{"id":78,"date":"2014-04-22T20:32:04","date_gmt":"2014-04-22T20:32:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.claibornechurchill.com\/blog\/?p=78"},"modified":"2014-04-22T20:32:04","modified_gmt":"2014-04-22T20:32:04","slug":"origin-claiborne-churchill-part-ii-start-winery-money-scarcely-clue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.claibornechurchill.com\/blog\/origin-claiborne-churchill-part-ii-start-winery-money-scarcely-clue\/","title":{"rendered":"The Origin of Claiborne & Churchill, Part II: How To Start a Winery With No Money and Scarcely a Clue"},"content":{"rendered":"

In early August, 1981, I gave up a tenured professorship at the University of Michigan to move to California and start work as a \u201cCellar Rat\u201d in a local winery, for $6 an hour. Fredericka and I had married on August 6th took Amtrak from Ann Arbor to San Luis Obispo, arriving just in time for one of the earliest harvests in history.<\/p>\n

The Pinot Noir crush started during the second week of August, and I quickly learned that I had severely underestimated my fitness level. Crush work at Edna Valley in those days was extremely labor intensive; within a month I had lost fifteen pounds and gained a nice layer of callouses all over my hands. At the end of each 14-hour day I would return to our little apartment on Higuera Street ($330\/month) sore and exhausted.<\/p>\n

Regrettably, I did not keep a diary of those early days. It was abundantly clear that I could not both DO the job and also REFLECT upon it. It was one or the other. I had burnt all my bridges, and I had to succeed in my new career.<\/p>\n

I had never been happier in my life.<\/p>\n

Working in the \u201cwine business\u201d was a breath of fresh air after the stale and stultifying atmosphere of the university. Here I found co-workers who reveled in hard work, who supported each other at all times, and whose satisfaction came from creating a product of the highest quality.<\/p>\n

I hasten to add also that it was a heck-of-a-lot of fun. The camaraderie, the horse-play, the pranking, the unrepeatable bad jokes: there was an esprit de corps I have never experienced before or since.<\/p>\n

\"Edna<\/a><\/p>\n

In 1983, after two years of cellar work, crush and bottling, laboratory and even sales experience, it was time to take stock of my new \u201ccareer.\u201d I was never really on a track towards the title of \u201cwinemaker,\u201d usually reserved for those who studied the subject at U.C. Davis. For a while it looked like I might be groomed to sell wine for Edna Valley and its parent, Chalone.<\/p>\n

But what I really wanted was to make wine. Our own wine. Different, special wines. \u201cNiche wines.\u201d<\/p>\n

In those days the advice was to make not wine that you liked, but that the market liked. \u201cMake Chardonnay and Cabernet and hire a pretty girl\u201d was the mantra.<\/p>\n

Fredericka and I rejected this idea. Through our experience in western Germany and eastern France we had developed a love of the dry, fruity and well-structured Rieslings and Gewurztraminers of Alsace.<\/p>\n

In the summer of 1983 we flew to Europe, took a train to the town of Barr at the northern end of the Alsatian \u201cRoute du Vin\u201d, and back-packed southward through the vineyards and wine villages, sampling the wine and food and visiting and talking to the vintners themselves.<\/p>\n

We returned eager to make wines inspired by the wines of Alsace. Still, we had no winery and no money. Happily, we were able to borrow a little from relatives, and then received permission from Chalone to start our wine production in a small corner of the cellar at Edna Valley Vineyard.<\/p>\n

In the fall of 1983 we bought 30 used barrels and eight and a half tons of grapes and produced 563 cases of barrel-fermented, dry wines: 224 cases of Dry Gewurztraminer, 128 cases of Dry Riesling, and 211 cases of a blend of the two, which we called \u201cEdelzwicker\u201d after the Alsatian name.<\/p>\n

\"Claiborne<\/a><\/p>\n

Now we could joke that we had fulfilled our dream not only to \u201cmake wines nobody drinks\u201d but also to \u201cmake wines nobody can pronounce.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next: Part III; \u201cSelling Wines that Nobody Drinks\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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