Valley’s grapes may be a tough sale this season

As retail wine sales tank, growers are becomingly
increasingly worried about selling their grapes to wineries this season. Moving into harvest, growers typically have all of their grapes sold under contract but the economy is taking a toll on that practice as wineries cut back by making less wine.
“A couple of different things have happened,” said Ned Hill, president of Parmalee-Hill Vineyard. “With the economy we’ve seen grape sales that have slowed down or stopped altogether and, wineries looking to buy are waiting it out to see if prices will drop.”
Hill explained this practice comes into play more with bigger wineries but, as a whole, many wineries are slower on the uptake this year.
“One good thing is that we’re coming off of two short harvests so there isn’t a huge bulk market for gapes out there. After the 2005 and 2006 harvest, there was a lot of extra juice available but that’s no longer the case so there’s less surplus around which is a good thing for growers,” said Hill.
Despite this, many wineries still aren’t rushing to buy.
Nicholson Ranch farms 30 acres of estate grapes on Napa Road at the junction of Highways 12 and 121. Proprietor Ramona Nicolson reiterated Hill’s sentiments but for different reasons. As the stock of their own vineyard has flourished, her winery has begun to rely on it to make more and more of their wine. And this year, Nicholson Ranch will be buying fewer grapes, focusing instead on their own estate grapes.
“For this year’s harvest, we’ve decided to buy grapes from just two vineyards yielding grapes that complement our own estate grapes beautifully when blended,” said Nicholson, naming the Neles Vineyard on Denmark Street in Sonoma as one, the other is in Napa.
“Over the years we’ve purchased lots more but this year, we’ll be focusing on the estate vineyard and cutting back on what we buy,” Nicholson said.
Nicholson feels that this will be a tougher year for growers to sell off their grapes. “Growers have raised prices steadily over the years and wineries can’t continue to pay elevated prices every year,” said Nicholson.
In terms of harvest, Nicholson anticipates a slightly larger crop this year from her vineyard while Hill envisions a small to average crop.
“The whole situation is a little scary,” said Hill. “Wineries are trying to figure out which segment of the market is going to be moving more – the high or the low end. After that, they can figure a sales point but until then, things are going to stay at a standstill. We’re all just waiting to see what happens.”