Too few knew the tasting room in Sonoma with a great bucolic hillside view and exclusively offering some of Joel Peterson’s legacy wines.
Gallo wasted no time last week, via a memo on Tuesday immediately after the purchase from Constellation, to announce the closing the tasting room in May to the employees; $40+ wines are not in their plans for Ravenswood. Gallo runs a tight ship.
Joel stopped by last Friday to say good bye to the the employees, some worked there 14-20 years. My heart goes out to those friendly and knowledgeable folks.
There are lots of higher quality, small productions wines, Cab Franc, Carignan, Petite Sirah, a dozen single vineyard Zins, Bedrock Vineyard wines, Estate wines, etc for sale currently which will be removed from the shelves and backroom and then?
I remember the Old Hill and Dickerson Zins in the mid 80’s, helping single vineyard Zins gain prominence. GONE in a flash.
That’s a shame. One never likes to read about this sort of thing and is always a concern when one of these conglomerates buys up chunks of an industry.
The winery had already been in the hands of a multinational beverage company for a long time. The difference is that it’s come into the hands of a more ruthlessly profitable one.
That’s too bad. Ravenswood was the first tasting room I ever visited, back around 2002-- great experience. Am hoping the single vineyard stuff will end up on WTSO or somewhere at good prices.
In case anyone objected to my prior trashing of Constellation Brands and refusal to purchase wines in their portfolio, NOTE that this is a Constellation Brads issue, not a Gallo issue. According to an article in the Sonoma Index Tribune yesterday:
“Constellation retained Ravenswood’s 12-acre eastside property and its tasting room. And earlier this month, employees of the tasting room say they were informed that they are being let go as of May 15.”
"A Sonoma source inside the wine industry voiced concerns that Gallo will drop the Ravenswood brand entirely. “Gallo has a very specific business model and when you crunch the numbers, Ravenswood just doesn’t fit that model.”
That closing quote feels bizarre. This deal was huge and already well felt across the industry. Gallo has already stated that they don’t plan to renew numerous fruit contracts because the purchase left them with enough to not depend on those previously in place.
The low end Ravenswood wines will triple in sales over the next two years, and be more popular then ever. They might be packed with mega purple up the ying yang, - but what the hell, they sure will be smoooooooooth…
Some of the updated info above is not what I was told earlier this month, I am thinking of heading back up there this weekend and will find out what the employees know at this point.
Gallo doesn’t jump to changes like that. It seemed obvious to me that the sake was branding only. Employees were discussing the impending closure the day after the sale.