The History of Napa Wines

A discussion about the history of wine in Napa, between Jim Schleckser, CEO of The CEO Project and host of The Lazy CEO Podcast, and Mark Gudgel, author and wine expert.

Jim:

For those of you that know me, and maybe some of you do, some of you don't, but I have an alter ego, and my alter ego is my involvement in wine. Several years ago, I decided to get kind of into wine beyond the drinking part, but the studying part, and, if anybody has ever done this, it's got phenomenal history and agriculture and geology and, and chemistry and all of this comes together in wine across thousands of years including, wars, death, taxation and just crazy what intersects with wine. So when offered the opportunity to talk to somebody who is working on a book in the wine space, and particularly for a very, very critical moment in history, I jumped at the opportunity to talk to him. So I have today with me, Mark Gudgel.

So let's start with what got you interested in wine in the first place.

Mark:

Back when we were dating, my wife and I would drink wine. We had gone to a train concert while we were dating right after we got engaged, and Train came out with a wine they sold at Target called Drops of Jupiter, and it cost $12. And occasionally, I would splurge on that, but it cost twice as much as the wine I was used to drinking. So it was a splurge.

Jim:

That's funny. Well, even now, 90% of all wine that's drunk is below $20 a bottle. So, I get asked, is it good wine? For ten bucks a bottle. It's not a bad bottle of wine. It's all relative.

Mark:

A lot of times, people will ask me what's good wine. And I tell them every time - whatever you like, as long as you can afford it. I like Petrus, but I can't afford it. Not good wine for me. But if you like Sutter Home Whi