Mark began his career as an accountant with Ernst and Young. Credit: New Africa/shutterstock.

New Zealand’s Foley Wines has announced the resignation of its CEO and director Mark Turnbull.

Turnbull has been CEO and director at the company since its merger with The New Zealand Wine Company in 2012, which later changed name to Foley Wines.

Turnbull will resign from his director position on 17 February and from the CEO role on 30 April, the company said.

Foley Wines manages collection of wineries and brands from New Zealand’s most “acclaimed” wine regions. Its portfolio includes the Martinborough Vineyard, Te Kairanga, Lighthouse Gin, Grove Mill, Vavasour, and Mt Difficulty.

In a statement, the company said Turnbull had led the group through “an extremely difficult period” for the New Zealand and global economy and a time of “significant challenges” for the kiwi wine industry domestically and worldwide.

Foley Wines chair Paul Brock said: “Mark leaves the company in a strong position to navigate the continuing challenges facing the NZ wine industry.”

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Turnbull added: “We have a small but hugely talented team, many have been with me for the journey from the start and something I will always be proud of. The results will be released in the next few weeks which will show a strong growth in export cases of 35%, so the company is well placed for the future.”

In its fiscal year ended 30 June 2024, Foley Wines generated total revenue of NZ$66.4m ($37.4m), a 0.3% decline on the prior year. Bottled sales revenue grew 0.3% to $62.5m.

At the time, Turnbull said the group was “pleased that case sales were down only 4% on last year, which was a solid turnaround from the first six months.”

Export case sales dropped 5.8%, but, “when compared to the industry being down 21% for packaged wine,” Turnbull said the performance “demonstrated the Company’s hard work on developing strong routes to market for our brands”.

Foley Wines ended the year with total net loss of NZ$4.08m, down 164% on 2023.

Turnbull said the group had faced “a significant over supply of Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc” causing “deep discounting” in the year.

However, he remained optimistic about the year ahead, stressing that: “The company is in a good position to sell through the 2024 vintage in a timely manner and hopefully with a normal vintage in 2025 will be in a much improved position for the 2026 financial year”.