Is this a winery or an oil refinery?

[ToddFrench]

Chill out, folks - look at the massive number of threads on WT, and look at how many drift like this - one per page, if that? Let’s not overreact here.

[Larry_Jones]

Gallo in Modesto looks pretty similar. They bring grapes in by train. They sample a railroad car full to determine how much to pay the grower.

[Guillaume_Deschamps]

@larry schaffer

These facilities may look like ‘atrocities’ but I am often blown away with the quality and consistency in wines that come out of some of them . . .

Are you also “blown away” by the “quality and consistency” of Coca-Cola? Heineken? Absolut?

[Greg_Malcolm]

The first time I visited Gallo in Modesto, I drove past the winery – literally, mistaking it for a refinery. It was amazing watching an endless line of 40’ semi-tractor-trailer dump trucks dumping grapes into the gian augers.

[CFu]

@Guillaume Deschamps

@larry schaffer

These facilities may look like ‘atrocities’ but I am often blown away with the quality and consistency in wines that come out of some of them . . .

Are you also “blown away” by the “quality and consistency” of Coca-Cola? Heineken? Absolut?

i am.

[larry_schaffer]

@Guillaume Deschamps

@larry schaffer

These facilities may look like ‘atrocities’ but I am often blown away with the quality and consistency in wines that come out of some of them . . .

Are you also “blown away” by the “quality and consistency” of Coca-Cola? Heineken? Absolut?

As a consumer, I truly am . . .

I think what you have to consider are the variables that can affect a product such as wine - from the grapes in the vineyard to the final wine - and how amazing it is that we end up with the final products that we do . . . regardless of the size of the production facility.

I’ve had a chance to tour the Gallo Modesto and Sonoma facilities, and though I may not want to work in a place like that myself, I was in awe of the technologies being used and yes by the final product. Would I want to spend all of my money on wines produced at places like this? Probably not . . .

But just because wine is produced in a larger facility, you should NOT jump to the conclusion that it is not made with the same passion as the wines made in smaller, garagiste type facilities . . .

There is certainly a fallacy in our industry that ‘bigger is not better’ and I have seen first hand in my job that sometimes, not always but sometimes, this is simply NOT true.

Cheers!

[Linda_Baehr]

There was a Gallo plant about three miles from my home in Fresno. It was mainly just a storage facility, and they had million gallon tanks there. They would literally block out the sun when you drove past.

[Bob_Wood]

I recall that the 1990 Robert Mondavi Napa Valley cabernet was made in a 100,000 case batch. The wine was excellent and I was astounded given the quantity.

[N_Weis]

Bigger doesn’t have to be worse. One of the assumed mis-truths of the wine biz.

At certain levels (such as that photo) it is somewhat inevitable because something is bound to slip through the cracks, but these are extreme cases.

[Bob_Wood]

The folks at Willamette Valley’s A to Z Wineworks are poster children for high-quantity, quality wines. They made 68,000 cases of their 2007 pinot noir, an always reliable bottle. They made another 32,500 cases of pinot gris, a wine I buy often.

[Eric_Anderson]

@Bob Wood

The folks at Willamette Valley’s A to Z Wineworks are poster children for high-quantity, quality wines. They made 68,000 cases of their 2007 pinot noir, an always reliable bottle. They made another 32,500 cases of pinot gris, a wine I buy often.

Geez, it does look like the Texaco facility in LA harbor area. OTOH, good wines are where you find them - be they smaller or larger producers.

Here’s the not-as-big Lodi “tank farm” of Michael David (Earthquake Zin, et al).

…and a shot of what they do to amuse themselves.

[CFu]

don’t bordeaux estates like Pontet have 20K+ case productions? I’m sure they aren’t making it in a garage somewhere.

[N_Weis]

20,000 cases is about 350 tons.

Some places might take 6 years to do 350 tons. Others might finish it before you can grab a cup of coffee in the morning.

Scale is scale. Quality suffers if you try to do more than your infrastructure and staff can handle. The proverbial 10 lbs of shit in a 5 lb bag. It’s important to point out that there must always be time for at least one person of the staff (the head honcho) to take a minute to think decisions through. When there is no time to step back and do a short bit of thinking, you’re doing too much.

In some cases, that might be 3 tons too many (I know some folks who need 5 hours to crush one ton of red grapes - seriously, a couple fruit bins might put them over the edge). In others, it might be a few thousand.

It’s really all relative.

[Mark.Ricca]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/23/business/global/23wine.html?_r=1&emc=eta1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Downward spiral or just a re-leveling?

[Jorge_Henriquez]

Old age or too much work?

Is this a winery or an oil refinery? - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Udo_Hoerhold]

There must be some real challenges to working at that scale. I wonder how they manage to clean all that enormous equipment. Plus, how do they prevent the juice from cooking when the tanks are out in the sun like that?

[Linda_Baehr]

@Udo Hoerhold

There must be some real challenges to working at that scale. I wonder how they manage to clean all that enormous equipment. Plus, how do they prevent the juice from cooking when the tanks are out in the sun like that?

The larger wineries have clean-in-place systems. Static lines running to tanks and tank washers mounted in each tank.
Refrigerated tanks. Most tanks made these days (whether indoor or out) have refrigeration jackets with glycol running through them to control fermentation temps, cold stabilization, etc.

[Guillaume_Deschamps]

@Nate Weis

Bigger doesn’t have to be worse. One of the assumed mis-truths of the wine biz.

Actually my comment wasn’t meant in a negative way, although I find it interesting that everybody interpreted it that way… I’m also impressed by the consistency achieved by the products I quoted (although quality is another matter), but it’s really a “you get what you pay for” type of comment. It might be consistent, but it’s not enough for me to be interested in drinking it…

[Daniel_Posner]

@Bob Wood

I recall that the 1990 Robert Mondavi Napa Valley cabernet was made in a 100,000 case batch. The wine was excellent and I was astounded given the quantity.

Their Napa Cab is still good quality, IMO.

Great pics, thanks for sharing.

[John_Liotta]

@Daniel Posner

@Bob Wood

I recall that the 1990 Robert Mondavi Napa Valley cabernet was made in a 100,000 case batch. The wine was excellent and I was astounded given the quantity.

Their Napa Cab is still good quality, IMO.

Great pics, thanks for sharing.

Still waiting on delivery from PC for my '90 Mondavi Napa Cab BTW . . .