The Latest from Cadaretta

Southwind F-Block Media Visit, Aug 18, 2011

Written by David Hance
Thursday August 18, 2011

This day the glasshouse gazebo at our Southwind estate vineyard is a busy place. We and some key members of the wine media are checking out the planting on our new “Fractured Block” (F-Block, for short). A large field of fractured basalt near the glasshouse. A grape-growing opportunity unmatched in Washington State, according to wine geologist Kevin Pogue.

WASHINGTON WINE'S POST-WINTER WAITING GAME

Written by David Hance
Friday April 29, 2011

We wait, and we wait, and we wait. And still we wait to see what our vines may yield this year. Farming, and winemaking, require a lot of patience.

From Wines & Vines online, 04.28.2011 …

An early cold front that swept across the Northwest last November yielded the second-earliest ice wine harvest on record in British Columbia, but grapegrowers in Washington state are still wondering what effect it had on their vines.

Many growers are reporting significant damage, but a chilly spring has delayed bud break and accurate answers to the questions that vineyard managers are asking.

“We don’t know what the aftermath will be, because we haven’t seen bud break yet in most places. And for most growers, it’s been so irregular, so non-uniform in terms of where damage occurred and how much,” Markus Keller, a researcher and Chateau Ste. Michelle distinguished professor of viticulture at Washington State University’s Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center in Prosser, told Wines & Vines this week.

Read the full article HERE.

THE CHALLENGING COLD OF WASHINGTON WINE-GROWING

Written by David Hance
Wednesday April 6, 2011

Cold weather can make Washington wine-growing a risk-filled undertaking. We choose cool vineyard sites for the brisk natural acidity their grapes provide our wines, but in a cool grape-growing year, those sites don’t get ripe enough. We choose warm vineyard sites for the full, ripe flavors their grapes provide out wines, but in a warm grape-growing year, those sites often ripen too quickly.

This balancing act, between vineyard sites (cool and warm) and vintage year weather variations (cool and warm) is a process we’ve been refining at Cadaretta. We’re feeling pretty good about our balance here, today, but after a couple of vintage impacted by cold weather, we’ve had to be pretty selective about which wines we put in the bottle — which wines are good enough for Cadaretta.

We still have some 2008 reds held for release later this year, and that vintage was a little light in quantity for us. The 2009 vintage was also light in quantity, and so is the 2010. Early fall frosts in 2010 will limit some vineyard sites in the 2011 vintage. What does all this mean?

It means we’ve had a run of vintages that yielded less wine than we anticipated, less top-quality wine to bottle as Cadaretta. On the other hand, as we’ve been balancing our vineyard site selection (between cool and warm sites), we’ve had better and better grapes from each vintage. Better grapes for better Cadaretta wine … just not quite as much wine as we’d hoped for.

Cold weather in Washington State can make wine-growing risky. But our balance at Cadaretta is good. Our risk is “will we have enough” rather than “will it be good enough.” That’s our Cadaretta challenge.

NEWS FROM RESIDENT WINEMAKER BRIAN RUDIN

Written by David Hance
Friday March 11, 2011

On March 7th we bottled the 2010 SBS, and the bottling was mercifully uneventful. The wine is slated for release on April 1st, along with our 2008 Windthrow (Rhone blend).

We will be in Seattle for a week at the end of March, touting our wares and popping in on our favorite accounts. We have the “Taste Walla Walla – Seattle” and “Taste Washington” events coming right up, during the third and fourth weekends of March, so we will be schmoozing in full force and presenting the new wines.

In the vineyard, Chris Banek and I are looking at the next five years for development and planting. We are installing a new sand filter station for the fractured basalt block, which will be planted with 7.5 acres of Syrah and Cabernet in very special soils.

My wife, Ashley, and I have a baby arriving in early may, so on the domestic front I am busy fixing up my dilapidated house and plastering and painting in the baby room.

CRUSH IT

Written by David Hance
Monday October 26, 2009

No, this post isn’t about crushing grapes.

It isn’t even specifically related to wine, although I’m a wine guy writing on a wine blog about another wine guy and a book he wrote.

But it’s not a book about wine.

Not really.

It does cut to the core of modern marketing, certainly modern small production wine marketing, very quickly … even if it isn’t about wine.

Gary Vaynerchuk operates a very large wine retail shop in New Jersey. And he’s pretty famous, in the world of social networking and blogging, for his video blog: WINE LIBRARY TV

Mr. Vaynerchuk’s new book, CRUSH IT! (Why now is the time to cash in on your passion) has recently been published.

Within the first 25 pages, Mr. Vaynerchuk sums up what I know matters in marketing, particularly what I know matters in small production wine marketing.

Referencing the current economic tough times, on page 7:

It’s never a bad time to start a business unless you’re starting a mediocre business. I think economic downturns represent a huge opportunity for everyone to get their focus on and start to crush it. The person who can dominate during rough times is the person who can dominate, period. Yes, we’ve seen a lot of people close up shop in the past years, but if they had offered a relevant and differentiated product or service, had been adaptable, and most of all had known how to tell their story, they wouldn’t have had to close.

And, from page 24:

Storytelling is by far the most underrated skill in business.

How many of us dream of starting a mediocre business?

This marketer’s advice is aligned with Mr. Vaynerchuk’s:

1. Be relevant (you and your product);
2. Differentiate yourself (and your product);
3. Be adaptable;
4. Put in the work necessary to be a good storyteller, using whatever communication tools are appropriate and necessary to connect with your target audience. If you don’t, how will they know you’re relevant and different?

Or are you trying to sell the irrelevant and same? Don’t bother, nobody wants that.

DAH is David Anthony Hance at dhance@cadaretta.com