This 12 months marks the twenty third anniversary of Wine Enthusiast’s annual Wine Star Awards, honoring the people and firms that make excellent contributions to the wine and alcohol beverage world. Here are the nominees throughout 13 classes for the 2022 Awards. The winners of those classes, in addition to the Lifetime Achievement Award and American Wine Legend, can be introduced within the journal’s Best of Year problem and celebrated on the annual black-tie gala in January 2023. We salute the devoted beverage professionals who’ve innovated and flourished this 12 months.
The Process
All full-time and contributing divisions (Sales, Events, Marketing, Editorial) of Wine Enthusiast Media had been invited to submit nominees for our Wine Star Awards classes and submitted their nominations anonymously, with explanations of what made the nomination acceptable for consideration. That checklist of nominees was then despatched to the group for nameless voting to cull the bigger nominee lists down. Final winners had been chosen from the culled down checklist by the Executive Media crew with alternatives primarily based on many elements, together with affect on customers and commerce within the wine, spirits, or beer area, industrial successes, firm/model imaginative and prescient, and trendsetting. The Wine Star Awards are an general beverage business awards program. While the editors are invited to take part, this can be a collaborative program incorporating the enter of all divisions of our firm and isn’t a solely an editorial franchise.
You’re Invited: 2022 Wine Enthusiast Wine Star Award Winners can be honored in particular person at The Westin St. Francis on Union Square, San Francisco, CA
For occasion inquires or to attend, please contact Abigail Turrisi, Events & PR Coordinator, aturrisi@wineenthusiast.net
Explore the 2022 Wine Star Award Nominees
You’re Invited: 2022 Wine Enthusiast Wine Star Award Winners can be honored in particular person at The Westin St. Francis on Union Square, San Francisco, CA
For occasion inquires or to attend, please contact Abigail Turrisi, Events & PR Coordinator, aturrisi@wineenthusiast.net
Person of the Year
Catherine Bugue
The Napa Valley Wine Academy has helped greater than 25,000 professionals and novice wine lovers progress alongside the trail to Wine & Spirit Education Trust certification and has earned a number of international awards for doing so. Key to the academy’s success has been the work of co-owner and Vice President of Education Catherine Bugue, who helped the academy obtain one of many highest cross charges within the WSET’s historical past whereas additionally remaining energetic with Napa Valley technical tasting teams and wine writing.
Tim Lightbourne & Rob Cameron
Although Invivo & Co. has loved the celeb highlight because of profitable model collaborations with UK speak present host Graham Norton and actor Sarah Jessica Parker, the corporate additionally parlayed two revolutionary and profitable fairness crowdfunding campaigns to fund its progress into one of many largest wine producers within the founders’ native New Zealand. In 2022, founders Tim Lightbourne and Rob Cameron invested in extra vineyards in Marlborough to provide elevated winemaking on the Invivo vineyard that’s set to supply greater than 2.5 million liters this 12 months.
Jeff O’Neill
Since founding O’Neill Vintners & Distillers in 2004, Jeff O’Neill has led the agency into changing into one of many largest vertically built-in wine and spirits producers within the United States. The firm produces a number of notable wine manufacturers together with Line 39, Robert Hall and Rabble. In latest years, the corporate has made sustainability a spotlight as evidenced by profitable the California Wine Institute’s Green Medal Leader Award in 2021 and incomes the celebrated B Corp Certification this 12 months. The latest certification makes the agency one of many largest firms within the United States to have efficiently earned the rigorous sustainability certification.
Pat Roney
Vintage Wine Estates CEO and founding accomplice Pat Roney carried out a sequence of strategic acquisitions of wineries and types over the previous 20 years to type one of the vital profitable and proactive wine firms within the United States. In 2021, Vintage went public to additional solidify its main place whereas additionally investing in new ventures resembling The Sommelier Co. and Vinesse wine membership to help future progress in e-commerce and direct-to-consumer gross sales.
David Adelsheim
One of the unique Oregon winemaking pioneers, Adelsheim and his spouse Ginny bought their first 19-acre property within the Willamette Valley in 1971. Driven by a centered imaginative and prescient to create persistently respectable wine, Adelsheim continued to enhance his efforts and people of different growers and winemakers within the state to frequently produce nice wine and that ultimately led to Oregon cementing its fame because the supply of world-class wine.
Lifetime Achievement Award
TBA
American Wine Legend
TBA
Winemaker of the Year
Helen Masters
Ata Rangi, which implies “daybreak sky” in Te Reo Māori, helped put New Zealand Pinot Noir on the map and winemaker Helen Masters has been steadily bettering the long-lasting vineyard’s output since taking on within the cellar in 2003. The family-owned vineyard’s property vineyards within the southern finish of the North Island are organically farmed, and Masters has maintained the vineyard’s fame for uncompromising high quality whereas persevering with to realize sustainable industrial success.
Ana Diogo-Draper
After learning winemaking in her native Portugal, Ana Diogo-Draper moved to California to work in Napa Valley in 2005, joined Artesa in 2013 and was promoted to director of winemaking simply two years later. Diogo-Draper dramatically improved the vineyard’s Pinot Noir program and only in the near past developed a brand new single winery Cabernet Sauvignon from property vineyards within the Mount Veeder AVA whereas increasing the vineyard’s ever-popular glowing wine program. She achieved all this whereas additionally being a founding board member of a brand new winemaking analysis group and making wines beneath her eponymous label by Naked Wines.
Doug Margerum
Prior to creating critically and commercially profitable Rhône and Burgundy varietals in addition to distinctive Sauvignon Blancs from California’s Central Coast, Doug Margerum and his household had been a number of the earliest and most vocal supporters of the area’s wines by their restaurant and wine store Wine Cask. Margerum additionally owned Vita Nova vineyard with Bob Lindquist of Qupé and Jim Clendenen of Au Bon Climat for greater than a decade earlier than launching his personal vineyard in 2001.
Paul Hobbs
From the success of his eponymous label and different winemaking tasks, the title Paul Hobbs has come to signify excellent winemaking world wide. Working with vineyards in California, New York, Argentina, France, Armenia, Spain and elsewhere, Hobbs is among the most profitable and well-known international winemakers. After rising up on the household farm in upstate New York, Hobbs studied winemaking on the University of California, Davis, took his first winemaking job with Robert Mondavi and was then impressed by legendary growers Larry Hyde and Richard Dinner to supply his owns wines in 1991. In May 2022, Hobbs opened his newest vineyard endeavor, Hillick & Hobbs, which is positioned in Seneca Lake, N.Y., and the place he’s centered on showcasing the perfect Riesling potential from the Finger Lakes area.
Nicole Hitchcock
The venerable J Vineyards & Winery property within the Russian River Valley has been a frontrunner in premium glowing winemaking and that legacy started with founder Judy Jordan, who ran the vineyard for many years. Winemaker Nicole Hitchcock has been carrying on each traditions of high quality winemaking and feminine management because the vineyard’s winemaker, and in 2022 she helped launch the “Shifting the Lens” culinary program that featured three BIPOC cooks showcasing their distinctive culinary creations paired with J wines over separate two-week residencies. The sequence additionally was meant to pave the way in which for extra equitable conversations and illustration within the meals and wine business.
Wine Executive of the Year
Robert Bradshaw
Robert Bradshaw—who joined importer Cape Classics in 2009 as chief working officer and have become its chief govt officer in 2010—was instrumental within the firm’s enlargement into importing wines from France and Italy. Bradshaw can also be credited with bettering the corporate’s distribution community, rising its nationwide accounts and forging new, strategic partnerships together with a pivotal settlement with South Africa’s largest unbiased wine producer, DGB, which is comprised of a number of the nation’s most famed manufacturers.
Ben Dollard
Named Treasury Wine Estate’s president of the Americas area in January 2020, Ben Dollard helped the Aussie wine company navigate the stormy waters of the pandemic by specializing in luxurious wine gross sales within the U.S. market and a profitable partnership with rapper Snoop Dogg and the favored 19 Crimes model. The give attention to premiumization and the U.S. market helped Treasury bounce again from Australia’s commerce dispute with China and paved the way in which for a $315 million acquisition of Frank Family Vineyards in Napa Valley.
Nicholas Miller
As govt vice chairman of gross sales and advertising for the Thornhill Companies and Miller Family Wine Co., Nicholas Miller performs an instrumental function in one of the vital dynamic full-service wine firms within the United States. In addition to proudly owning the Bien Nacido, Solomon Hills and French Camp vineyards, the household—which has been farming in California since 1871—owns 1000’s of different winery acres within the Central Coast and produces dozens of their very own wine manufacturers whereas additionally sustaining an intensive non-public label enterprise.
Jim Bernau
Founder and CEO of Willamette Valley Vineyards, Jim Bernau has lengthy been a pillar of Willamette Valley winemaking, main the way in which in making a world-class vineyard centered on Pinot Noir and supporting the bigger group and setting a mannequin of sustainability. His innovation proven by with the latest launch of Domaine Willamette at Bernau Estate Vineyard—a facility making superior conventional methodology glowing wine in Dundee Hills.
Alessandro Angelini
Miami, Florida-based Ethica Wines has turn into one of the vital influential importers of Italian wines for the U.S., Canadian and Asian markets. The firm represents greater than 50 of Italy’s high wineries and Vice President of North America and National Key Account Manager Alessandro Angelini has been instrumental in rising the scale and share of the agency’s portfolio. An import-export veteran with practically 30 years of expertise, Angelini joined the agency in 2012 and helps handle its international distribution and gross sales community from his house base of Trento, Italy.
Tyson Overton
Named CEO in March 2021, Tyson Overton helped the family-owned Wente Family Estates in Livermore, California, see one other 12 months of robust progress. Overton joined the corporate in 2014 to supervise its gross sales crew and was promoted to the put up of chief gross sales and advertising workplace after regular year-over-year gross sales will increase that helped Wente improve its share of the extremely aggressive U.S. wholesale market. Overton continued that streak of profitable gross sales progress by the challenges of 2020 and is now considered one of only a few non-family members to steer the long-lasting vineyard over its 139-year historical past.
Innovator of the Year
Anita Oberholster, Tom Collins and Elizabeth Tomasino
This trio of West Coast college researchers has made quite a few breakthroughs in understanding and managing the consequences of wildfire smoke in grapes and wine and has communicated these findings to the business by conferences and webinars in addition to by the media so customers can higher perceive the dangers and sensory results from smoke. With Anita Oberholster on the University of California Davis, Tom Collins at Washington State University and Elizabeth Tomasino at Oregon State University, the three consultants are implementing a coordinated strategy that can also be conscious of key regional variations to what’s poised to be the most important risk to fashionable winemaking within the western United States.
Stephen Hagen
Faced with the prospect of shedding protection or prohibitive value will increase to safe hearth insurance coverage for his Junction City, Oregon, property, Stephen Hagen enlisted his menagerie of livestock to graze their method to security. Calling his technique “grazing-based viticulture,” Hagen expanded the animals’ grazing space into the wildlands surrounding his vineyards to scale back the hearth danger and supply his critters with free forage. His systematic strategy begins with sheep grazing tall grasses, adopted by goats clearing out remaining brush and brambles whereas pigs present a remaining spherical of vegetation elimination.
Cathy Huyghe
Over the previous 12 months, the info analytics agency Enolytics solid a number of key partnerships with corporations resembling Commerce7, WineDirect and Vermont Information Processing that assist wineries discover success in each the direct-to-consumer and wholesale markets. Enolytics co-founder Cathy Huyghe is a frequent speaker at business conferences, the place she spreads a message of how the corporate is admittedly about empowering vineyard workers to really feel assured utilizing the info they already need to make higher choices and attain firm objectives.
Mimi Casteel
Calling her Salem, Oregon, winery and Hope Well wines the “alchemy between the pure world, my deep love for this floor and the unsung heroes whose robust fingers, hearts and minds have helped me make it,” Mimi Casteel has turn into a vocal and profitable advocate for regenerative farming. After a profession as a botanist and ecologist for the U.S. Forest Service, Casteel labored at her mother and father’ Bethel Heights Vineyard for a decade earlier than establishing her personal 80-acre farm that provides grapes to different wineries and Casteel’s Hope Well model. Casteel factors to the devastating wildfires of 2020 as proof that the disaster of local weather change requires a complete shift to regenerative farming, and her message is gaining traction amongst growers and winemakers world wide.
Tablas Creek Vineyard
One of the best-known manufacturers out California’s Central Coast, Tablas Creek Vineyard can also be well-known for its give attention to Rhône varietals because of the founding partnership between France’s Perrin household (Château de Beaucastel) and their American companions, the Haas household. The vineyard has additionally turn into one of the vital sustainable U.S. wineries after incomes natural certification in 2003, biodynamic in 2016 and a latest certification by the Regenerative Organic Alliance, ROC. In 2022, the vineyard added the ROC brand to its label and launched a premium field wine (with the equal quantity of 4 bottles) to additional its sustainability efforts.
Social Visionary of the Year
Hue Society
The Hue Society, based in 2017 by Tahiirah Habibi, is a trailblazing group rising Black, Brown and indigenous illustration and entry within the wine business. By connecting a distinguished group of innovators, sommeliers and winemakers with a quickly rising inhabitants of Black wine fans, the Hue Society is bridging the hole in financial inclusion and illustration for communities of coloration.
John Jordan Foundation
To rejoice the 50th anniversary of Jordan Winery in Healdsburg, California, and the tenth anniversary of proprietor and CEO John Jordan’s personal charitable basis, the vineyard hosted a multi-city tour to help native teams serving to their communities. Proceeds from occasions in Dallas, Denver and Nashville went to help initiatives in schooling, public well being and humanitarian causes.
Maryam + Company
Maryam Ahmed is the previous director of public packages on the Culinary Institute of America in California, the place she carried out a wide range of shopper and commerce packages. In 2022, Ahmed launched her personal firm, Field Blends, which offers distinctive journey experiences to facilitate an improved discourse on meals and wine. Maryam + Company is a meals and wine consulting agency that gives an excellent better suite of companies in occasions, communications, wine schooling {and professional} networking to in the end enhance variety and equitable entry.
Jordan Sager and Adam Sager
Brothers Jordan and Adam Sager are co-presidents of Winesellers, Ltd., which is an importer and advertising agency serving all 50 U.S. states and which was based by their father in 1978. In 2021, the Sager brothers based Kind of Wild, which is a direct-to-consumer wine firm promoting natural and vegan-certified wines produced by family-owned wineries. Since launching the enterprise, the Sagers have contributed to varied environmental teams, and in 2022 they joined 1% for the Planet, pledging to donate one % of Kind of Wild’s annual gross sales to help a wide range of nonprofits centered on bettering the setting.
Tiquette Bramlett
After being named president of Compris Vineyard in 2021, Tiquette Bramlett turned the primary Black lady vineyard govt in Oregon and since then has used her place to proceed to advocate for equitable illustration within the business. Prior to her new function, Bramlett had already based the group Our Legacy Harvested to coach, advance and empower the BIPOC group within the wine business. The group’s inaugural internship program positioned 5 BIPOC people at variety, fairness, inclusion (DEI) skilled wineries within the Willamette Valley for this 12 months’s harvest.
Wine Region of the Year
Abruzzo, Italy
Earlier this 12 months, the Consorzio Tutela Vini d’Abruzzo introduced its new “Abruzzo Model” that redefined the area’s manufacturing laws with the introduction of a “Superiore” classification for the regional d’Abruzzo DOCs and the discount from eight IGTs to a single IGT Appellation, Terre d’Abruzzo. The new mannequin marks a pivotal turning level for Abruzzo and is meant to assist foster and strengthen a standard identification within the area. The organizational modifications are consistent with a wider effort amongst family-owned wineries to maneuver away from the high-volume, low-price co-op mannequin towards larger high quality wines that mirror the area’s distinct terroir and which are more and more made with natural grapes.
Marlborough, New Zealand
Few New World wine areas have had as a lot international affect as Marlborough. Ever since its bombastic, zingy and inexpensive Sauvignon Blancs burst onto the world stage within the early Eighties, wine drinkers can’t appear to get sufficient of a wine model that’s at the moment emulated by wineries world wide. Marlborough is the supply of 71% of all New Zealand’s wine and 99% of its vineyards are licensed sustainable. While Sauvignon Blanc stays Marlborough’s signature selection, a brand new wave of innovation has yielded glorious Pinot Noir and a kaleidoscope of high quality cool-climate Chardonnay, Riesling, Pinot Gris and Syrah.
Southern Oregon/Rogue Valley, Oregon
The area stretching between the California-Oregon border and the southern tip of the Willamette Valley has seen an explosion in recent times of recent wineries whereas established estates have loved an infusion of recent funding. One of Southern Oregon’s biggest attributes is its big selection of winemaking types and grape varieties, because of a light local weather with ample sunshine and a variety of soil varieties and elevations. An ever-improving infrastructure of accommodations and eating places is spreading all through the area that is still largely freed from crowds and site visitors. Add in jaw-dropping scenic magnificence in addition to cultural points of interest such because the world-famous Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon, and Southern Oregon is rapidly changing into a must-visit for any traveler.
Uco Valley, Argentina
The variety of soils and micro-climates make Uco Valley one of the vital thrilling high-altitude wine areas in South America. Located on the foothills of the Andes Mountains, Uco Valley is house to a number of the most famed producers in Argentina. Many of those wineries had been constructed within the late Nineteen Nineties and early 2000s and proceed to supply excellent wines whereas providing equally unforgettable hospitality experiences. While Malbec stays the area’s mainstay, many wineries within the Uco Valley and Mendoza are attractive clients with crisp whites and flavorful rosés as they proceed to develop their choices to serve a global viewers.
SLO Coast, California
Approved by the federal authorities this 12 months, the brand new SLO Coast AVA stretches alongside a portion of the particular shoreline of the a lot bigger Central Coast area of California. Taking its title from the town and county of San Luis Obispo, the area is considerably cooler than the remainder of the Central Coast and recognized extra for light-footed, savory Pinots and refreshing, saline Chardonnays than the luxurious Cabernets and brambly Zins of close by Paso Robles. With a cool local weather and untapped potential, the SLO Coast is changing into a well-liked vacation spot for youthful winemakers desirous to make their mark by crafting revolutionary and scrumptious wines.
American Winery of the Year
Far Niente Winery
Far Niente Winery has thrived in recent times because of a classy direct-to-consumer program and an intensive gross sales and distribution community that nimbly balances robust retail demand with a recovering restaurant sector. A shrewd gross sales technique has been coupled with a practical strategy to provide that has seen the vineyard, which is backed by the sources of a personal fairness funding agency, purchase a number of new vineyards and one other Napa Valley vineyard to help the enlargement of its Bella Union model.
Hope Family Wines
Producing a number of widespread and fast-growing manufacturers together with Liberty School, Treana, Quest, Austin Hope and Troublemaker, Hope Family Wines in Paso Robles is rapidly changing into one of many foremost producers in a area that continues to realize nationwide approval for wines which are as straightforward to take pleasure in as they’re inexpensive. The firm’s property vineyard just lately earned certification as sustainable together with different environmentally pleasant farming practices.
Troon Vineyard
Located within the Applegate Valley of Southern Oregon, Troon Vineyard has a protracted historical past relationship again to 1972, but latest years have seen it turn into one of the vital forward-thinking wineries within the U.S., as it’s considered one of simply two to have turn into Regenerative Organic Certified by the Regenerative Organic Alliance. The latest certification follows a conversion to biodynamic farming that has revitalized the property’s soils whereas additionally offering a template for different wineries each regionally and world wide to scale back their environmental footprint.
The Eyrie Vineyards
Building on its legacy as the primary industrial Pinot Noir winery within the Willamette Valley, The Eyrie Vineyards is changing into a frontrunner in regenerative and sustainable farming. Since David Lett planted his first vines in 1965, the winery has by no means been handled with chemical fertilizer, plowed or irrigated, and native crops thrive between the winery rows. This dedication to low-impact farming has helped keep a various mixture of plant and animal life, resulting in a vibrant and wholesome winery that continues to supply glorious wines.
Wild Arc Farm
Situated on 10 verdant acres within the Hudson Valley of New York, Wild Arc Farm was based in 2016 by Todd Cavallo and Crystal Cornish, who left Brooklyn with a imaginative and prescient of making a sustainable meals system. The lifelong metropolis residents proved to be fast learners, and their regenerative farm (the place they apply permaculture) was quickly producing high quality wines bought by a mailing checklist and choose retailers. While Wild Arc is commonly credited with handedly renewing curiosity in piquette, they’re revolutionary producers of all kinds of wines, cider co-ferments and conventional spirits, in addition to champions of hybrids. And they proving it could possibly all be accomplished in a very demanding local weather.
European Winery of the Year
Pasqua Vigneti e Cantine
The Veronese wine firm based in 1925 and nonetheless owned by the Pasqua family may very well be thought-about a global analysis laboratory. The enterprise employs workers from 9 totally different nationalities spanning 5 continents—all who foster an open-ended dialogue on making the perfect wine potential. After adopting a brand new motto, “House of the Unconventional,” the vineyard has pushed the boundaries of winemaking types and traditions and that has helped it win new followers within the pivotal U.S. and Asian markets.
Trimbach
The Trimbach household has been on the heart of wine manufacturing in Alsace, France, since 1626, spanning 14 generations. Comprising greater than 130 acres, the Trimbach estate has been farmed organically since 1972 and a couple of third of the property is Grand Cru vineyards. The vineyard is the main provider of Alsatian wines to the U.S. market and its Riesling and Pinot Gris wines are broadly lauded as being a number of the best examples of the varietals produced anyplace on this planet.
Bodegas Faustino
After celebrating its 160th anniversary in 2021, Bodegas Faustino, positioned in Oyón, Rioja Alavesa, is one other European vineyard with a protracted historical past that has saved tempo with the traits of the worldwide market and is lauded as considered one of “First Families of Rioja.” The vineyard is the most important winery landowner in Spanish area with greater than 1,300 acres, offering it with practically half of the entire market share of Rioja Gran Reserva wines and a number one Rioja model within the U.S. market.
Domaines Ott
One of the unique and main producers of high-end Provençal rosé, Domaines Ott has been on the forefront of the surge in recognition of rosé wines within the U.S. and world wide. The firm’s three primary estates, Château de Selle, Clos Mireille and Château Romassan, every produce a rosé in addition to crimson and white wines. In latest years, the corporate has been credited with setting a brand new commonplace for ultra-premium rosé with its Etoile wine that’s produced with an artisan-vigneron strategy and represents the perfect of all three estates.
Vigneti Massa
The iconoclastic winemaker Walter Massa is also known as a genius, however within the late Eighties and ’90s many questioned his judgement for working with an almost forgotten—and virtually—extinct white grape generally known as Timorasso. What might have appeared like a foolhardy pursuit then has turn into incomparably astute now, because the grape in Massa’s gifted fingers has proved to be an excellent signature white for the Piedmont area. Massa has helped save a number of different subalpine grapes in subsequent a long time as effectively.
New World Winery of the Year
Two Paddocks
Sam Neill is thought world wide for his roles in blockbuster motion pictures, but his vineyard Two Paddocks within the Central Otago area of his native New Zealand is producing practically as a lot buzz amongst wine followers as the newest installment of Jurassic Park did amongst moviegoers. Neil planted their first winery in 1993, and have steered the distinctively ethereal and stylish model of the label’s Pinot Noir that, as vines attain three a long time of age, has been getting higher and higher. Two Paddocks is now among the best Pinots labels in New Zealand. The impeccably farmed single winery wines are actually expressions of Central Otago’s distinctive subregions.
Bodega Zuccardi Valle de Uco
The Uco Valley property of Familia Zuccardi, which is among the largest wine producers in Argentina, was based within the late 2000s; its architectural marvel of a vineyard was completed in 2016. Sebastian Zuccardi, who’s a member of the third technology, has maintained a give attention to analysis and innovation on the vineyard, which produces a spread of wines from totally different areas of Mendoza, appellations of the Uco Valley and single vineyards. The ensuing wines have been praised as recent and sophisticated examples of terroir relatively than showpieces for particular grape varieties.
Monte Xanic Bodega Vinícola
The secret is out on the burgeoning wine scene in Mexico’s Valle de Guadalupe, and that’s largely because of Monte Xanic, which produces practically 100,000 instances of premium wines at a wide range of costs. The vineyard’s approachable and persistently high-quality wines are matched by an excellent hospitality expertise and a dedication to defending the setting and bettering the standard of life within the space.
Montes Wines
One of Chile’s largest wine producers, Montes Wines, continues to assist elevate the nation’s profile with regards to premium winemaking. What began out in 1987 as a small boutique vineyard has as a substitute grown into one of many nation’s largest—with out compromising high quality by remaining dedicated to analysis and innovation. Montes was one of many first in Chile to develop vineyards on steep hillsides in addition to in cool, coastal areas, and there may be presently an ongoing undertaking to supply high quality wine on the rugged panorama of the Chiloé Archipelago practically 750 miles south of the capital of Santiago.
Reyneke Wines
Johan Reyneke took a winery laborer job after graduating college, and that humble work sparked a lifelong curiosity in natural and biodynamic viticulture that’s now placing Reyneke and his eponymous vineyard on the forefront of sustainable winemaking. After forming a small farming operation, Reyneke began making wine to usher in extra income. Those natural wines captured the eye of the distributor Vinimark that partnered with Reyneke in increasing the enterprise. Today, Reyneke Wines farms greater than 120 hectares of vineyards with out the usage of any chemical inputs and in accordance with Demeter Biodynamic requirements.
Importer of the Year
Vineyard Brands
Based in New York and Birmingham, Alabama, Vineyard Brands was based in 1971 by Robert Haas. He later created an worker inventory possession plan, thus enabling his colleagues (who had helped construct the corporate) purchase it—so he might give attention to founding Tablas Creek Vineyard within the late Nineteen Nineties. Since then, Vineyard Brands has grown to serve all 50 U.S. states, representing 60 wineries from world wide. Nearly all of the wineries within the firm’s portfolio are licensed sustainable, natural or biodynamic and final 12 months it partnered with the Black Wine Professionals to supply pattern wines for schooling.
Pacific Highway Wines
Headed by gross sales and distribution veteran Mark Giordano, Pacific Highway relies in Greensboro, North Carolina, and represents wineries from world wide. The firm is owned by the Oatley household of Australia and the Giesen household of New Zealand. The Giesen line of alcohol-free wines has been considered one of its high sellers of the previous 12 months. Several new manufacturers added to the portfolio, together with the U.S. manufacturers Gaslighter and Wine by Joe, has the corporate assured in robust progress in coming years.
Skurnik Wines & Spirits
Michael Skurnik launched his import agency in 1987 and two years later roped in his brother Harmon after which joined by sister Rita in 1991. The siblings had been impressed by their mother and father’ love of wine, and the inspiration paid off: The firm has grown to signify greater than 500 wineries from world wide. Skurnik Wines & Spirits just lately introduced an enlargement of their distribution community into Rhode Island and launched the only origin pisco, Suyo, to the U.S. market as a part of the corporate’s craft spirits portfolio.
Mary Taylor Wine
The 25% tariffs on wines from a number of of the main European wine nations imposed in 2019 had been described by many within the commerce as extra disruptive to enterprise than the worldwide pandemic. Mary Taylor, who discovered success with importing a line of inexpensive, easy-to-appreciate wines by her white label program, turned a vocal and efficient opponent to the barrier on world wine commerce, talking regularly on the subject on podcasts, media interviews and tireless campaigning.
Demeine Estates
Since buying the historic Heitz Cellar in Napa Valley in 2018, Gaylon Lawrence has rapidly turn into one of many main gamers in Napa in addition to the worldwide wine enterprise. That preliminary buy has been adopted by a number of others, together with the formation of an import and advertising agency with accomplice Carlton McCoy Jr. and led by President Philana Bouvier. Demeine relies in Napa Valley and represents a number of wineries in Napa Valley in addition to Italy and France.
Retailer of the Year
ReserveBar
Founders Lindsay Held and Jeff Carton launched ReserveBar in 2013 after they had been shocked to find there was no web site to facilitate the straightforward supply of a number of bottles of premium vodka to a school buddy who lived on the opposite facet of the nation. That easy discovery sparked the launch of what has turn into one of many main U.S. e-commerce web sites that provides customers their selection amongst a loaded portfolio of premium wines and spirits whereas specializing in customization, personalization and revolutionary gifting. The firm acquired the web-based market and on-demand supply service Minibar Delivery in 2021 to assist it retain its main place within the booming e-commerce beverage alcohol market.
Fresh Market
Ray Berry left a job overseeing greater than 3,600 7-Eleven comfort shops to launch a brand new form of grocery retailer together with his spouse Beverly. In 1982, the couple opened the primary location of The Fresh Market in Greensboro, North Carolina, and 40 years later the corporate has grown to 159 shops working in 22 states throughout the U.S. In latest years, the chain has made a seamless pivot to e-commerce the place consumers can discover a myriad of choices for grocery supply, absolutely prepped restaurant-quality meals and an intensive assortment of beer, wine and spirits from world wide.
FreshDirect
Celebrating its 20th anniversary this 12 months, FreshDirect proudly claims to have pioneered on-line grocery buying. The firm delivers orders to the better New York Metropolitan space in addition to counties in New Jersey and Connecticut, from its state-of-the-art, 400,000-square-foot facility within the Bronx. In the previous 12 months, the corporate expanded its widespread “Rosé Express” service of two-hour deliveries of wine, beer and spirits to the Hamptons and Montauk.
Vino Volo
As journey has rebounded again to pre-pandemic ranges, the greater than 30 Vino Volo places at airports throughout the U.S. have included extra than simply wine to draw thirsty vacationers. The firm, which is a part of the worldwide hospitality company, Lagardere Travel Retail, has launched an expanded beverage program that includes beers and cocktails by regional brewers and distillers which are paired with meals objects from the native space.
Benchmark Wine Group
Napa Valley-based Benchmark Wine Group describes itself because the main supply of high quality and uncommon wine for retailers, eating places and collectors world wide. The firm purchases the collections of personal people in addition to members of commerce and releases them on the market through its web site. Benchmark ensures the provenance and high quality of the wine it sells from its 15,000-square-foot, temperature-controlled cellar and gives “Accellarator” packages which are curated collections of wines for many who need to immediately purchase an enviable assortment of extremely allotted wines.
Spirit/Distiller Brand of the Year
Teremana Tequila
Americans can’t get sufficient tequila as seen by the spirit’s ongoing gross sales progress, and one of many quickest rising tequila manufacturers is Teremana—Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s entry into the world of celebrity-backed tequilas, produced in partnership with Mast-Jägermeister in Jalisco. The title is derived from the Latin phrase “terra” which means earth and “mana’ the Polynesian phrase for “spirit.” In August, the model introduced a promotional cope with the restaurant chain Applebee’s that featured two new flavors of margaritas.
Buffalo Trace Distillery
An enduring pattern over the previous decade has been the recognition of American whiskey and bourbon. Kentucky-based Buffalo Trace Distillery stays one of many U.S.’s hottest whiskeys and has been spending tens of millions to develop its manufacturing capability to fulfill insatiable demand. Master Distiller Harlen Wheatley can also be broadly revered for his “Warehouse X” trials which have yielded invaluable insights on whiskey manufacturing and ageing. The firm just lately donated a number of bottles of its rarest whiskeys in a web-based public sale to boost cash to assist these impacted by the floods in Eastern Kentucky.
Woodford Reserve
Brown-Forman’s Woodford Reserve Bourbon continues to innovate, even from its place as a frontrunner within the American whiskey class. Master Distiller Chris Morris is just the second particular person to carry the title on the Versailles, Kentucky, distillery; all through his profession he has been instrumental in bringing cask-finishing to American whiskey whereas additionally supporting the subsequent technology of distillers. Earlier this 12 months, Morris opened a pop-up “sensory lounge” in Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport to showcase the corporate’s partnership with the long-lasting Paris cocktail bar Little Red Door.
Drumshanbo Gunpowder Irish Gin
Former spirits advertising govt, P.J. Rigney arrange The Shed Distillery with a copper pot nonetheless in 2014 in a distant nook of Ireland to supply a gin with 12 unique botanicals, gunpowder inexperienced tea and native flora. Everything is processed, distilled and bottled on web site. The Kosher licensed facility can also be licensed as a sustainable enterprise by Origin Green. The gin is among the quickest promoting manufacturers within the premium class and can also be receiving rave opinions for its unique, nuanced style.
Ardbeg Distillery
One of the best-known names on this planet of single malt Scotch, Ardbeg, doesn’t relaxation on its distant perch of the isle of Islay however is among the most daring and experimental of Scotland’s legendary distillers. From sending vials of whiskey molecules to the International Space Station to check space-based maturation to launching a punk-rock, particular launch produced with roasted black malt, Ardbeg continues to search out methods to push the boundaries of one of the vital tradition-bound segments of the spirit world. Earlier this 12 months, Ardbeg launched “Planet Ardbeg,” which is a limited-edition sci-fi graphic novel depicting the adventures of a Quantum Distiller.
Sommelier/Wine Director of the Year
Tonya Pitts
With greater than twenty years within the restaurant and beverage industries, Tonya Pitts is presently the sommelier and wine director of One Market Restaurant in San Francisco, California. After her first job as a number for a French restaurant in St. Louis, Missouri, Pitts traveled west to the Bay Area, the place she labored as a server at Zuni Café and Stars Restaurant earlier than overseeing the wine program for chef Loretta Keller at Bizou Restaurant. Pitts’ time with Keller impressed her to focus wholly on wine, and along with managing the beverage packages at different eating places, Pitts was a choose for the San Francisco International Wine Competition for 5 years and runs her personal beverage consultancy.
Amy Racine
As beverage director for JF Restaurants, Amy Racine is not only dealing with drinks at a few of New York’s hottest eating places, she’s additionally on the slicing fringe of pairing wine and cocktails for a variety of ideas from New York (together with the brand new La Marchande on Wall Street) to Long Island to Los Angeles and, quickly, Tampa. Founding chef John Fraser is broadly generally known as one of many world’s main vegetable cooks, and Racine has developed beverage packages to help that distinctive imaginative and prescient. A local of Cleveland, Ohio, Racine attended the Culinary Institute of America, earned her superior sommelier certificates and labored in California for a couple of years earlier than teaming up with Fraser in Manhattan.
Cheron Cowan
Prior to changing into the beverage director at Tom Colicchio’s New York restaurant Craft this 12 months, Cheron Cowan was in an identical function with Maialino Mare in Washington, D.C. Cowan is a sophisticated sommelier and member of the Court of Master Sommeliers. She can also be the founding father of Vine Media 360, which is a web-based useful resource to assist these pursuing a profession within the restaurant business to be taught extra about wine.
Arjav Ezekiel
Last 12 months, Arjav Ezekiel and his spouse Tracy Malechek-Ezekiel opened Birdie’s, a neighborhood restaurant and wine bar in Austin, Texas. The duo serves easy American meals impressed by the delicacies of France and Italy. Ezekiel moved together with his household when he was 12 from New Delhi, India, to Portland, Oregon, the place they ran a restaurant. Ezekiel began his skilled profession at Komi in Washington, D.C., earlier than shifting to New York, the place he helped open Danny Meyer’s Untitled on the Whitney and the place he met Malechek.
Dominick Purnomo
The wine director and co-owner of Yono’s restaurant in Albany, N.Y., grew up working in his household’s restaurant earlier than learning lodge and restaurant administration in faculty. After graduating, Purnomo was impressed to give attention to wine, and that has led to his wine lists profitable a number of nationwide and worldwide awards. Purnomo is a member of the board of administrators for the New York State Restaurant Association and the New York Wine & Grape Foundation.
