Grape grabbers at the ready! Poulton Hill Estate is recruiting Harvest Helpers – also known as volunteer grape pickers – to help in its vineyard during the upcoming harvest season.
The estate vineyard in Cirencester plants almost 10,000 vines across the vast landscape and is asking its local community to pull on their gloves and collect a pair of clippers to assist in producing the nearly 20,000 bottles of wine that the vineyard makes each year.
The Estate said: 'We are always keen to have helpers at our harvest. It's a great way to get to know our customers and our local community.'
Although there is no set date for the harvest season, the vineyard says their Regent and Rondo grapes are showing signs of veraison – indicating that they will soon begin to ripen – and early reports from the Agriculture and Horticulture Board show that the harvest season began as early as July, making it the earliest harvest season on record since 2006.
Poulton Hill Estate is home to award-winning wines, with it recently claiming 'Best Artisan Drinks Producer' at the 2025 Gloucestershire Foodie Awards. And in May, it reopened The Bulari Bar – named after its trademarked term for English sparkling wine – with plans to host a range of pop-up food vendors, such as Gurt Wings and Tania's Thai-style Tacos, all month long until Friday 26 September.
Visitors to the bar can sample the many wines the vineyard has to offer and watch the sunset over the picturesque vines and farmland that is right at home in the beautiful Cotswolds.
As well as a vineyard, Poulton Hill Estate also has an orchard that is home to two of the oldest breeds of sheep in the UK, who graze on the fruit and fertilise the soil to keep the orchard as fruitful as possible.
Anyone interested in becoming a Harvest Helper can find contact information on the Poulton Hill Estate website.
