WINE BIZ DRAWS VALLEY NOTABLES 78 South Bay Accent CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT: KEN ZINNS; COURTESY OF CLOS LACHANCE WINES; COURTESY OF HOUSE FAMILY VINEYARDS; OPPOSITE PAGE: COURTESY OF CLOS DE LA TECH CK Vines is a subsidiary of Clos LaChance that provides installation and maintenance of small-scale vineyards on a homeowner’s property in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Far from a landscaping company, CK Vines takes special care of more than 25 local home vineyards and offers to buy the fruit for use in Clos LaChance wines. What’s clear is that the grapes from well-tended, intelligently chosen vineyards have a market. For example, the pinot noir from the home vineyard in Los Altos of well-known former networking CEO BILL KRAUSE has appeared in at least two well-received commercial wines. Having a vineyard in the front yard surely beats looking at a lawn, which produces no income and definitely isn’t a conversation starter. A MUCH-REPEATED PHRASE about the wine business is that it’s the best way to turn a large fortune into a small fortune. This doesn’t seem to dissuade famous and wealthy—or just wealthy— individuals from planting vineyards and sometimes launching wineries. A partial list of celebrities who moonlight in the wine biz includes Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, Joe Montana, Madonna, rocker Mick Fleetwood, Wayne Gretzky, Pixar chief John Lasseter and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. Our region is particularly teeming with well-heeled wine entrepreneurs. Given its great climate for grape growing, the Santa Cruz Mountains region is home to wine operations from high-tech titans in addition to the one T.J. Rodgers founded. The most notable enterprise is Rhys Vineyards, owned by venture capitalist KEVIN HARVEY. Rhys pinot noirs have inspired rapture among wine critics, but the Los Gatos winery—which operates several vineyards spread across the mountains—also makes chardonnay and syrah. According to the New York Times, Rhys produces “among the best American pinot noirs, a beacon for those who value grace, balance, structure and distinctiveness in wine.” Another serious operation is House Family Vineyards above Saratoga, owned by former Intel executive DAVID HOUSE. Cabernet sauvignon is the winery’s focus, but House is also the managing partner of the historic Mountain Winery in Saratoga, which he and his colleagues rescued from financial turmoil and refurbished into a premier event and winemaking operation, replanting and extending vineyards on the undulating hills. During earlier incarnations, the former Paul Masson winery had lost focus on winemaking in favor of performances, but under House’s tutelage, grape production was brought back to glorious life. Such is the broad appeal of wine and the wine lifestyle that many other well-heeled valley residents are keen to buy a piece of it—if only as vineyard owners or home winemakers. In fact, a percolating consumer trend is planting home vineyards in the wealthier enclaves of suburbia, paying for the work and potential winemaking to be done by others. Nicknamed “vanity vineyards,” this concept inspired a second company for Clos LaChance Wines founder BILL MURPHY, a former high-tech executive himself. Kevin Harvey David House Bill Murphy and family
South Bay Accent - Aug/Sep 2014
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