The weather is shifting, trip-planning season is underway, and tasting room traffic is about to pick up. This is the good news. The bad news? If you're reading this and thinking "we'll get to our spring marketing when spring gets here," you're behind. The tasting rooms that stay full from April through June aren't the ones with the best wine or the prettiest views. They're the ones that showed up in someone's planning process three weeks before the trip happened. People don't stumble into wine country on a whim and wander from door to door the way they did fifteen years ago. They research. They scroll. They book. And if your winery isn't visible and compelling during that research window, you're invisible when it counts. The hotel industry figured this out years ago. Marriott doesn't wait until summer to market beach properties. They start running "book your getaway" campaigns in late winter, because they know the booking win

California has generated considerable excitement in the industry by offering a DTC permit allowing craft distillers across the country to ship their products directly to consumers in California, one of the country's largest retail markets. Since COVID, California craft distillers have had a temporary direct shipping privilege, which ends 12/31/2025. California’s new Type 94 Direct Shipper Permit will allow spirits direct shipping for both in-state and out-of-state craft distillers. CA ABC will accept applications starting December 15, 2025, and will issue permits effective January 1, 2026. Here's what craft distillers need to know about this new permit; those located outside of California should consider these requirements before jumping on this opportunity: The permit is only available to distillers producing 150,000 gallons or less per year, of which sixty-five percent (65%) must be of their own production. The permit will expire on 12/31/2026 and cannot be renewed unl

Santa Rosa, Calif., August 27, 2024 – Lumo, the precision irrigation company that helps growers achieve and maintain precision irrigation quickly and efficiently, announced today the release of a new 4" smart valve. The new Lumo 4” valves are ideal for 5-20 acre blocks and come with the same great features as their 2” counterparts - they’re simple to install, easy to use, and more affordable than traditional systems that rely on hardwiring in solenoids and a complex patchwork of 3rd party tools.Over sixty vineyards in Napa, Sonoma, and the Central Coast, including some of the best growers in the world, are already using Lumo to irrigate their vines because it gives them 24/7 remote control of their irrigations, block-level visibility into their applied water volumes, and real-time alerts and support when things don’t go to plan. The new 4” valves are ideal for 5-20 acre blocks and come with the same great features as their 2” cou

Afternoon Brief, October 26th

Washington State University's Sensor-Laden Chardonnay Block Collects Data for AI Scientists and Offers Demonstrations for Growers: Automating vineyard irrigation requires a network of sensors, solar panels, wires and data loggers that can be at risk of run-ins with equipment. That’s one of the first lessons the engineers learned at Washington State University’s Smart Vineyard demo farm in Prosser...

Afternoon Brief, May 4th

Grape Crush Reports Are Essential for U.S. Wine Industry Growth—Here’s Why: In established and emerging regions alike, grape crush reports demonstrate the economic impact to legislators while supporting data-based decision-making for long-term growth...

Within the 2022 SVB State of the Wine Industry Survey run last October, we asked how 2022 went and got the following response.  Forty-percent of respondents said that the year was one of their better years or their best year ever. Fully sixty-five percent said it was a good year, and those results are very close to those from 2019 when we asked the same question. The survey is largely representative of the views of premium wineries. Good News and Bad News The results from the above survey reflect the view of the smaller premium wineries, and while they had a good year, the same can't be said for the industry as a whole. 2022 will be the second year in a row the wine industry will report negative sales growth by volume. I've been scouring the press this month, looking for an estimate of positive volume growth but haven't found one yet. The estimates I've seen range from negative 3.5% volume decline, to negative 0.6%. This is the first time there is an industry ana

We have the honor to announce 10 new winners at the 9th annual KEGGY Awards, recognizing the exceptional impacts these partners have made in reducing waste from the landfill and CO2 emissions. The KEGGY Awards were created in 2014 to recognize winery partners for their commitment to sustainability by choosing reusable stainless-steel kegs - a truly zero-waste package. Each Free Flow keg holds the equivalent of 26 bottles of wine and will eliminate approximately 1,560 bottles from the landfill over its lifetime. WINERY AWARD RECIPIENTS  To recognize the bottle waste saved from the landfill   Saved more than 1,000,000 bottles (1,834,405 lbs CO2 emissions) Prestige Wine Imports Angeline and Martin Ray Vineyards & Winery   Saved more than 500,000 bottles (917,179 lbs CO2 emissions) Trinchero Family Estates Treasury Wine Estates Banfi   Saved more than 100,000 bottles (183,436 lbs CO2 emissions) Whisper Wines Kobrand Corporation Biagio Cru Wines & Spirits Da

The Female Finesse Behind De Toren’s Fine Wines

August 3rd – Female harvesters and vineyard tenders at De Toren Private Cellar play an integral role in the estate’s world-class wines. The permanent vineyard and cellar team is sixty […]