Filippo Casella is the father of John and Joe Casella who operate the Casella wine business, owners and producers of the [yellow tail] phenomenon. Having built the first winery on the family’s land near Yenda in 1969, he’s also the man responsible for the fact that the Casellas are actually involved in the wine business. But, for some private reason, Filippo Casella had something against his neighbours, the McWilliams. It’s of no consequence to this story what it was, but that it existed. Filippo never appreciated the fact that every time he looked out in a certain direction from his house, the landscape he saw was dominated by the tall distillation columns and tank farm of the nearby McWilliams winery at Yenda. That’s one of the reasons he’s happy to stay in his original and frankly rather modest home, which has since been surrounded on all sides by the large buildings and massive tank farms of his own family’s winery. He no longer has to look across at McWilliams every day. Well, if the news from Griffith is true, last week Filippo’s own family bought that very winery!
