Beyond the Vines: Tony Biagi’s Journey Through Napa, To Kalon, and Winemaking Wisdom

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
We're allowed to craft what we feel the best wine is from the terroir on
the property. And so I really think that as a, as a winemaker, you have
to do that. I think if you start chasing this or chasing that, you can
get caught with your tail, you know, and so you have to craft what you
feel is the best. Sit back and grab a glass.
It's Wine Talks with Paul Kay.

(00:21):
Hey, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Kay. And we are at an away game
up in the Napa Valley about to have a conversation with Tony Biaggi. You know,
I don't even. I don't. Every time I say it, somebody corrects me. To Colon.
Tokelon. Yeah, to Colon. Again, I've heard it a million different
ways. Of course, Tone or Tokalon. I think most of. Most of the Napa
Valley people I've heard say tone, but I have a feeling back in the day

(00:42):
it was supposed to be pronounced Tokalone. So, you know, have
a listen to a show I just released. It was really fun because I had
an intern from Cornell University. We
got a stint in Au Chateau Bailly in Bordeaux, France.
And she was on the podcast and she
told of a 19 year old's perspective of going to France

(01:06):
and explaining how she was indoctrinated to the vineyards
and into the winery, into the French culture. And I was. It's a fascinating
perspective on something like that. Really, really fun, but not why we're here.
Okay. We're going to talk about Tom Biaggi
and, you know, so much to talk about. We're up here in the Napa Valley
and I'm reading a little bit about the history of this vineyard and it seems

(01:27):
to be. Could be considered one of the most famous vineyards in the country.
Yeah, I would say that, you know, Tocquellon and Martha's Vineyard would probably
be the two, but Tocquelon's of course, taking the mantle as probably.
I hate when we go back to France, but I think we have to. Here
is the Grand Cru side of Napoleon. Why do you hate to go back to
France? Well, no, I love France. No, no, I just think sometimes we get caught

(01:48):
up in trying to compare and compare, compare rather than be our own thing.
However, I do believe the Grand Cru system of ranking vineyards is there
for a reason. I think to definitely would take that mantle. I wonder why they
don't do that here. Is it. Is it a vintage association kind of issue or.
I don't think so. I think it's very much that Our country is based on
a capitalistic society where everybody can know if you want to plant Pinot Noir in

(02:08):
Calistoga and make world class wine, go for it. No one's going to tell you
what to do or the opportunity. I think it's also a way for
France to protect wealth. Back in the day with, you know, the feudal lord, not
the feudal lords, but the dukes and duchesses owned a lot of the stuff. And
so, you know, our property is better than yours, so it's worth more money. I
think that's an interesting perspective. So. But I've always had this romantic

(02:29):
thing about the fact that they protect themselves, but the French love the factory. Any
European loves the fact that America is this wide open book and
you can do whatever you want in that industry. But then at the same time
we lose some of our, I don't know, like they protect their
butter and they protect their cheese and then their wines.
And their wine business. They protect their wine business, subsidize it. I wonder if that's,

(02:51):
in this day and age, a negative. If it's,
if it's, you know, because there's such an issue with the industry right now and
there's declining sales and all these different things going on with Gen Z and
packaging, but I wonder if that, that control is actually
stifling a little bit of creativity. I would think so at times. I think this
is why a lot of them come here. I mean, there's a, there's a, there's
a wealth of French knowledge here now in Napa Valley and Sonoma, you know,

(03:14):
Philippe Malka, Benuet to name two or even, you know,
yeah, cathiards over there and you know, the old four springs. So I
think they love the opportunity to be an open book, to be able to craft
whatever you'd like and do whatever you want. You might think you're crazy, but hey,
do what you want, you know, So. I think we're all a little crazy. To
get in this business at times. I think my parents thought I was, so I

(03:35):
know that. So how did, how did that happen? Did you. Born and raised in
San Mateo, California by Belmont, San Mateo. My parents were divorced, so I go back
and forth and they were. My parents were super supportive growing up.
Loved unconditionally. My mom said all you need to do is find a job with
healthcare. So any moms out there will get that comment. So healthcare is very important.
And I just knew I can never be behind a desk. I knew I can.

(03:56):
I had to be outside. I went to Davis. Strangely Enough. I was
recruited to wrestle and I want to be a marine biologist.
I took a winemaking class with Ann Noble and I fell in love. Said, oh,
I could do this. And my parents were collectors. By no means the collector
in the way you would think. My stepfather collected Ridge.
He loved Ridge Zinfandels and those wines and Ravenswood.

(04:18):
My father made home wine and Lodi. It was
ghastly stuff and awful stuff, but he enjoyed doing it and he enjoyed drinking
wine. So it was always around the table and so it was always
part of the lifestyle there. But it was by no means with my dad cracking
82 Latour for dinner, that was not the case. But he knew what the finer
things were, especially my stepdad. So he was really excited for me

(04:39):
to go into the business. That's an interesting thought though. The Finer
Things. And I'm looking at that book over there, the Greatest wines
to Collect. And I also watched a movie recently, somebody sent me
of the greatest collection in the world. Simple Guy just
got the bugs early on. And now considered the greatest collection of the world. The
value of the collection. And I wonder what the. And I just got inspired looking

(05:02):
at this book. Is that just because us or do you think that everybody
has the opportunity to get that inspiration when they have the proper glass of wine
that you just go whoa? I think it exists in
any medium, whether it be food. People, you know, have a bite of
three star Michelin food and then they have to see every three star Michelin restaurant
in the world. Yes. Music, you know, I mean.

(05:25):
Exactly. Or music. Music or sound systems. I mean,
I just like the car on my car radio. But people have Macintosh systems that
are just to start a 50, $70,000 systems. I think wine plays
into that. And I don't know if it's the finer things in life, but just
tasting what is the best of the best, understanding that and
understanding what goes into it. And I think it touches back with Tokelon and the

(05:46):
fact that when you have wine from a site, a place, you can say
this bottle's from that place. I think Burgundy does that the best, of
course. And I think California has sort of become the Burgundianization of such
of valley. Everybody makes a single vineyard or something. And I feel that
the place. I think people really love the place now more than ever. I think
with social media sort of dominating everything, people really want to

(06:08):
touch and feel place. Well, to
Cologne has so much history
and maybe when it comes to representing a sense of time and
place, it that just takes time to Understand it here. You are
rather newcomer to the vineyard. How did you. Yeah. Go about trying
to understand what this vineyard does? I think I'm still learning. I

(06:30):
don't think. I don't think you ever know. I mean, for other places, you know,
before I came there, I was at Plumpjack for 10 years. And that's an old
famous vineyard called the McWilliams Vineyard. And I felt not into four or five
vintages in did I even understand how the property kind of worked. And even with
some client, other clients I have now, I just made a decision this year
to do something completely different. Talking to my assistant, going, you know, and he agreed.

(06:50):
He goes, I've always looked at it this way. Maybe I should look at it
that way. And I think at the people that have come before me at
Toquelan, you know, the people from the Robert Mondavi winery,
You know, there would be Robert himself or Tim Mondavi, Jean Viev Johansson,
who's still there, by the way. I mean, she still comes by and I get
to ask her questions. We butt heads all the time, very lovingly,

(07:12):
but, you know, philosophical. Philosophically, yeah. No, but she knows the
property. I'll ask her a question, goes, oh, yeah, I remember walking that in 89.
And that vineyard was very much like this, you know, like, wow, okay, That's. That's
a wealth of knowledge you can only accumulate over time. I think you'll understand this.
I mean, if you have children, you'll get it. If you don't, I think people
out there with children will get it. You know, it's like, I'm not smarter than
you. I'm just older than you. I've seen more things. So

(07:35):
I really think that's the case. I mean, and not. But also to understand who's
walked the property before you is really, really pretty impressive. So how true
is that? Right? I mean, that's a really interesting point. Experience
in life, whether you're a parent telling your kids or a
winemaker, it takes time. And I. I do a lot with the
Armenian vineyards, Armenian wine trade, trying to establish a position.

(07:56):
And I've told people, man, what they've done in the short amount of
time since they were free because the wine industry was
stifled by the Soviets is amazing. But they have a long
way to go to understand what a vineyard is going to be able to do.
Yeah, absolutely. I think what we have here,
you can reflect on that experience from these people that were there already.

(08:19):
Absolutely. I can definitely Genevieve, who's there, and I can even, you know, Luckily, I'm
friends with Tim Mondavi outside. Or I can ask him questions. Hey, when. You know,
when your dad or you are looking at this and you're setting it up, because
the vineyard now was originally set up by the Mondavi for Tim Mondavi
and that last company. Why were you thinking this? Why were you thinking that? And
Jean, Vivienne, what were you thinking? Just to get the perspective. Now, I'm dealing
with their thought process. I'm dealing with the results of that thought process.

(08:42):
So I really feel that being able to talk with them and ask them
questions, sometimes they're like, you know, I thought this, and I was way off base.
Or sometimes you hit it out of the park with your idea. That is what
it is. We're still learning over here, you know, And I. And I think, you
know, you look at Burgundy or you look at Bordeaux and their systems, you know,
it makes sense why the first growths were the first growth, the uplifted rock and
pebbles here. We're still trying to figure it out. I mean, I was blessed to

(09:05):
work with Dan Duckhorn right out of college, and he always pointed to the alluvial
fans of Napa Valley, of where the best vineyard should lie. And
Toquen's in an alluvial fan. So Dan was right, you know,
so. So do you think that your perspective. Because this is important,
particularly now in today's marketplace with the Gen Z's drinking particularly, they don't want to
drink what their parents drank. They don't collect all the different issues. We don't. We

(09:27):
go on forever on that conversation. We want to, but we won't. But the.
The idea that the perspective
has to be contemporized. Now, I've heard two schools of thought when I do this
podcast. I was with Monsieur Clouet of Cheval Blanc, and
he's like, we don't look at the consumer. We
just produced what this vineyard's gonna produce. And

(09:50):
given that thought, and I had this. I floated this to him, and he agreed
with me, which was, there's never a bad vintage, because if
vintage is true to its environment, then it's a
good vintage. It may not taste the same as the one previous or the one
after, but if it's true to the weather conditions, the soil, and everything
that was presented in the vineyard that year, it's a. It's a proper

(10:11):
vintage. Yeah, but we have a dynamic here. We have consumers. We have to
decide, you know, so is your perspective
different than your predecessors? And is that based on. Do you
think the contemporization of wine in the industry we have to deal with
because we have to sell stuff. That's our job. I think
what I've been blessed with here at Tokalon is that the ownership group, which of

(10:33):
course is a publicly traded company, but the management group, I should speak one step
down, allows us to craft the best
wines from the property in our beliefs of what that should be.
I don't think they've ever come to us and said, you need to do this,
you need to do that. I've never been told once to do any of that.
So interesting. Been very good most all, you know, whether it took long or any
of my clients are really about working together, you know, now I talk to the

(10:56):
ownership, I talk to the, my bosses, well and then other
companies, the owners quite a bit. And we have a lot of connection with that
way. But in the end it's a lot. We're allowed to craft the
best wines. What we feel the best wine is from the terroir on the property.
And so I really think that as a winemaker you have to do that. I
think if you start chasing this or chasing that, you can get, you can get

(11:16):
caught with your tail, you know, and so you have to craft what you
feel is the best. So. So that aligns itself with that
traditional thinking, which is we're going to produce the best
expression of what it is. Yeah, absolutely.
And I think with Tokalon Vineyard company, they've allowed me to say, you know, there's
no case. They've never make me, they don't need cases, they want to make the

(11:37):
best wine possible. So some years it's going to be small. I mean, in a
tough year, you know, we would probably make less wine. And
in a world class vintage, if we can craft, we will. It's about the quality
and the wine in the moment. It's not about, hey, we need X cases
every year. So they very good to me about that. What does.
I love this conversation because it's, it's what I believe. It's the Roman. It's

(11:59):
not the romantic part, but it's the honest part. And wine.
I remember reading an article years ago from a guy saying the problem with wine
is they don't listen to the consumer. And they don't. And I'm like, but I
don't think that's what wine is. We need those
consumer versions, the Josh's and the Apothec reds on the shelf
for the people that come and taste. And then all of a sudden Realize there's
something like to cologne on the shelf

(12:23):
also. Right. But the contemporary thinking is,
what is innovation? We need to innovate. Does that mean anything to you? Innovation in
the wine world, is that sort of a vineyard innovation, packaging
innovation, marketing? Well, I think the funniest thing about innovation,
it's a great question, but I think innovation is the
innovation that allows us to go back to tradition. You know, what. What are the

(12:44):
tool. What are the tools you're giving me so I can make wines traditionally? Yes.
You know, like, that's how I want to look at. Look at innovation, you know,
and so forth. That's clever. I like it. You know, and because there are so
many more tools out there. And I, you know, Bob Levy was a mentor of
mine from Harlan, and he said the best winemaker has the most. Most. The best
winemaker has the biggest quiver with the most arrows. Right. And that's experience. And it's
what tools you have and how can you use this tool to fix these issues?

(13:07):
You might come up. No vintage is perfect. I mean, you know, the best vintages,
of course, are other vintage. The head pops up here, you know, oh,
what's that? Sometimes bigger game of whack a mole. Sometimes
it's a lesser game of whack a mole. And it is a natural beverage. I
mean, if you're making natural beverages, I mean, when I say natural, we're growing the
grapes organically out of Tokalon and we're fermenting them. You know, we're not using

(13:29):
it. We may use a little nutrient. We do use commercial yeast. And I can
go into a deeper issue, why I would do that at low volumes, but other
than that, Malolactic is native. And then we're going to try to rack them three
times and bottle them. We're not doing anything out
of the ordinary. So. So those. Those lessons,
having been a duckhorn Cade, Plump Jack. Yeah.

(13:50):
Hourglass. Which one of my favorites. I'm still there. Yeah, I'm still there. Are you
really? Absolutely. Yeah. So we had a bottle at Rheinfeld the
other day. Yeah, thank you. Yeah. You know, Jeff Smith had been really good to
me and he allowed me to do this because I was working at PlumpJack and
I was looking for my next. Next opportunity. And Jeff was very kind to say,
hey, why don't you come work for me? And I was replacing Bob Foley

(14:13):
and you can take. You can work with some other people and start your little
brand yourself. And so that's, of course, now, many years later, has allowed
me to Work with Ton vineyard company, which is very exciting for me. So that's
really cool. Yeah. So those lessons, like,
you're in a different part of the Napa Valley when you work at these different
places, you're under the tutelage of a different organization.

(14:35):
Yeah. Both management and philosophical. Does that
bring a certain amount of roundness to the next project that you're
working on? I think the ability to see more, have. Have it open,
you know, your lens is so much wider. I think you see a lot of
things. You go, oh, that might work here. Maybe it won't work here this vintage,
but maybe next vintage. I've learned something that might help me. And again, it's about

(14:56):
adding arrows to your quiver. You know, like, let's try this. I saw this over
here because I do, you know, I do some. Do some work in. I did
some work in Paso Robles. I did some work. I still work in Santa Barbara
a little bit with some consulting with a client down there, and I do some
work in Sonoma. So, you know, different fruit sometimes brings up different
ideas. And so. But then how. How can I implement those ideas? You know, maybe
waiting to pick maybe the maceration techniques, maybe, you know, the

(15:19):
oak choices all sort of open your mind a little bit more. I mean, I
think this business, it's like the chef, you know, the more wine you can taste,
the more ideas you can see. And I always tell young winemakers, interns,
hey, work with me for this year. Take what you like,
that I've done, and what you hate, throw it away. But there's going to be
three or four things that you're going to learn from this, and then, you know,

(15:40):
taking the next step. I interviewed with Tony Soder once, and, I mean, Tony's a
legend here in Napa Valley. I mean, he's, to me, you know, as cool as
it gets. And he said, work like nine and go work
nine harvests in a row. And of course, my dad, my stepdad's like,
absolutely not. You need a job. You know, So I couldn't do it. I wish
I could. But his idea was. I now understand what he was saying is, go

(16:01):
see as much as you can see, especially when you're young in this business, because
you don't have children, you don't know, you don't have a mortgage payment. You can
do that, you can travel. And this is what's great. You know, I know we
were talking about my girlfriend, Katie Linda. Her son is doing that right now, and
he's traveling all over the world. He's been in New Zealand, South Africa. You know,
he's working with Staglin right now and these great companies and he's seeing so much.
And I'm jealous, you know, 50 years. Old, I'm super jealous. Like, I just

(16:25):
came to work in Napa and don't get me wrong, I enjoyed my time there.
Of course, to see the world because of a job is pretty cool.
Well, that's a, that's another. I bring that up quite frequently because there are
many people that go do two vintages a year. They go to South America, they
go southern hemisphere, they do a vintage there, they come back and do one up
in the northern hemisphere. And I think you'd agree
with this. Obviously you, if, if you work that same vineyard for 20

(16:48):
years, if you work at to a cologne for
20 years, you have a certain perspective on that vineyard, almost every
vine, practically. You're going to know and you're going to create a different
wine than somebody that's doing what, what Katie's son's doing,
traveling the world, working in different vineyards, getting a different perspective with a
worldwide perspective. They're going to come back with a different opinion of what this vineyard

(17:11):
is. And one's not better than the other. It's just perhaps it might
be better, it might be worse, who knows? And I think, but I think what
he's gaining is knowledge that in 20 years working with his family's vineyards, he'll have
all this knowledge from the beginning to look at his vineyards maybe a little differently
than the winemaker does right now. So I just, I'm, I'm, I'm
kind of looking back on my, you know, there's no regrets. But I say I

(17:31):
wish I would have done that. You know, do I agree with. Yeah, So
I really wish I would have seen something. This is when, when I was
talking at the beginning about this young girl that went to Chateau Bailly,
my first conversation with her as a 19 year old, she says, I don't want
to work in the vintage, you know, in the vineyard. Uncle Paul. And she's at
Cornell eonology school. I'm like, well, if you don't want to work at the vintage

(17:51):
girl, you're going to, you might as well get out now because you're going to
be in the vineyard. Well, what was the first thing they did? They put her
in the vineyard. Yeah. And now she's like, I love the vineyard. So there must
be something very cerebral about that. Well, yeah, it's funny, you know, walking Tokelon
and walking Anyway, but really, Token, because of the history and the energy of that
property, the vineyards do have an energy to them, and
you can feel it at times, sometimes more than others. I definite

(18:14):
think, you know, Toklan in the morning when it's foggy, is pretty beautiful. I don't
think there's many other places in the world that's like it. Just the vista that
you're looking out east from the vineyards all the way back against the
Himayacamas. Yes. It's just a stunning piece of dirt. You can feel the energy
there. And so there's a reason. I mean, it means. I think token
means beautiful place. I mean, it is so. But vineyards in general,

(18:34):
maybe it's the water underneath them, maybe just the roots. They're
very magical places to be in wine. So very
calm at times, too. Maybe that's the difference. Maybe that's the reason.
Wine, because I never get a definition as impossible to define. Why?
What's so special about this product and what's so interesting about it? And why does
it connect us to the soul? And that energy you're talking about coming from the

(18:58):
vineyard might be the answer. That wherever that energy is coming from and
whatever you believe that energy is coming from is what differentiates
the beverage and how it affects the human soul.
It's a connection. It creates all kinds of
energy. When you share. I would agree. I think also what people forget at times
is it's vintage dated. And so when

(19:21):
you're having that bottle of wine at your favorite restaurant and you read
that vintage and remember, wine's usually sold Sauvignon Blanc. Of
course, white wines come to market much quicker, but great white red wines are often
aged. And so you're seeing something that's five or six years old, and I
feel it brings you back to that moment at time. It does. To me especially,
I could tell you every vintage and what it was like, what was going on

(19:42):
in my life. You know, the best of the best and the worst of the
worst are all sort of marked by a vintage and that number.
And I think, anybody, you know, oh, 2007, oh, yeah, this was happening.
2004, oh, my daughter was born. And then you start thinking about it, and I
think that metaphysicalness of it, like opening the mind to that date
and then having that liquid do that, and then maybe drinking a

(20:02):
little bit, imbibing too much and maybe getting a little more emotional about that. But
I really think very few things in our heart, our. In. In our
world, our vintage data that we consume, you know, I Mean, yeah,
that's true. Nothing else. They use up use updates, you
know, best buy. But you don't ever, you know, they don't say drink buy on
our wines. It's basically all right, that 1975 is a really

(20:24):
enjoyable bottle of wine, you know, So I think that. And then
that it comes from nature, It's a natural product. Yeah. And it comes
from a vintage date, I think are the two most powerful things. I think that's
it. I didn't even think about that thought process because I, when I was in
the retail side of things all these years, people would say, and they would
do it too late. And that would be, I need a bottle of 2004

(20:46):
for my daughter's when she was born. And I want to find. That's my daughter's
birth year. And I have, I've been collecting them. So it's so funny. So they
wait till it's 20, 25 and go, I need a bottle, you know, 21 year
old bottle. I'm like, well, I don't know, you know, it's a little hard to
find, but if you thought about it up front. But why? The question is, why
do we do that? Why? Like, what is it that we try to preserve
when we buy a bottle of wine of a birth year or

(21:09):
a wedding year? Like, I used, I bought 86, I got married in 86. I
bought the Charles Krug 86 Winston Cuvee
or something. And it meant something. It's all gone now.
But I bought six bottles and it meant something every time
I opened it. And you don't, like you said, you don't do that with a
Best Buy date, you know. Yeah, Jack Daniels,

(21:31):
Heineken. None of that occurs like that. So do you fight
then? Do you fight this Napa,
you know, it has settled on a style that people appreciate it and we need
the people to understand those styles. And I won't name any brands, but
there's that opulent, fruit forward little high RS
type wine that represents

(21:55):
currently, unfortunately, sort of a default style of the
Napa Valley. Do you fight that or you just. We, we appreciate
the fact that they exist because it brings people to the table. I
think you have to look at this. Your second idea is how you have to
look at it that brings people to the table. I focus on what I can
do and make the best wines possible, you know, using the tools that you were

(22:15):
saying, the, you know, the moving forward of
mechanization or just having better ideas of how to do things, but trying to go
back to the naturalist wines possible. Yeah, you know, very.
Additions, just sulfur, other than sulfur, and then bottling without filtration.
That's the goal. There's no nevers. I think

(22:36):
the. I think generally I would like to be. Yeah. I mean, but so never
and always. I mean, I also don't want to sell something to the consumer that
might be spoiling the bottle. So we're looking at that, and we have to be
careful of that, I think. Oh, is it. It's where philosophy meets
incompetence, you know. Yes. Philosophically, I want to do this, but I don't
know what's going to happen if I do it, so I'm going to do it
anyway. And that, that gets pretty dangerous pretty quickly.

(22:58):
You know, I've had, over the years. There's
one biodynamic, actually, it's very funny because we're talking about the vineyard a little bit,
but it's a biodynamic from Sardinia, I think. And these guys
play music in the vineyard, you know, and they had done this experiment where they
put rock and roll in a vineyard and they put, you know, all
this stuff. I suppose there's. You talk about the energy in the vineyard. I suppose

(23:20):
there's possible, yeah. I mean, if you look at Le Flev. I mean, La Flev
is biodynamic in the vineyard, and they make their wines more traditionally in the
cellar. But I think it really does start in the VI and how you handle
things, which is really exciting about Tokalon. I mean, you know, they're trying to. Taking
all the, all the acreage from Mandavi's Tokalon organic, you know, certified organic. Well,
weren't we always organic? I mean, I mean, I mean, up until a
certain point when pesticides and sexicides and herbicides became a thing. Yeah, I think,

(23:43):
I think they always did what was. You know, I think if they could do
it, they would. We're. Now we're asking the questions. Why would you. I think
that's more than ever. Look, I started in the, in the 90s, and it was
already a push to organics. But I did hear the older stories of no
bugs in the vineyard. Never saw a bug in the vineyard. You know, smudge pots
burning. Winter, you couldn't see up valley because it was so, so, so smoky and

(24:04):
all these different things. And I think that's changed quite a bit here. And so
I'm really proud that we're, that they're, that we're doing that here. No, I, I.
Look, I think in general, particularly with Sort of the movement, the political movement
towards healthier eating. This is sort of healthier drinking. I think it makes
a ton of sense that the vineyard's not, you know, doused and stuff. And
I. There's a lot of books about how we've destroyed our wheat

(24:26):
farms and through all kinds of reasons, and now we're going back. I just think
it's interesting that we've created this problem
of insecticides, herbicides and pesticides and the diseases and the things that
come from it. And now we're allowing ourselves and patting ourselves on the back for
going back to what it was before. Well, again, I think we have to pat
ourselves in the backs. We are trying to make change, and change is hard, you

(24:46):
know, and so, I mean, a pat on the back might be maybe a little
too crazy to take the victory lap, but in the same instance, I'm really,
I really feel proud that, hey, you know, at least maybe we're the first generation
to do that. I think it's great. And the generation above us to start moving
back to camp, we. We can. We coexist, you know, and with
regenerative farming and so forth. Well, they, you know, they talk about that. You
know, in the earlier days of organic farming, I may say 20 years ago,

(25:10):
the yields were lower. You were. It wasn't guaranteeing you're getting a better product. You
were just getting organic. You weren't. And that was the problem. That's what I think
soured a lot of people. There was a couple wineries, and I won't name names
because they don't probably want to be known, but they were organic in the vineyard,
but they didn't want to be known for those organics because it was. Was who.
You know, there was other wineries that had the, the stigma of organic and bad.
Yeah, organic meant bad. And I don't, you know, that's why I think someone like

(25:33):
Le Flev, who does biodynamically in the vineyard, farms biodynamically,
but then crafts wonderful wines. And I know Dalavala is doing a lot of
biodynamic things and they make world class Cabernet now. So you can do both.
Whereas I think in the 70s and 80s, I think it was, you can't do
both. Right. So that was, that was kind of bad. So. Well, we
did, you know, there's a lot of movement for food too, and, and

(25:55):
there's an energy when it comes to wines and food, like we talked
about earlier in the vineyard, that come from seasonal
food. I just thought of this, the other day, I was thinking, like, oh, my
gosh. Because we. We. My daughter just came from a town called
Potsdam, New York, which is. You don't want to go there.
But the coolest thing about it is you go to the farm and you buy

(26:15):
your vegetables, you go to the dairy and you get your milk and you buy
your meat from the. The. From the butcher, from the cattle ranch.
Well, that's as seasonal as it gets, 100%. And there's a. There's a. There
is a certain value, huge value to that nutritionally
and I think to the human cycle. You're also getting out,
you know, where you can. Your daughter can just stay at home and order all

(26:37):
of her groceries, you know, online and deliver it. But you're getting out, you're talking
to people, you're talking to the vendors. You're. Hey, what's going on? How's it looking
out there? Oh, whoa. The cow's not happy right now, you know, Right. Or the
butcher. Hey, I don't really like this. Maybe go to this cut of meat or,
Or. Or the vegetable. Yeah, I'm sorry. We had a bad run on strawberry this
year. You know, in the springtime was really weird. We'd have a lot of good
strawberries, and the garlic was weird. I mean, just funny. You see things. So

(26:59):
the more you're out there, the more you see. Oh, sorry. It was super late.
We had heat during the flowering of these certain peppers, and so we had on
peppers for another three weeks. And it's just funny to be able to talk to
people, to understand how the weather and the climate affects us every day. But I
think when you sit in your home in front of a computer and just hit
buttons, you know, you're. You're not even around that. And I think it's funny,
right? I didn't even think of that. It's a really good point, but isn't

(27:22):
wine the ultimate seasonal product, a vintage wine? It is.
And I, you know, I often tell people the hardest, you know, we. We compare
our business to the restaurant business. You know, we
are. We are overly reliant in a great way on Hispanic
culture, which is a restaurant business in California as well. So, you know, you
have that and you have how hard it is to do. The difference is they

(27:43):
can cook that pork chop every night, 15 times a night. We get one
chance with grapes to do it. Well. Yeah. You know, and then next you have
to wait to next thing. Oh, God, I should have done this. Yeah. But then
next year is completely different. Then you know, it's kind of like, you know, like
I want to, I want to play dice, I want to play craps. But then
next year you're playing blackjack because the weather's completely different.

(28:04):
So it's just, you know, I tell people I get 30 or 40 chances
in my life to do it right and do it well. You know, luckily I
do work with some other clients, so I get to touch more stuff. But for
the most part part, you just spent a year. You know, when you lose a
year, like 20, 20, the fires where, you know, almost all my clients for
the most part did not make wine. You almost lost a whole event. Just kind
of like, you know, in that way, being a professional athlete, when you go down

(28:26):
with an injury, you lost a year, it's just gone. And you're not guaranteed
many more of them. So that's interesting. You know,
there's, I brought this up before and I think you just mentioned it and you,
you, you live the reality of it that, yeah, 30 to 40 vintages is
probably a career year period. It is 100%. Yeah. And that doesn't seem
like a whole lot, you know, for a lifetime, because it is only once a

(28:48):
year. It is. And you, you know, there's a lot of pressure there not to
make any mistakes. You know, there is. And I think, you know, especially working with
Toquelon, I mean, you know, you have these world class grapes coming at you almost
every year. You know, you're getting the best, you're getting the best ingredients. Like working
at a three star Michelin restaurant. Everything you buy there is going to
be world class, the best suppliers, the best everything. I think that's kind of what
Tokalon is, is that this is best fruit coming at you and you better make

(29:11):
the best wines. Now what's the, the what's best that's in the eye of the
beholder. But in my mind, did I craft the best wine possible from
what I saw and from what the vintage is? And I feel great about that.
That's kind of all you can, because like I said, what you could, I can
guarantee if we were went out for a wine list right now, you'd probably pick
something completely different than me. We would both agree on whatever we picked

(29:32):
that we enjoyed, but we would have probably gone somewhere completely different. That's the love
of wine. Right? So, so let's go to the business side of
this, the Tokellon hierarchy of
management.
Do you meet like this is going to move into the distribution side of things.
And the way DTC works and all the problems we have in America with selling

(29:55):
alcohol. But when it comes to Tokelan, what
is the conversation like in the boardroom? What do we talk about?
I think they. I mean, I don't really know because I've never been in the
boardroom, so I can't. No, no, no, no. That says a lot right
there. Allow us. They empower, you know,
Sam Glazer, who's the, who oversees the wine program in San Martin, to really

(30:17):
let us do our thing and let us be. You know, they said a lot.
They've been very hands off. I mean, there are some. There are some small family
wineries where the owner sits next to you every day and make sure you do
everything right. So being. The fact that they've empowered us to make the best wines
possible is super. That's. I mean, that's the best form of leadership you can have.
That's amazing, empowering. So, so. But I think if you were. And I'm not going

(30:38):
to put words into their mouth, but I think they know that they own the
best, arguably, if not the best piece of property in
California wine business. If not the Americans, you know, that's amazing.
They know what they have. Yeah. But that takes a lot of discipline
for the. Particularly in today's world of marketing and all the issues
that are coming down the pike here and this drop in consumption.

(31:00):
I mean, I was talking to Violet Gergis. She, I think she said
the taste room traffic goes down 30%. You know, that's a
substantial amount of traffic to ignore. Right.
And here they are at your place saying,
we're still. We're going to hold the line. We're going to. We're going to let
the team do what they need to do. Well, not only that, there's. If you

(31:21):
go to Mandavi, right now, they're reinvesting in the tasting room. They're leaving the arch
in the tower. Of course, they redid it all, but then adding new tasting rooms,
they really believe in the long term viability and success. I noticed the construction
fence on the highway. Yeah, yeah. No, it's going to be beautiful. And hopefully you
can come back to the launch of it. It's going to be really exciting. So
they're investing long term in it. They believe in it long term. So, you know,

(31:41):
that's interesting because Robert Madhavi, I saw the pictures out in front here when we
were at the arch here down in Napa Valley downtown. I did not know this
building existed. Been by here a thousand times. I never noticed it, but there's pictures
of Robert Mondavi out there, and he was
considered the. The. The flag waiver, the, you
know, the inspiration behind and putting Napa Valley on the map besides the

(32:03):
judgment of Paris and all these other things that occurred. But the guy that went
out and waved the flag, who got on the plane, who went down to Southern
California, spoke at my dad's Les Amie Divan meetings to
make this happen because he believed in what was going on here.
Yeah, absolutely. No, I mean, it's an honor to work with these grapes and the
grapes that, you know, in 66 his family had and working with them and,

(32:24):
you know, I got a chance to meet him three times and oh, yeah,
he. He was super inclusive. I mean, super nice. He sat next to us from
Mustards, of all places and started asking us questions. And when he found
out that we were in the wine business, started giving us a hard time about
stuff. And I mean, what can you say it
hasn't been written already about him? He's just a legend. Without him, we're probably

(32:46):
30 years behind the curve. I mean, his dreaming and his
tenacity and his focus, his vision. I was talking to
George Tabor, the guy that showed up at the Judgment of Paris. He was on
the show a couple years ago and he said, yeah, maybe
California would have become. It wasn't for my article
and that whole Judgment of Paris, maybe it took. It would take 10 more

(33:08):
years. And I don't know how you make that prediction because
it took a worldwide. Maybe
Robert's job would have been a little tougher to get on the planes and fly
to SoCal and fly to the east coast and wave the flag in the Napa
Valley. But certainly now the world, the wines are world
class and they compete all. Over the world, 100%. I

(33:30):
mean, sometimes win. It's. You know, I don't think he ever wanted to be the
best. I wanted to compete. I think if you. I think if you're in this
business, you learn that everybody's taste is personal.
I always used to jokingly say, you know, I don't want to come in first
in any blind taste. I want to come in last. I want to compete. Yeah.
And I want to, you know, I feel that's pretty good place to be because
some person's going to rank it first. Some person's going to rank it. That's just

(33:51):
the way taste is. You guys seek that, the. The ratings and all that.
I don't know if you guys are submit them. I Don't know. We do. I
mean, I work with all the critics, you know, and. And I still think you
have to focus on making wines possible that make yourself happy again. It goes back
to chasing this and chasing that. I mean, the marketplace for critics has
changed. I mean, when I came through, there was two. There were a lot of
critics. There were two powerhouses. That was the Spectator with James Lobby

(34:15):
affecting California Wine, and of course, Robert Parker. There was Stephen Tanzer on a
lesser extent in the Connoisseur's Guide and Underground Wine Journal. I think underground was
Steven, but for the most part the wine enthusiast, of course.
And then the wine news. I don't know if you remember the wine news, but
it was really the Spectator and it was Parker. Those are the 100 pound
gorilla. So you, I think, has changed considerably. Here's one of the

(34:36):
reasons. Just visually, when you go to anywhere, particularly a
supermarket, almost every wine is a shelf talker on it. Oh, yeah.
So now the consumers look at going things. So it seems like
there's a little dilution in the ratings.
Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of people doing it. But I do think that's
a great thing because of the fact that when two people

(34:58):
have such a power, more full grab on it, and they both like the
same style of wines, and that's not a bad thing. Look, every style is about.
Every style's allowed in any wine business. You know, it's like anything else.
But when two critics like the same thing, it could be very, you know, okay,
well, gosh, you know, we need to focus on trying to drive this. Well, now
there's so many different great critics out there. I'm just gonna make the best wines

(35:20):
I can make and hope and find your tribe and find your critic that enjoys
what you're doing and what you're trying to craft. I think that's the best thing
for them. That's the best thing for the consumer. It's the best thing for brands.
Brands and just to go out and craft, you know, do what you believe in
and find your tribe. And they'll find you if you're doing it well. Look, not
everybody does it well too. That's the hardest part. You know, there's

(35:41):
been a movement for Eno tourism
lately all over the world. And I.
When I was selling wine, when I was selling the Wine of the Month subscriptions
in the early days, there was this huge value to me standing somewhere like
at a Taste of LA or a Taste of Pasadena or Taste of the
Oregon event and shaking a hand

(36:02):
and having that conversation with somebody. And certainly that kind of
relationship is built for a wine dinner. All the
different methodologies that we have to share a glass of wine with
somebody. But it seems to me, particularly in today's marketplace,
that the experiential side of wine is becoming more important
to earn the trust of a consumer

(36:26):
needs that kind of conversation. Yeah. You know, it's funny, we
were talking about critics just now. Wine Spectator has sort of taken this
view now of re educating the young consumers again. And I thought they did a
wonderful job in this article recently. And where I'm not here to show, you know,
to talk about any critics, but I think what they did was let me tell
you how wine's made. And I had people in the business who've been in the

(36:46):
business 20 years ago. This is a great article. They're trying to identify the
younger generation. This is how white wine is made. This is how red wine is
made. I think it was the white wine article that was written. It was fantastic.
They're doing a really good job of trying to re. Educate the consumer. Especially we're
talking about the younger consumer coming up because wine can be terribly.
And you know this more than anybody, wine can be terribly

(37:07):
overwhelming and scary. And then for years,
especially before critics became, and the Internet became so powerful, the
gatekeepers can be very hard with the information. I mean, I can remember being a
young person going into wine stores and they had no idea I was at UC
Davis getting my degree and working retail in the winter weekends, they'd almost shoo me
off. Like, why are you here? Go away. Why don't tell you anything. And I

(37:28):
could just imagine someone who's just a young financial person getting out of the business
and going to a wine store and being told that way. No wonder people. So
I think what Spectator did in this article is a great thing for
wine in general to show you, here's how it's done. This is actually a natural
beverage going from getting to end. They're also doing a great job. And most of
them and the bigger issues are talking about, you know, the, the

(37:50):
articles they write about Italy, the articles they write about Spain, the
articles they write about France. They do a wonderful job and a deep
research on where to eat, where to drink and where to visit. Now, granted, that's
their bend on some of the wineries, but getting people here is everything. I mean,
as you know, you travel the world for wine, and I've been lucky enough to
do the same. Wine grows in beautiful places. Yeah, we all know that and

(38:11):
there's great food, you know, So I. There isn't a day I don't think my
dad. Dad. Yeah. For telling me, hey, son, I think I'm gonna sell the Wine
of the Month club. You may want to just come check it out then I
would work for him for three months and packed wine and charge the credit card.
I go, yeah, I think I can do this. Yeah. And that's like. And he
passed away a couple years ago. But I'm like every day I'm like, wow, thanks
for letting me do this. Yeah. Then you got to take a trip. Then they

(38:33):
winds a Spain go, hey, why don't you come over for a couple weeks, check
out Spain, whatever. Absolutely. You know, that's the
interesting problem though, because wine is
you can learn as much and you're still learning. You're going to Learn through your
40 vintages that you get to manage. This book that's
on the table here about the greatest collection in the world. You can continue to

(38:53):
study at the infinitum. So I've always believed that
the individual persons could be their resistance to learning.
It could be their excitement to learn. Whatever it is, you can learn as
much or as little as you want. But I've always believed, believe that that
honest glass of wine eventually finds its way to the generation. Some generations
are later. Gen Z's are a little later, but they're going to get tired of

(39:14):
White Claw and they're going to get tired of these flavored beverages that have all
this crap in it. And they're going to have this glass of wine one day
and go, you know, this is really interesting stuff. And some of those people will
say where it's from, let's go visit it. Some wong. Some are going to say,
I'm going to continue to buy this wine because it's just really
good. And I'm wondering like all the

(39:36):
word. I should be careful the adjectives I use
for what I read on LinkedIn and places like that of these people that are
talking about how the industry doesn't react and it doesn't understand the consumers. And
I'm like, well, part of it's a. It's one time a year and
two, there is a certain aristocracy that
surrounds wine. Right. And I have to be frank

(39:59):
in that I'll go to a tasting room here. I mean, I tasted 100,000
wines in my career. Documented. Right. So I get it. I'm better
at some. I'm better at sort of structurally understanding wine rather than the flavors.
And what I Taste. But when you walk into a tasting room, sometimes you're just
treated like you're paying a hundred bucks, you know, whatever this charges these days.
And I think that adds to this aristocracy a little bit, that I'm a

(40:22):
little intimidated because they want. Want to. They want to share
that they know more than you. And I don't think that's a good thing. Absolutely
not. And I think the best workers in the. In the
tasting room let you sort of let go along with you for the ride, you
know, invite you, listen to you, you know, and that's what I've seen. At least
now I still go to tasting rooms. I go. I like to go over, because

(40:43):
I don't make a lot of Pinot Noir. One client, I do. So I like
to go to Russian river and taste wines. Yeah. And just sort of. And then,
you know, Katie and I, you know, my girlfriend will go. We'll go taste wines
together and just observe how they're hosting things. And it works for
her because she go back to her winery and say, hey, I saw this. And
this. This might be a really interesting thing to. To. To talk about. Right. And
I. I get to see how people are handling themselves. And some people, like you

(41:05):
said, want to talk over you, want to tell you. And then they find out
that you're a winemaker in Napa Valley, and they're like, oh, okay, that was an
interesting hour. I just, you know. Yeah. So. But most people just, I think the
best salespeople, I mean, and that's why I think we need to invest a lot
more time and energy into the people that work in our tastings, because they're the
front line. They're the ones. Ones talking about our brand and. And. And

(41:25):
expounding on what we're trying to achieve, and not only about the brand, but the
wonders of Napa Valley or Sonoma. You know, a rising tide floats all
boats. We want people to come to California. We want people to go to, you
know, if they're going to Paso, we want them here. But, hey, they're coming to
California. They're. They're going to eventually find us. And
that's interesting. You know, unfortunately, it has. You know, we are working on

(41:45):
some things to get. Trying to get things more affordable here. Things are expensive, and
we're not. We're not ignorant to the. To that. So, yeah, that is a huge
issue. And here's what was told to me recently
in a tasting room in his.
The woman's husband is a winemaker in the Valley as well. And she
said, and I kind of experienced this because we typically stay in Yountville. We have

(42:07):
a couple of hotels we really like, and we noticed that the
attendance is down. There's not many people here, but the prices are
still really high. And the comment that was made to me was,
yes, the. The hotels have business to run as well, and so they're able
to use a skeleton crew with a 30% occupancy charge, the same
amount, and. And. And their expenses are lower,

(42:30):
but they still get the revenue. But that's not good for the
tasting rooms because the people aren't here. Driving up down the highway and going, thing
seems to be busier this week, and of course, it's harvest, so
that's. Yeah, it's a great time to be here. You know, we have seen, you
know, as busy as it was a couple years ago. No, but
I think that's just. If you look at, you know, I think Covid really sort

(42:50):
of accelerated things. It got really busy again. So the Roaring twenties feel.
Whereas if you look at the long term, I think this was posted, I want
to say, in the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal, if you take
off those years, we're still on a path up. It's just not as great as
it was in those time frames. It's still growing. It's just not growing as fast
as we. As we experienced during COVID which I think any business would say
was pretty booming for a couple of years, too, so. But we need to do

(43:13):
more. I mean, I think I don't get to make a lot of those decision
reasons because I'm not at, you know, I don't own hotels here. Well, that's not
by design. Yeah, yeah. I make wine. But I would say that I hope
that they're, you know, I know that visit Napa Valley is working on that. I
know hotels are working on that. I know the leadership of the vendor solution are
all working on opportunities to get more people here, to get it more affordable
to do all those different things. It's kind of interesting. No, I would want

(43:35):
to finish it. We're almost done, but I want to finish on the philosophy of
Tokalon on the way up. But
there's 13 that I know of wineries for sale in
Temecula and Temecula.
And I, I told somebody, they asked me, like, what would you think? I said,
you're not in Temecula. You're not buying a winery.

(43:56):
You're buying strictly a hospitality business because the
busloads come in. It's A. It's. It's experiencing wine
country in a much more affordable environment. And you don't have to travel six
to eight hours in a car to get there. You can travel two hours anywhere
in la, you get the Temecula, two hours. And so they're like, what do you
mean? I said, it's not about winemaking there. It's about

(44:17):
hospitality. And maybe there's some lessons there because
you said it already. It's really
salesmanship. Hospitality is really salesmanship. And
maybe that's one of the aspects that tasting room
managers and tasting personnel should be indoctrinated
to, which is. My career, was a sales guy all my life, is

(44:38):
understanding the customer. Customer. Yeah. Understand the person's walking the door,
where they're at in their career of wine tasting, in this case. And,
you know, if I'm selling copiers, where they're at in the copier world, whatever they're
doing, to understand with that and then respond to that.
Respond to that position and take it to that level, wherever that
is. You know, Danny Meyer wrote a great book on service, and everybody who's in

(45:00):
the service industry should read that book. Yes. Because, I mean, his restaurants in New
York are just juggernauts for service. And I think even I've read the book on
the winemaking side, how to talk to People. How to. How to. You know, because
I am still selling, you know, whether I'm selling right now to your company or.
Or whatever I'm selling. I'm all. You're always selling, whether you like it or not.
And, you know, you have to be. And so

(45:20):
I think everybody should read that book at least once, especially if. In sales, because
I will. Yeah, it's a great book. And he's a Cornell grad, so. Right.
Yeah, I think so. So. So tell me about, as we wrap
this up, the. The. The. The ongoing philosophy and then
what we think the future holds for. To cologne.
Yes. So, you know, agree it took long. You know, so we craft

(45:43):
three wines. We craft highest beauty, we craft Eliza's Cuvee, and
we craft hwc. And
the highest beauty is as a collection of the best blocks that
I get, the best barrels of Cabernet Sauvignon from Toquelon.
I work with 10 different blocks. I hand select them myself.

(46:03):
And the second wine, I'm going to talk.
I'm going to talk about what my favorite wine is right now, because it's special.
The HWC is basically. When Robert Mondavi got the property in
66, they discovered a clone of Cabernet. It's very small, very small, clustered
berries, very dark, very black. And it's called the Mondavi selection.
That wine is just that clone. It's only planted

(46:25):
sporadically throughout the Tocquellon vineyard.
And I craft anywhere between 300 to 600 cases of that a year
off the property. And that's a Special, special caber. 100% cabernet.
Highest beauty. Andy Erickson, of course, founded the brand I took over. I
intend to blend a little more Cabernet Francop Petit Vo in there. He was 100%
cabernet there. The last wine, I think, you know, I was asked, you know, to

(46:48):
chat with you today. You know, they said, well, just if he asks you what
you. What is your favorite wine you're crafting right now? I think the most unique,
one of a kind wine we craft off that is Eliza's, which is a Cabernet
Franc. Cabernet blend. Wow. Cabernet Franc at Toquelon is really
special. It's one of a kind. Not very many people make it. Even, you know,
over at the other side of Tocquelon, you know, they have, I think, two acres
of it. And so we're very blessed to get Cabernet Franco there. I've talked to

(47:09):
Tim Mondavi about it, and he's like, yeah, Tony Cabernet Franc. Special.
And it really, truly is. So that's the wine that I'm probably the excited,
most excited for people to try, critics and consumers alike, because not many
people get a bottle of Cabernet Franc and put it out to them to somewhat
masses. So those are the three wines we're crafting, and we're always trying
to work to get better. We have some new blocks coming online on Toquelon. They

(47:31):
had to replant some stuff, and we had some older vines. I mean, there are
blocks out there that are two years old now that the Mandavi family planted that
we're working with that. It's just beautiful, beautiful Cabernet Sauvignon. So
super excited to work with that. And then, as I said earlier,
I'm now going into my. I worked with the 21s and 22s of
Andy Erickson, and Andy was kind enough to

(47:52):
recommend me for this job when he moved on. And Thomas Brown, who also crashed
Schrader, was also kind enough to recommend me. So they both
coincided. So I was able to get the job. And
just building on what he built and just really getting to know the blocks,
because then there, you know, there's some blocks that I think are just now coming
online that are going to be amazing. So, you know,

(48:13):
Cabernet Frog is getting a little renaissance. I think
it's the sirens call. It's everybody loves Cabernet Frank. Then for some reason, no one
ever buys it, you know. Yeah, but they, you know, they've. They've been. Some of
them are thin, some a little acidic. They don't care a lot of
depth, but they've come around. And
I remember I had a conversation with August Sebastiani last time we were

(48:35):
up here. And I, When I was talking to him, I
go, wait a minute. I go, I bought like in the early
2000s, maybe even late 1990s, the
cabernet franc from Sebastiani. I go, it was. And the label was
like one of the little girls in the family drew it on the wall. He
goes, yeah, that was my sister, sister. And she taken crayon and they

(48:57):
took a picture that made it a label and it was 100% cabernet franc. That
was back then. Yeah. But now you see it, you know, Santa
Milion is, you know, very prevalent always. But to see.
I would love to see how this Cabernet franc and this
vineyard is so. Probably so expressive. It really
is. And I think that's why Tim and Davi said it's so special. Cab Franca

(49:18):
is so special there because I know that now, tasting the Cabernet Francs, I can
taste in the older Mondavi reserve wines, you know, and when it's funny, because
even three or four, I know it's funny, you'll do a wine tasting and someone
go, how much franc is in this? And. And 2%, like, ah, I
totally get that. I'm like, well, I don't. That's funny, you know, 2%. I don't
know how you taste that, but it's funny at 4 or 5%. I do see

(49:39):
a little bit of that sort of the etherealness to it, the sort of the
herbal, the really beautiful herbalness to it. Sort of like the violets that I always
take. Darjeeling tea, you know, a gunpowder tea.
So just, you know, it's like a dried herb, Herb. Herb de
Provence kind of thing that I love in that wine. So it's super exciting to
work with. And so we're doing some co fermentations with Cabernet there to make a
more. More complete wine super fun. I super love it. And, you know,

(50:02):
kind of a. It's kind of an ode to Cheval
Blanc in A way. But even though there's no Merlot, you know, this Cabernet gets
to take that place. But you know, there's a lot more.
Actually our last visit to Saint Emilion
opened my eyes to the fact there's a lot more Cabernet Franc than you think
there. Oh yeah, absolutely. To counter the, the, the, you know, the

(50:23):
viscosity and the weight of Merlot. So it's kind of interesting. Yeah, they're not planning
Merlot out there too because the climate change are saying or Cabernet. They're planning Cabernet
more and more over on the plateau, not down in the flats. So it's been
interesting to see how it goes. So can you imagine they're. They're testing like Tariga
national and stuff in Bordeaux. Yeah, we're doing it here as well. We're doing it
here now. I've often said, you know, you get to get the whole. Are you
worried about cabernet? 10 years from now I go, Cabernet will be here long after

(50:46):
I'm gone. There's so many smart people here. They'll figure out ways to grow it.
You know, people are going back to head trained again to get more shade, you
know, more, you know, back to camp California sprawl to shade the fruit more. There'll
be new clone material, new rootstocks, as you were saying earlier. And it's a great
way to almost, you know, we're going to wrap this up. But what's old is
new again. You know, we're going back to St. George. We're going back to 110R.
We're going back to the old heritage clones that had been here for 50, 60

(51:08):
years. And so I think, you know, it's funny, all these old farmers we made
fun of now are geniuses. So you know how that works, right?
Well, there's a guy, it's called Terravox. It's in
Kansas, right outside of Kansas City. He's up in the
hills. He found a book, Eisterhold,
his name was Eiserhold. He found a book of American wine

(51:31):
grapes from the 1800s, pre
prohibition from that part of the country, which is, you know, really where most
of the wineries were. And they always, they started in Kentucky, I think. Yeah.
And so, and I told the guy and I read about him in the Smithsonian
magazine and he's trying to repropagate these things. He found
14 of these grapes in different nurseries around the country and

(51:53):
he's starting to grow them. And I'm like, dude, you have the
tallest job in the world. You have no history. You have no idea what the
soil is going to bring you. You have no idea this grape's going to do.
He goes, I know. He goes, I've already thrown four of the grapes off the
vineyard because I can't make a palatable wine out of them.
I said, wow, what an amazing task to not have any history
to work from. And it's not vinifera. It's like, oh, no. It's

(52:17):
like. It's a little brass guy. Yeah, well, because you got to remember,
I mean, that's such a humid area. Humidity is just not good for grapevine, you
know, for. And then also you have Pierce's disease, which I'm sure they would have
pressure as well. That's what killed. You know, they called it Anaheim's disease. That's what
killed most of the vineyards in Anaheim. So, you know. You know, it's so funny.
You land over in Ontario and there's all these old head train vineyards all around.

(52:38):
It's crazy. So, yeah, so I'm excited to see. That'd be interesting to see. I
mean, that's interesting. That's an interesting piece of history brought up as we end. This
is. You know, most of LA was planted like that. Anaheim
was devastated by Pierce's. Yeah, they used to call it Anaheim's disease. It
wasn't Pierces, it was Anaheim's disease. Yeah, no, that's what they call now. It's, of
course, Pierce's disease. But, yeah, I know. And you know, you know, Tegan

(52:59):
Pasalako over at Turley, I mean, he's pretty knowledgeable in all this older stuff, so
he loves collecting these old books. So he's always posting stuff and pretty fun. I
mean. But yeah, I mean, California has a great history in the so. But we're
learning, like I always say, what I know could fill volumes. What we don't know
could fill libraries. Well, we appreciate the fact you're here at the helm
to propagate that history and contribute to it, because

(53:21):
as most, most, at least European and now American
vineyards would say, or winemakers, I'm just. Passing through this 100%.
I hope they'll leave it better for the next person that's after me that's. It
still goes. I mean, the vineyard's amazing and I know that my time will be
up and then the next person will be coming on in. And, you know, it's
always interesting, you know, to love French wine and to see that. I wish there

(53:42):
was more. I think the family winery in Napa Valley is making a comeback now
because of that, too. That you'll see that the generational pull. I mean,
it's like anything else. It's called the wine business, their side of it. That's going
to be very hard. It's the business that's not the pretty side, it's the hard
side, but it's a business. So great having you on the show and good
luck with the harvest this year. Thank you. Yeah. Running through it right now. I'm
going to go head back to the vineyards as soon as we get done, so.

(54:04):
All right. Cheers. Cheers.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Beyond the Vines: Tony Biagi’s Journey Through Napa, To Kalon, and Winemaking Wisdom

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist

All Episodes

Beyond the Vines: Tony Biagi’s Journey Through Napa, To Kalon, and Winemaking Wisdom

Stuff You Should Know