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Thursday, May 17, 2012
Feature: March 2008
Striving for Grapeness
Sacramento and Davis grads stomp their marks on the industry
Story by Jon Lewis
With a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry, Margaret Davenport had a background in science. But it was the relationships she formed while earning her master’s in enology at UC Davis that propelled her into a long and decorated career as a winemaker.
Mitch Cosentino had a passing familiarity with wine, having grown up with a grandfather who bottled his own. However, it was a case of “divine misguidance” while earning a communications degree at Sacramento State that nudged him toward an immense operation that bottles wine under eight labels in Lodi, Napa and Yountville.
Davenport and Cosentino are just two of the hundreds of key players in the state’s $45.4 billion wine industry who can attribute a part of their success to the foundations they developed at UC Davis and Sacramento State.
UC Davis’ renown for its Department of Viticulture and Enology is well-documented. Established in 1935 after the 1933 repeal of Prohibition, the department has developed a global reputation for grooming top-flight viticulturists and winemakers. The department also has a star-studded academic team that draws from the fields of chemistry, genetics, microbiology, plant physiology, sensory science and more.
Sacramento State has long been a cornerstone of the Capital Region for the contributions from its College of Business Administration, and its management, marketing and finance departments also have proved to be a perfect complement to the demands of the wine industry.
Marc Mondavi, vice president of Charles Krug Winery, has benefited from both. A third-generation member of one of Napa Valley’s famous winemaking families, Mondavi studied viticulture and enology at UC Davis and business administration and marketing at Sacramento State.
Mondavi says his studies at Sacramento State helped him with business fundamentals, allowing him to remain viable in a fast-changing and competitive industry where giant wineries and boutiques alike are competing for consumers, shelf space and placements on restaurant wine lists.
“That’s what education and school is all about. It’s the basics and a foundation. And then you get your feet wet,” Mondavi says.
Mondavi oversees the CK Mondavi portfolio of labels while his brother, Peter Mondavi Jr., oversees the Charles Krug and Napa Valley labels. The senior Mondavi, 92-year-old Peter Mondavi, continues as president and CEO. Acquired by the Mondavi family in 1943, Charles Krug is Napa’s oldest winery.
After focusing primarily on winemaking and production, Mondavi says a lot of his time is now spent with marketing and personnel issues. “That’s always a challenge. Human resources is a big component of business,” Mondavi adds.
Mondavi says a solid business background also helps him keep up with the phenomenal growth in the wine industry. “In 1969, there were 29 wineries in Napa County. Today, it’s close to 500. Wineries are popping up all over,” says Mondavi, who started full time in the family business in 1978.
As for another successful alum, Davenport might as well be featured on a UC Davis recruitment poster. She received an undergraduate degree in biochemistry at San Francisco State and landed a lab job at Simi Winery in Healdsburg in 1980. The world of wine intrigued her — especially the one beyond beakers and lab coats — so she enrolled at Davis the following year as a graduate student.
In 1983, she completed her graduate studies in enology and landed a job at Wente Brothers in Livermore, putting her fascination with yeast to good use in the production of sparkling wines. Her time there also gave her ample experience with Wente’s other offerings, including Rieslings, blush wines and varietals like Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel, Merlot and Petite Sirah.
Eager to return to western Sonoma County, Davenport became the assistant winemaker at Clos du Bois in 1987. Three years later she was named winemaker. By 1997, she was a vice president and the winery was 10 times larger than when she began as assistant winemaker.
She retired in 2003, started a consulting business, began teaching an online course in wine production through UC Davis Extension and started her own label, Davenport & Co., which is currently producing 1,000 cases a year of Russian River Pinot Noir.
Davenport says she benefited from her studies with Cornelius Ough, an enology professor emeritus. “He had lots of industry connections, and he helped me get my first job.” While at Davis, Davenport served as president of the campus chapter of the American Society for Enology and Viticulture, a position that has kept her in touch with scores of classmates.
“All Davis graduates who are out and about are great resources,” says Davenport, who is now serving as the consulting winemaker for Passalacqua Winery while slowly nurturing four acres of Zinfandel and Syrah grapevines she has planted in the hilly Rockpile appellation above Lake Sonoma.
Her years at Clos du Bois brought her in contact with growers throughout the region, relationships that continue to help her as a winemaker, consultant and instructor. “I know so many growers, and I know what the fruit is like from practically everywhere in Sonoma County because I bought so much.
“It was a great experience, but working for myself is less stressful. I don’t have a staff to look out for. It’s up to the wineries I work for to provide the people they trust, and then I train them.”
Cosentino, a Sacramento State grad, sauntered down a much different path to success. Making wine — much less establishing multiple wineries and forming professional relationships with the likes of former NBA star Larry Bird — was far from his mind while he attended college, competing on the Hornets golf team and working part time at a men’s clothing store.
A co-worker’s musings about wine tasting and life’s simpler pleasures made him stop and think.
“Something there triggered a light and told me I needed to pay attention, that this might be important. I was thinking of life, enjoyment and pleasures. That’s when I started teaching myself and began learning about and enjoying wine,” Cosentino says.
Cosentino went on to earn a communications degree, but couldn’t find a way into the broadcast market in California. He decided to put his sales background to use at a wine distributor. While his college education didn’t tie into his career, Cosentino says it was still time well spent. “A college education is learning how to learn.”
Cosentino says he was passed over by Valley Vintners Wine Co. of Modesto, a Gallo property, but ended up with a sales job at Stanislaus Distributing Co., one of Gallo’s competitors. Within 18 months, Cosentino was the wine manager and getting to know winemakers. Acting on their encouragement, he established Crystal Valley Cellars in Lodi in 1980.
In 1990, he moved his operation to Yountville and christened it Cosentino Winery. He established a second winery, CE2V, in 1999 in the Pope Valley district in northeast Napa Valley. The Crystal Valley Cellars name resurfaced in 2001 when Cosentino acquired 70 acres of Zinfandel vineyards and a functioning winery in Lockeford near Lodi.
Brands under Cosentino’s signature now include Cigarzin, M Coz, Blockheadia, The Wines, CE2V, Edie and Legends, a partnership with the former NBA star Bird. In 1986, a 1983 vintage reserve Cosentino Cabernet was named best American Cabernet in the American Wine Competition.
For Redding winemaker Roger Matson, a degree from UC Davis “was the ticket” into the wine industry. A 1982 graduate, Matson says it didn’t particularly matter if studies focused on growing grapes or making wine. “Davis was so highly regarded, people figured you had a pretty good background. The main thing was you got your diploma, and you got into the wine industry.”
Today, Matson says Davis features a more integrated approach that emphasizes both viticulture and fermentation. In addition to a solid scientific background in chemistry and microbiology, Matson says his time at Davis garnered him the references needed to start his career in Australia. That 1983 venture included an excursion to New Zealand, where Matson says he checked out the fledgling kiwi wine industry, which is now a great success.
After stops at two California wineries, including Parsons Creek in Santa Rosa, Matson returned to Redding in 1999 to help his father, Oscar, with Matson Vineyards. The winery is the oldest in Shasta County. Established in 1984, it produces about 1,300 cases a year.
“We’re much too small. We’re just limited by the size right now. We need a larger facility to store wine. That’s the grand plan: another facility and a tasting room,” Matson says.
Armed with a finance degree from Sacramento State, Thomas Rochioli set out to make a name in the banking world, but he was soon drawn back to the Russian River Valley vineyard his grandfather established in the 1930s.
Working with his father, Rochioli added a winemaking operation. “It was difficult at the beginning, but bit by bit, it’s growing,” Rochioli says. A background in business helped the third-generation rancher and budding winemaker.
“There were not a lot of business degrees back then on family farms. I actually made a business plan when I started working; I stuck to it and it worked,” says Rochioli, who graduated in 1981. “I was also fortunate to have a family farm to start with, and it’s still a family farm.”
Today, Rochioli Vineyards & Winery bottles 12,000 to 15,000 cases a year. “We’ve had a lot of good success. We’re small, but our wine is in high demand.” In fact, there’s currently a five-year wait list to purchase the winery’s single-vineyard offerings, many of which retail for $200 a bottle or higher.
Rochioli, the winemaker, says he learned the craft from his grandfather, along with some trial and error. “A lot of it is the school of hard knocks, and I got to know a couple of good winemakers who kept me in line.”
Richard Arrowood’s degree in chemistry from Sacramento State, backed by graduate work in fermentation science at Fresno State, provided him with a foundation in science that has supported a 40-year career in the wine industry.
Arrowood, the winemaker for both Arrowood Vineyards and Winery and the new Amapola Creek Winery — both in Sonoma Valley — says Sacramento State “had a very positive influence” on his career. “I had some great professors. If you take an interest in what they’re teaching, they take an interest in you.”
Arrowood began his career at Korbel Champagne Cellars and worked with United Vintners and Sonoma Vineyards before a 16-year tenure with Chateau St. Jean, during which Arrowood was named winemaster. In 1990, he left to devote his full attention to Arrowood Vineyards and Winery.
Like Arrowood and Rochioli, Kurt Burris says he benefited from the friendships and contacts he established while in college. Burris received a degree in enology from UC Davis in 1993 and works as a sales rep for Grgich Hills Cellar in Rutherford and Madroña Vineyards in Camino.
“I’ve stayed in touch with the department. It’s been fun and relatively valuable. Davis has a good reputation and deservedly so,” Burris says. He adds that his technical degree tends to set him apart from other reps who feature marketing and business degrees. “My degree has been a really valuable resource for the wineries I work with and a good source for my clients.”
Burris covers the Sacramento and Lake Tahoe areas, focusing on independent restaurants and retailers. His Capital Region clients include popular midtown Sacramento restaurants Waterboy and Aioli Bodega Española.
Tony Rynders says he was eager to experience the practical side of the wine industry, so he took a job with Mirassou Winery in San Jose. After a year and a half, “I decided this was something I wanted to pursue, so I went to UC Davis and got accepted in the master’s program.”
Now looking forward to his 10th harvest as the head winemaker at Domaine Serene in Dayton, Ore., Rynders says his Davis education “gives me a little deeper tool bag. My time at Davis was well spent, without a doubt.”
Picking Davis was an easy choice. “I wanted to go to Davis. It was the school everyone recognized as the place. As I’ve gone along, the top question is always ‘So, did you go to Davis?’ and I can happily reply, ‘Yes, I did.’”
A formal education isn’t required to make good wine, Rynders says, but it certainly helps, especially when you’re working your way up through the ranks. “Going to school shortened the learning curve for me. It’s a very important tool in my bag as far as my depth of knowledge, but it’s not the sole focus of what I do every day.
“We’re kind of like chefs or wine technicians. We’re all cooks, so to speak. The interpretation and execution is where you see the separation. To me, the diversity of experience and overall approach is what makes this profession very interesting.”
