In hot pursuit of terroir
What are your beliefs about terroir? Researchers across multiple disciplines find some common ground at the 2016 Terroir Congress XI.
All posts filed under: Vineyard & Winery Management
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Go with the flow
To filter or not to filter? You’ll find winemakers in both camps. But when filtration is called for, cross flow technology is proving to be the best case scenario for leaving wine sitting pretty. Although there are scenarios where older filtration technologies like hardwood cellulose pads or diatomaceous earth (DE) are better suited to the task, the minimal risks and considerable rewards of state-of-the-art cross flow filtration are readily apparent in the cellar and in the glass. “There’s a time and place for unfiltered wines,” says Gary Sitton, newly-appointed winemaker at Ravenswood Winery (Sonoma, Calif.), founded by winemaker Joel Peterson in 1976. “We view filtration as a tool that lets us guarantee the quality of our Vintners Blend and County Tier wines.” In an effort to work more sustainably in the cellar when filtration is necessary, winemakers like Sitton have found alternatives to crystalline silica-laden DE filtration, which requires workers to wear protective gear and to dispose of hazardous waste. “From a quality perspective, cross flow has let us move away from the use of pads …
Customizing for the curated economy
Just a few short years ago, integration was one of the biggest hurdles facing wineries of all sizes as they worked to combine mobile point-of-sale (POS) and customer relationship management (CRM) systems with a host of disparate back-end systems. The industry’s software as a service (SaaS) providers have responded by offering robust bundles of subscription services that address every aspect of winery management and sales cycles. While challenges still exist, particularly for capturing disparate social media channels and CRM, wineries of all sizes have effectively closed the gap on integration. Today, customization has emerged as the newest challenge confronting both business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) wine sales. According to Dave Dobrow, vice president of business development and marketing for Copper Peak Logistics, who recently spoke on a panel addressing customization at the Ship Compliant 2016 conference, wineries are doing a good job embracing the curated economy. “The subscription food business has gone berserk and wineries are looking to copy that success offering wine club shipments that are specifically curated to add value and recreate the …
The Dawn of Agtech
Agricultural drones may be creating plenty of buzz, but their terrestrial cousins — the robots — are poised to make their commercial debut. Next year promises to be the year of the agricultural robot. With the altruistic vision of creating a sustainable society where future generations are free from worry about food security and safety, the world’s first robotic lettuce farm will go into production in 2017. Kyoto, Japan-based company, Spread, has retooled an indoor vertical lettuce plant where robots will plant, water, harvest and trim up to 30,000 heads of lettuce every day. The automated plant will reduce labor costs by 50%, cut energy use by 30% and recycle 98% of the water needed to grow the crops. The company has plans to build similar robot farms to grow staple crops and plant protein around the world. Growing lettuce in a greenhouse is a far cry from managing a vineyard, but from apple harvesting robots that can carry bins of fruit weighing half a ton, to grapevine pruning rovers that make surgical cuts, several …
Bronco’s Bright Green Future
A focus on sustainability
drives progress as Bronco
Wine Company hits a
1 billion bottle milestone.
Franzia’s Unified Keynote Speaks to Past, Present and Future
In a rare and much anticipated public address, Bronco CEO Fred Franzia delivered the January 26 keynote speech and, with it, set the stage for the 2016 Unified Wine & Grape Symposium in Sacramento. Franzia paid homage to the founding figures of the California wine industry, including his uncle Ernest Gallo, with a look back at their history and, with his characteristic candor, tackled some of the trade’s most relevant topics. As the nation’s largest vineyard owner — Bronco Wine owns in excess of 40,000 acres — he was quick to count grape growers among the most interesting and opinionated people he deals with in the industry. He credited Central Valley growers with teaching him much through the many hours he’s spent in their company over the last 50 years. Expressing regard for his peers and fellow industry icons Robert Mondavi and Jess Jackson, Franzia pointed to their similar practice of always tasting blind and their keen ability to critique what they tasted. On the subject of industry growth, Franzia was at once optimistic and …
UV Tank Sanitation a Viable Conservation Strategy
A new method for sanitizing stainless steel tanks and barrels using ultraviolet light is finding a receptive audience in California. The BlueMorph technology has been in development for four years and is coming to market at an opportune time. According to founding partner Alex Farren, a biochemist and toxicologist, the method known as Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation (UVGI) uses little or no water, no chemicals and only takes 30 seconds to install. Depending upon size, tanks can be sanitized in less than 30 minutes.
Ozone Sanitation Moves from Winery to Vineyard
In 1997 ozone was approved by the EPA as a safe and effective method of general sanitation for wineries. With the commitment to sustainable farming practices on the rise, it’s now proving to be equally useful in the vineyard. Ozone, or O3, a bluish unstable gas that smells like the air charged by lightning during a thunderstorm, is generated when oxygen and electricity are combined. At high enough concentrations, ozone-charged water becomes a chemical-free alternative to pesticides. Third-generation grower John Bacigalupi farms using many of the traditional methods he learned from his father and grandfather. Last year the Bacigalupi family marked its 50th year growing grapes in Russian River Valley and, in his efforts to be a better steward to the land, Bacigalupi continually adapts his farming practices to keep pace with the way pests and disease respond to chemical treatments. Read the article here 2015JA_PARKERWONG_Ozone
Flash Heat Treatment Shown to Benefit Vines and Wine
Many advances pioneered by the dairy industry have improved winemaking in the cellar, but when it comes to using flash or instantaneous heat, it all starts in the vineyard. Flash pasteurization was first applied to milk in 1933. Sixty years later, flashbake ovens made their debut and, shortly thereafter, the adoption of frost prevention and thermal pest control techniques for winegrowing began making news. Fast forward two decades and you’ll find the latest generation of Thermal Plant Treatment (TPT) technology gaining interest from Oregon to Monterey. After three years of rigorous trials by Walnut Creek, Calif.-based AgroThermal Systems, trials show that patented flash heat treatments to vines are producing a host of benefits that extend well beyond the disruption of pest lifecycles. Read the article here: Flash Vine Treament
Berry Sensory Analysis: A Common Language for Describing Maturity
If everyone on your winegrowing and winemaking teams shares a common language, there’s less risk involved when it comes to making crucial decisions. Few would argue that the most crucial decision a winemaker faces is when to pick. Beyond establishing intentions for the style and quality of the finished wine, making confident, proactive picking decisions relies on accurately assessing levels of ripeness. This acquired skill is on that vineyard managers and winemakers typically master through trial and error as they learn to speak the same language when describing degrees of fruit maturity and other sough-after qualities. Using the analytical method of Berry Sensory Analysis (BSA), a technique to describe the characteristics of grape maturity developed by Jacques Rousseau at the Institut Cooperatif du Vin in Montpellier, France, and introduced in Northern California by Enartis Vinquiry in 2006, winemakers can c onfidently assess fruit quality for specific wine styles and, in turn, gain more control over harvest timing decisions and production methods. Read the entire article here: Berry Sensory Analysis