run by that family; others now sit inside much larger wine companies, and two of the Niagara names reach into the Okanagan as well.

Ownership is the clearest dividing line. Inniskillin, founded by Donald Ziraldo and Karl Kaiser with a first planting in 1974, and Jackson-Triggs, launched in 1993 by the company Donald Triggs and Allan Jackson built from the old Cartier wines, both passed through Vincor and Constellation Brands and today trade under Arterra Wines Canada, the name the business took in 2017 after Constellation sold its Canadian wine arm, English Wikipedia says. Peller Estates belongs to Andrew Peller Ltd of Grimsby, Ontario, which agreed in June 2026 to be taken private by Fairfax Financial Holdings, Canadian Grocer reported. In the Okanagan, Anthony von Mandl bought the Mission Hill estate in West Kelowna in 1981; Quails’ Gate grew from land the Stewart family began planting in 1956 and relaunched as a winery in 1989; and Burrowing Owl, near Oliver, began when Jim Wyse bought vineyard land in 1993, with the winery itself built in 1998, the company says. Cave Spring’s first vintage came in 1986, from vines the Pennachetti family planted in 1978.

A Canadian wine brand’s identity is usually carried by a label, a place name and a story about the land, because the company behind the name may have merged, been sold or grown far beyond its first vineyard. Each guide separates what independent sources record from what the winery says about itself — its founding story, its owners over time, where its wine is grown and made, and how its labels and buildings present it — and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word.

A family company with nine wineries, and a new owner.

Peller Estates is one label in a wider group. Andrew Peller Limited says it operates nine wineries in British Columbia and Ontario, and its premium brands include Trius, Thirty Bench, Sandhill, Red Rooster, Black Hills Estate Winery, Tinhorn Creek and Gray Monk alongside Peller Estates. It also makes spirits, cider, craft beer and kits for home winemaking.

Ownership changed hands in 2026. Canadian Grocer reported on 16 June 2026 that Fairfax Financial Holdings had signed an all-cash agreement to acquire Andrew Peller, and Global Drinks Intel reported the next day that the deal, unanimously recommended by the board, would take the Toronto Stock Exchange-listed company private. Canadian Grocer said John Peller, the former president and chief executive who retired in early 2025, and certain affiliates had agreed to exchange their shares for a stake in the new owner rather than sell, and that chief executive Paul Dubkowski and chief financial officer Renee Cauchi would stay in their roles. Fairfax chairman Prem Watsa was quoted as saying that the Peller family “has been a leading name in wine in Canada for generations.” The company said the transaction was expected to close in the third calendar quarter of 2026.

The name needs a little care online. The corporate site is andrewpeller.com, and the winery and its wines trade under the Peller name; Andrés Wines, the company’s original name, has not been its corporate name since 2006.

For a design guide, Peller Estates shows how a founder’s surname can anchor a family of wines, from estate bottles and icewine gift packs to spritzers. Compare Inniskillin, the Niagara-on-the-Lake winery, and Cave Spring, the Niagara winery. For this guide we use Niagara claret, icewine gold and frost cream with a serif, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

Keep Peller Estates’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.