June 28, 2023 • 8 mins
On this week's episode of Where To Next, we stop by The Urban Winery to chat with CEO Damon Callis about everything wine! Damon gives us an inside look at everything going on at the winery, how it came to be, their private wine-making classes, the barrel club, their personal family connection to wine, and more!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Good morning, and welcome back toWhere to Next, a travel podcast.
My name is Francesca and I amjoined by Damon Callus, CEO of the
Urban Winery on the program today.Welcome Damon. Hey, how's it going
everybody? Thank you thanks for havingme so excited to talk to you about
one of my most favorite things wine. Of course, the Urban Winery dot
com is where you want to gofor all the information and to start planning
(00:20):
your visit today. So Damon,let's jump right in. Tell me all
about the Urban Winery. Well,the urban Winery is is a really wonderful
concept that we created, my wifeGeorgia and I. It is started in
two thousand and fifteen with the heavyhill and climb of optually having the urban
Winery exist in the state of Maryland. We actually had to go through a
legislative process to allow us to operatethe way we operate. What that specifically
(00:44):
means is that we don't have asingle source of designated location where we actually
grow our grapes. But I Damonhave procured grapes for a number of years,
over twenty years, and a developedrelationships with farmers in Maryland and some
of the best producers in Maryland andaround the area. So I also get
grapes from California or Virginia and Pennsylvania, and our focus is on local.
(01:06):
So my relationships with the farmers inMaryland range from the Eastern Shore all the
way over to Washington County, andwe get grapes and we bring them into
our tasting room, production facility arearather and we produce everything from grape to
glass. That is really really cool. I love that it all started with
the relationships behind the scenes, becausethat's really what makes places like the Urban
Winery so special and so unique tothe area. And I know that we
(01:30):
all love I know I do.I love to sit back and relax,
SIPs and wine and enjoy myself.But there's so much happening at the Urban
Winery. I was reading up onthe wine making experience. Can you kind
of walk me through what that's like. That is such a fun experience.
I'm glad you brought that up.The wine Making Experience is a fun,
interactive, hands on opportunity for ourcustomer base, our enthusiastic customer base,
to learn about the wine making process. It really is. It's a two
(01:53):
session experience. It's broken up inabout an hour and a half for the
first session, and at first fortyfive minutes you sit down with the sumlier
me or another member of my staffand we talk about three or four wines
through a nonpretentious, very century evaluatedtype of conversation. This is what you
look for, this is what youcan smell, This is how you should
(02:15):
smell better than you're currently smelling,and this is the way. This is
what you look for on the tasteand on your palette. And that comes
with, you know, either aspread that you selected with your friends or
your family, whether it's pairings andcheese and shakrueri or some hot dishes that
we have as well, and wego through the history of the urban winery
to get a little bit more indepth on some of the questions on why
(02:37):
do you smell this, and howdo you do that? Why does it
taste like this? And we answersome of those questions, but the real
fund really comes in when my wife, Georgia, she is an expert winemaker.
She's been making one since she wasa little girl and it was her
father who got her started, andshe goes through all the science of the
winemaking process. She was a registerednurse for a number of years, an
(02:57):
expert in her field, and thenshe brings you know, her her science
background. So you'll learn about howhow much alcohol is being produced, how
is alcohol produced, You'll learn aboutthe different types of clear fires as it
vegan friendly, as it is allother types of things. All of our
stuff is, by the way,vegan friendly. Put that out there.
(03:19):
Yeah, of course you have to. That's a big question. A lot
of people ask that question. Idon't really think about it because in the
history of wine making, well,in the history of winemaking, you would
use you know, sometimes they woulduse fish bladders or egg whites and to
help settle the settle some of thematerial down in it. But we don't
do that anymore. There's actually aspecial compound that Georgia talks about. It's
called ben andite. She'll get intothat all that, but that's a really
fun experience which you go through allthose different things, and there's about seven
(03:40):
or eight different things that a groupof people would do, so you know,
whether it's sanitizing something, or addingsomething, or or adding the yeast.
That the final accumulation of all thingsis adding the yeast. And she
goes through all those different steps.So once that's complete, we keep it
here in a climate controlled closet fordepending on the duration, who could be
anywhere between ten weeks, sometimes sixteenweeks. Sometimes we get some requests for
(04:04):
some of our darker red wines tohave an extended aging, which we are
happy to do that too. Butthe best part, I think is the
best part is the second time youcome back after those couple of weeks,
you have developed a label, whetherit's for a wedding or birthday party,
or business book club or just friendsgetting together, and you'll put that label
(04:25):
on after its bottle. So youcome the second time, you clean the
bottles, you sanitize the bottles,you put the labels on, you fill
it with wine, you cork ityourself, and you get more important to
get to enjoy the wine while you'rebottling it. And so it's not for
me. I think it's a reallycool experience and I'm humble of every single
day that we get to produce somethingthat people like and come back for and
(04:46):
want to share. And that's reallythe gift of winemaking. That's the gift
of the winemaking experience, whether it'slike I said, a wedding party from
one family to another, or familiesare doing it together as an activity together
like we used to do, orlike we do as a family. Actually,
and having your personalized label to givesomebody, it's such a fun experience.
Damon Callos, CEO of the UrbanWinery. The Urban Winery dot com
(05:11):
is where you want to go forall the information and to start planning your
visit today. And I know weare officially into summer, which thy in
goodness. I think we're all readyfor some sun and fun and to sit
around and drink some wine. Anyfun events or anything coming up at the
winery that people should know about,Yes, absolutely. We have coined Thursday
are Jazz Nights, Jazz and Bluesnights, So Thursday Nights come on out.
We've got great drink specials, wehave great live music from different our
(05:34):
local artists. We have different musicalevents on the weekends as well. We
offer wine classes. We had aPortuguese wine class just the other day.
We have other wine classes coming up, Greek, Italian, French, Spanish,
it's South African and we bring inexperts in their field in those areas
and we talk about the wine aswell. Another big summer push for us
(05:56):
is our canned wines. Yes,we were a pioneer of canned wines here
in state of Maryland. And thisis excellent for like you're saying, sipping,
relaxing by the pool, at thebeach, leave the cork at home,
the cork screw at home, justenjoy it. Come and grab a
couple of cans of wine, putit in the cooler, and you can
enjoy your wines at the pool,while you're hiking, while you're camping,
while you can't watch your kids fightwhatever, on the go. There you
(06:17):
go. That's the way to sayit. On the go. And I
was on your website at the UrbanWinery dot com of course, checking out
this really cool thing that you guyshave, and I'd love for you to
tell everyone listening a little bit aboutthe barrel Club. The bill club is
a really an elevated way to getvery intimate with our with our winemaking process.
I means we have some very boutiquestyle wine, some experimental wine,
(06:39):
some some varieties that we just don'tshare with the public. So the people
who are really are enthusiastic fans whowant to be a little bit more in
depth knowledge about the winemaking process.And we even have our Wine Barrel Club
participate in our larger production when weget the grapes coming in there in September,
they get exclusive access to our eventsspace so they can counts on our
(07:00):
events space. And of course yes, you get the wine on a quarterly
basis. I mean obviously that's reallygood too. You get you'll get the
selection. Yeah, no, right, that's exactly what that's about. Absolutely.
I think it's so cool. DamonCalli CEO of the Urban Winery.
The Urban Winery dot com is whereyou want to go online for everything that
you need to know, and Damon, before I let you go, I'd
(07:21):
love to know and for everyone elseto learn what's new, what's coming up
this season at the Urban Winery forpeople to look forward to. We have
an amazing new rose that just thatwas just bottled. This wonderful rose's got
really beautiful light white flowers on it'sgot this nice sitchrus profile, a little
bit of a great food on thefinish, and it's called Better Day Rose.
(07:43):
This is our second version of it. We had first released it back
into our twenty twenty when everything wasclosed, and we had our faith,
we had our family, and wealways said that we were going to have
a better day because it was reallyterrible. And we released that in twenty
twenty and it has been selling bonkers. It wanted a silver medal in Los
Angeles at Los Angeles International Wine Competition, So a small winder here Malon winning
(08:05):
big international as across the country.There. We're super proud of Georgia.
Georgie's my wife of twenty three yearsand she's just doing a phenomenal job.
So that's something to look out for. Twenty twenty three. Better Day,
Rose, Absolutely, Damon calla CEOof the Urban Winery the Urban Winery dot
com for all the information and tostart planning your visit today. Damon,
I want to say a big thankyou, And you got me on the
(08:26):
mood to be sipping some wine,so I might have to make my way
down and check y'all out sometime soon. Hey. Absolutely, I got a
cold glass right here, right nextto me, waiting for you. It's
got your name on it. Hi, thanks Damon. You bet
Good morning, and welcome back toWhere to Next, a travel podcast.
My name is Francesca and I amjoined by Damon Callus, CEO of the
Urban Winery on the program today.Welcome Damon. Hey, how's it going
everybody? Thank you thanks for havingme so excited to talk to you about
one of my most favorite things wine. Of course, the Urban Winery dot
com is where you want to gofor all the information and to start planning
(00:20):
your visit today. So Damon,let's jump right in. Tell me all
about the Urban Winery. Well,the urban Winery is is a really wonderful
concept that we created, my wifeGeorgia and I. It is started in
two thousand and fifteen with the heavyhill and climb of optually having the urban
Winery exist in the state of Maryland. We actually had to go through a
legislative process to allow us to operatethe way we operate. What that specifically
(00:44):
means is that we don't have asingle source of designated location where we actually
grow our grapes. But I Damonhave procured grapes for a number of years,
over twenty years, and a developedrelationships with farmers in Maryland and some
of the best producers in Maryland andaround the area. So I also get
grapes from California or Virginia and Pennsylvania, and our focus is on local.
(01:06):
So my relationships with the farmers inMaryland range from the Eastern Shore all the
way over to Washington County, andwe get grapes and we bring them into
our tasting room, production facility arearather and we produce everything from grape to
glass. That is really really cool. I love that it all started with
the relationships behind the scenes, becausethat's really what makes places like the Urban
Winery so special and so unique tothe area. And I know that we
(01:30):
all love I know I do.I love to sit back and relax,
SIPs and wine and enjoy myself.But there's so much happening at the Urban
Winery. I was reading up onthe wine making experience. Can you kind
of walk me through what that's like. That is such a fun experience.
I'm glad you brought that up.The wine Making Experience is a fun,
interactive, hands on opportunity for ourcustomer base, our enthusiastic customer base,
to learn about the wine making process. It really is. It's a two
(01:53):
session experience. It's broken up inabout an hour and a half for the
first session, and at first fortyfive minutes you sit down with the sumlier
me or another member of my staffand we talk about three or four wines
through a nonpretentious, very century evaluatedtype of conversation. This is what you
look for, this is what youcan smell, This is how you should
(02:15):
smell better than you're currently smelling,and this is the way. This is
what you look for on the tasteand on your palette. And that comes
with, you know, either aspread that you selected with your friends or
your family, whether it's pairings andcheese and shakrueri or some hot dishes that
we have as well, and wego through the history of the urban winery
to get a little bit more indepth on some of the questions on why
(02:37):
do you smell this, and howdo you do that? Why does it
taste like this? And we answersome of those questions, but the real
fund really comes in when my wife, Georgia, she is an expert winemaker.
She's been making one since she wasa little girl and it was her
father who got her started, andshe goes through all the science of the
winemaking process. She was a registerednurse for a number of years, an
(02:57):
expert in her field, and thenshe brings you know, her her science
background. So you'll learn about howhow much alcohol is being produced, how
is alcohol produced, You'll learn aboutthe different types of clear fires as it
vegan friendly, as it is allother types of things. All of our
stuff is, by the way,vegan friendly. Put that out there.
(03:19):
Yeah, of course you have to. That's a big question. A lot
of people ask that question. Idon't really think about it because in the
history of wine making, well,in the history of winemaking, you would
use you know, sometimes they woulduse fish bladders or egg whites and to
help settle the settle some of thematerial down in it. But we don't
do that anymore. There's actually aspecial compound that Georgia talks about. It's
called ben andite. She'll get intothat all that, but that's a really
fun experience which you go through allthose different things, and there's about seven
(03:40):
or eight different things that a groupof people would do, so you know,
whether it's sanitizing something, or addingsomething, or or adding the yeast.
That the final accumulation of all thingsis adding the yeast. And she
goes through all those different steps.So once that's complete, we keep it
here in a climate controlled closet fordepending on the duration, who could be
anywhere between ten weeks, sometimes sixteenweeks. Sometimes we get some requests for
(04:04):
some of our darker red wines tohave an extended aging, which we are
happy to do that too. Butthe best part, I think is the
best part is the second time youcome back after those couple of weeks,
you have developed a label, whetherit's for a wedding or birthday party,
or business book club or just friendsgetting together, and you'll put that label
(04:25):
on after its bottle. So youcome the second time, you clean the
bottles, you sanitize the bottles,you put the labels on, you fill
it with wine, you cork ityourself, and you get more important to
get to enjoy the wine while you'rebottling it. And so it's not for
me. I think it's a reallycool experience and I'm humble of every single
day that we get to produce somethingthat people like and come back for and
(04:46):
want to share. And that's reallythe gift of winemaking. That's the gift
of the winemaking experience, whether it'slike I said, a wedding party from
one family to another, or familiesare doing it together as an activity together
like we used to do, orlike we do as a family. Actually,
and having your personalized label to givesomebody, it's such a fun experience.
Damon Callos, CEO of the UrbanWinery. The Urban Winery dot com
(05:11):
is where you want to go forall the information and to start planning your
visit today. And I know weare officially into summer, which thy in
goodness. I think we're all readyfor some sun and fun and to sit
around and drink some wine. Anyfun events or anything coming up at the
winery that people should know about,Yes, absolutely. We have coined Thursday
are Jazz Nights, Jazz and Bluesnights, So Thursday Nights come on out.
We've got great drink specials, wehave great live music from different our
(05:34):
local artists. We have different musicalevents on the weekends as well. We
offer wine classes. We had aPortuguese wine class just the other day.
We have other wine classes coming up, Greek, Italian, French, Spanish,
it's South African and we bring inexperts in their field in those areas
and we talk about the wine aswell. Another big summer push for us
(05:56):
is our canned wines. Yes,we were a pioneer of canned wines here
in state of Maryland. And thisis excellent for like you're saying, sipping,
relaxing by the pool, at thebeach, leave the cork at home,
the cork screw at home, justenjoy it. Come and grab a
couple of cans of wine, putit in the cooler, and you can
enjoy your wines at the pool,while you're hiking, while you're camping,
while you can't watch your kids fightwhatever, on the go. There you
(06:17):
go. That's the way to sayit. On the go. And I
was on your website at the UrbanWinery dot com of course, checking out
this really cool thing that you guyshave, and I'd love for you to
tell everyone listening a little bit aboutthe barrel Club. The bill club is
a really an elevated way to getvery intimate with our with our winemaking process.
I means we have some very boutiquestyle wine, some experimental wine,
(06:39):
some some varieties that we just don'tshare with the public. So the people
who are really are enthusiastic fans whowant to be a little bit more in
depth knowledge about the winemaking process.And we even have our Wine Barrel Club
participate in our larger production when weget the grapes coming in there in September,
they get exclusive access to our eventsspace so they can counts on our
(07:00):
events space. And of course yes, you get the wine on a quarterly
basis. I mean obviously that's reallygood too. You get you'll get the
selection. Yeah, no, right, that's exactly what that's about. Absolutely.
I think it's so cool. DamonCalli CEO of the Urban Winery.
The Urban Winery dot com is whereyou want to go online for everything that
you need to know, and Damon, before I let you go, I'd
(07:21):
love to know and for everyone elseto learn what's new, what's coming up
this season at the Urban Winery forpeople to look forward to. We have
an amazing new rose that just thatwas just bottled. This wonderful rose's got
really beautiful light white flowers on it'sgot this nice sitchrus profile, a little
bit of a great food on thefinish, and it's called Better Day Rose.
(07:43):
This is our second version of it. We had first released it back
into our twenty twenty when everything wasclosed, and we had our faith,
we had our family, and wealways said that we were going to have
a better day because it was reallyterrible. And we released that in twenty
twenty and it has been selling bonkers. It wanted a silver medal in Los
Angeles at Los Angeles International Wine Competition, So a small winder here Malon winning
(08:05):
big international as across the country.There. We're super proud of Georgia.
Georgie's my wife of twenty three yearsand she's just doing a phenomenal job.
So that's something to look out for. Twenty twenty three. Better Day,
Rose, Absolutely, Damon calla CEOof the Urban Winery the Urban Winery dot
com for all the information and tostart planning your visit today. Damon,
I want to say a big thankyou, And you got me on the
(08:26):
mood to be sipping some wine,so I might have to make my way
down and check y'all out sometime soon. Hey. Absolutely, I got a
cold glass right here, right nextto me, waiting for you. It's
got your name on it. Hi, thanks Damon. You bet
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