How and Why Do We Make Wine?

Many people ask us this question. Making good wine is a challenge. Making great wine is a very big challenge. Making great California wine while living in South Carolina? Well, some would say, there is a bed waiting for us at Marshall Pickens Psych Hospital.

Why?

This part is easy. My dad bought a home winemaking kit when I was a kid. He was an engineer who liked science, and tried to expose his kids to this in fun ways. In retrospect, I suppose this was his way to introduce us to chemistry. It worked.

We experimented with every kind of juice we could find, making some really bad wine in the process. After the first go round, we collectively decided a better wine making kit might help and made a trip to a specialty winemaking store that carried high quality varieties of grape juice and equipment. This batch turned out better.

It was great fun, even tasting the really bad wine. Watching the fermentation was like magic. We did not realize we were taking part in a process that, according to archaeologists, has been going on for 7,000 years.

The second catalyst occurred when I was in California last spring at a health care legal conference. An attorney colleague was pouring his own wine at the legal conference wine tasting. I thought: if he can do this then so can I.

After the conference we went to the Monterey Peninsula to sightsee. In the process we tasted some of the local Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir. Some of it was good. Some of it was way beyond good. It was all small production wine, sold mostly in California. I thought: we HAVE to get more of this stuff to South Carolina!

How?

Here it gets trickier. First and foremost, we work with really top notch professional people. They make it possible. And fun, although we are very serious about making exceptional wine.

Second, we take a very different approach than a traditional winery. We don't own any land or vineyards. This would tie up too much time, capital and risk. We also don't own any tasting rooms or fancy faux French chateaux. We don't even own a trailer.

Third, we share the winemaking facility, supplies and equipment with other winemakers. This is a common (but not widely acknowledged) approach for small high quality brands and even some bigger wineries. This allows us access to state of the art equipment and processes that we could never afford on our own.

Our facility is in a converted warehouse in the industrial district, far from any Napa or Sonoma wine tours. It ain't pretty and would not impress the tourists (however, our tourist count = zero) but it has everything we need to make great wine.

And this is all good because the grapes don't know the difference. Our money gets spent on really great fruit and really great winemaking people, processes and techniques. We will pay more for the best fruit, talent and equipment and skip all of the window dressing.

And it is showing up strongly in the wines. Our fellow winemakers who have been at this for a few years now are posting some big scores and getting lots of recognition. We are confident we will too. For us, the focus is all on what goes in the glass and nothing else.

The Silicon Valley tech entrepreneurs, the movie stars and the retired Fortune 500 CEOS can acquire or create a small Napa or Sonoma California winery for $10-25 million or so. Those fortunate few can buy an instant wine lifestyle.

The rest of us, including many passionate young winemakers with virtually no capital, have to be more creative.

So that is what we do and honestly, we prefer our approach. The camaraderie and shared expertise make for more fun and better wine.

How? Part Two

Next time I'll talk about what happens when the grapes arrive. It's all about fork lifts, getting stained purple up to your elbows, double sorting through tons of fruit and why winemakers say it takes a lot of beer to make wine. It's REAL glamorous!

Cheers,

Dave
Calicaro Wine