Right About Now with Ryan Alford - Austin Hope - from 97 Points to World Domination - Building a World-Class Winery

Episode Date: May 18, 2020

On this special episode of the Radical Marketing Podcast Ryan sits down with Austin Hope, the award-winning winemaker, and owner of Hope Family Vineyards. Austin gives the origins of his family history in the wine business with some fascinating discussion around his time with Chuck Wagner the founder and winemaker of world-renowned Caymus Cabernet. Austin talks about his self-growth in embracing his name in developing the Austin Hope line of wines including his sizzling Cabernet which has scored 95 points or higher in every vintage and most recently was rated the #10 wine in the world in 2019 by the Wine Enthusiast. The 2017 Reserve Cabernet Ryan claims may be the best glass of wine he has tasted, ever! Taste and listen along! Links from this Episode: https://www.hopefamilywines.com/ Please share, review, and subscribe! The Radical Marketing Podcast is always looking for intriguing guests. Email inquiries to [e-mail] Follow us: @radical_results on Instagram @ryanalford on Instagram www.radical.company If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, join Ryan’s newsletter https://ryanalford.com/newsletter/ to get Ferrari level advice daily for FREE.  Learn how to build a 7 figure business from your personal brand by signing up for a FREE introduction to personal branding https://ryanalford.com/personalbranding.  Learn more by visiting our website at www.ryanisright.comSubscribe to our YouTube channel  www.youtube.com/@RightAboutNowwithRyanAlford. 

Welcome to the Radical Marketing Podcast. Here is your host, Ryan Alford. Hey guys, it's Ryan Alford. Welcome to another edition of the Radical Marketing Podcast. You know, a little detour here from normal, maybe, but I know in talking to some of my friends, when I told them that I had a certain name to be mentioned shortly coming on the podcast, as winos like that we all are, there was a lot of excitement. Because I don't know how, Austin, but even Austin Hope in South Carolina is becoming a known name.

But Austin Hope, owner and winemaker of Hope Family Wineries, man, it's great to have you on the podcast. Thanks for having me, Ryan. This is super cool, man. Pretty pumped about it. Yeah. You know, you always got good content. It's fun. I love that. I appreciate you saying that. And my teams in in our studio here doing some BTS they'll be excited and proud to hear that too you know when you're an ad agency you got to put out some good content you know so appreciate the kind words and it's been great following you you know the winery business you know Instagram and technology and different things it's funny that funny that a lot of people haven't embraced

things. And I know you're a little bit of a rebel as it comes and we'll get into that. But it's been good following you and seeing behind the scenes of the winery and different things. But I can't tell you again how excited I am to have you on and just want to get into it. So owner, winemaker, let's start from the beginning. So, you know, there's going to be some people that listen to our podcast that, you know, all right, who's this Austin Hope guy? You know, not me and some of our closest friends that were actually sipping on one of your wines last night. But let's talk, you know, a little bit of the history, you know, your background. I know it's a family business, but let's start a little bit.

Let's just start with a little bit of the origin story of your background and, you know, what's led to today. We're a third generation California farmer that wanted to race Formula One cars growing up. And now I'm sitting here talking to you. That's kind of the fast forward. But if you start from the beginning. So my folks, they moved from Bakersfield, California. So I was born in Bakersfield. We moved to Paso Robles in 1978 and started planting wine grapes. And so just to kind of give you a landscape, set the scene.

In 1978, there was, you know, less than a dozen wineries here. We probably count them on one hand, actually. And, you know, less than than a thousand acres of grapes. Most of my folks started planting wine grapes in which was you know pretty unheard of. We weren't very welcome into the community. Honestly grapes were not wanted by locals so this was a very much driven by grain, cattle, some dry land almonds, walnuts scattered around the hillsides but it was definitely a dry land you know wheat grains that they were growing. They didn't really go hand in hand

together, grape farming and grain farming so they were they didn't really like us it was a it was not a not an easy thing and we'd be honest we didn't know what the hell we were doing so yeah we came from a completely different background at the time and my grandfather my mom's dad was in the beer business over there in Bakersfield and he was a Texas immigrant during the Dust Bowl and and was working for a little distributor pushing that pushing a Swiss Chalet wines and Colt 45 and delivering those beers and wines out of one truck kind of deal and my grandfather was pretty smart about things. And he said, when it came up to the gentleman, he said, I'll buy it. And he'd been squirreling away money.

And so he took that over and he just started waiting, got another truck. And then he kept, so he had 45, all staff and a handful of other things. And then he kept – so he had Colt 45, Paul Staff, and a handful of other things. And then he kept going to Colorado every year and would knock on Adolph Coors' door and say, hey, we want Coors. We want Coors. And he says, we don't have Coors. We can't go that far.

And that went on for a while. And then finally, Adolph said, okay, I'll give you Baker's filled the bar. So that's the territory you can have. said okay I'll give you Baker's filled the bar so that's the territory you can have and they went from you know having you know selling a few thousand things of beer to you know selling a few million cases of beer in a few years and my dad had worked for him and then anyways fast forward my grandfather passed away my dad was in a position to take over so the company was sold the general manager and we uh uh borrowed some money from uh my grandma sorry i signed a bank note and first he went my my dad went to uh my dad uh my grandfather's

best friend which was another immigrant that came over and he ended up in farming and banking and all kinds of things in the valley and he says uh he says uh what should we do and he says uh he always called everybody cousin he said cousin move to Paso Robles and plant apples and grapes you can't screw that up and so that's what we did I mean literally that's how much we do about farming uh quickly learned that uh apples were not the right thing to grow in Paso and then just kind of transitioned over there over time into planting the right varieties. We sold our first ranch within a few years to somebody that had to have it. And we planned about two more pieces of ground and repaid debts and started farming more red grapes.

And then as that progressed, I lived in the vineyards as a child. I mean, I grew up in them and hoed weeds every, you know, every day I was told to. So I really, you know, grew up in the fields. And then, you know, we, my uncle came into the business and he, he was more aggressive towards the wine side of it. So we started making some bulk wines, selling bulk wine here and there. And then that's where we met Chuck Wagner, which his family started Liberty School. And then Liberty School, we started over the years, we started selling them bulk wine. And then Chuck Wagner came down and says, hey, can you supply us? We think we're going to bring, we want them to take Liberty School and see what we can do and then bring it

back out. Cause it had kind of gone away in the past. In the beginning it was truly a second label of Caymus. So whatever leftovers they had off of the Caymus vineyard, they would put into Liberty school. But as you know, Caymus became started becoming more iconic of a brand, that was, there wasn't much fruit. So that's where we met. And so the Liberty School was not made there for a while, but then we came back. So we became kind of friends, and then we started doing, taking trips together. And then we kind of came to

conclusion that we should take over the brand and bring it to Paso because we were already growing it and we were making it in Paso and we were bottling in Paso and at that same time Chuck was really becoming you know what he is today the iconic Cabernet of Napa Valley and I was getting more involved in the wine so I knew the Napa started working for Chuck and you know kind of this learning everything he was you know super gracious and you know would drop me off in the you know in this behind the scenes and in the you know is this building and then it would be the marketing and then I would hang out the tasting room and then he'd send me to a vineyard, and so I kind of got to see a lot of it, you know, the kind of scenes, and, you know, during that time, we had built a little tasting

room down here, and a bed and breakfast, and we hadn't really jumped completely off in the wine, we were having other people make it for us, and it was, you know, back then, it was pretty, you know, pretty, pretty funny, it was called Hope Farms Winery. Had a cattle brand on the label. Nice. Just really signifies the luxury of red wine, the old cow branding. Exactly. So we were not sophisticated at that time.

And we weren't making sophisticated wines at that point. We were just making wines. I mean, we had, you know, several winemakers around here that would, you know, make us a Muscat Canale and make us some Weiss Inverdill, make us a Merlot. And, you know, we really just were – it was a pretty new, novel thing. We were, you know, we were selling Cabernet, chocolate, and sauce. And whoever was driving to Hearst – going to see Hearst Castle would pass us, and there wasn't any wineries, so they'd stop, and so during that, we started talking about wine, my uncle was really, really trying to push the family into the wine

business, and my dad was kind of, you know, hesitant to really jump off of that, because, you know, we had a, you know, good thing going, thing going with farmers and that's what we did. So meanwhile, while I'm working for him, we went on a trip together. My dad, Chuck Wagner, and Chuck Wagner's general manager, Paul, and my uncle, Paul. And we were in Mexico at Pheasant Hut and we were talking and he says, why don't we take over Liberty School and give it a sense of place and see what we can do with it we wanted to start another brand which turned into vitriana in 95 so we uh we set it all up and we're prepared to go and that was in 95 and got it all together and uh in uh in 96 uh my uncle which was spirited, who I looked up to a lot, spirited the wine piece of it, died.

Actually, today, May 13th, 1996. Man, I'm sorry to hear that, but maybe we're celebrating him now. Yeah, we are. He would flip a lid if he saw where we were today. So it was interesting because I was – not to get too digressed, but I came from the cemetery just now and put flowers on every day or every – you know, the year he died or the day he died, 13th. It's amazing, you know know because it really changed our family and put us all into reflection and uh changed uh everything we've done but i think he'd be

super proud and uh you know such a cool cool legacy to see but so anyways that happened and uh chuck wagner asked me and uh can i do this and my uh my dad asked me can i do this? And my, uh, my dad asked me, can I do this? Cause my dad did not want to be in the wine, wine side of it. And luckily I was, um, young and, um, young, dumb and, you know, full of testosterone. I can do it. You know, my dad calls it, my dad calls it piss and vinegar. Yeah. All right. So luckily I said yes. And you know know, it was me and I hired a wine salesman. And I went and grabbed a guy named Jesse that I owed weeds with my whole life. You know, classic immigrant story. Came to Mexico illegal, became legal over the years. And still with us today. I saw him this morning.

You know, that was a long time ago. But he's a broad-name man, I said, you're gonna learn to make wine, you're gonna quit hoeing leads, come on, let's go. And the three of us went at it, and now, here we are today, we're in every state in about nine, 10 countries, and just, we've got five brands, and shit, I don't know, man shit i don't know man i don't know

where time went but we just keep driving and striving and having fun i love it so are we at pretty much is this year 25 then i'm hearing if i'm adding the numbers up right triana launching in 95 is that safe so 19 or 24 years as your own label um you know i guess liberty school was always kind of your label in a way but uh you know officially with taking it back did y'all did you guys take it back in that same time period was a few years before that we started uh started the conversation in 95 because we were actually making the wine in past roles at the time uh back then because they didn't have space up there so we it was natural we were making the wine down here um and so on and so forth so it was uh really 96 95 96 is when we closed the deal put it all all together and took it down here and gave it its new roots because the brand was actually started in 75

by Charlie Wagner, Chuck Wagner's father. So it's got quite the legacy, actually. It's crazy. You know, I told you kind of pre-episode that I had known, I think, you know, in starting to follow you guys, there was some connection to Chuck Wagner, but I did not know the Liberty School connection exactly. So that's fascinating. And, you know, even non-wine drinkers, I think, knows of the best known cap, probably the best, one of the top three or four best known Cabernets in the world now, I would venture to say, um, what, um, and obviously learning from him and I, you know, I taste it now in your wines a little bit, some of the pedigree there. Uh, I definitely want to talk about that a bit too, but is there any insights

into, you know, someone that's, you know, a casual wine drinker you've heard of Caymus, any good Chuck Wagner stories or insights that would be, you know, like something that, that would be unusual or you wouldn't know or wouldn't expect coming from, you know, again, kind of a champion of cabernet um i think probably the biggest thing that that you know chuck taught me um you know he never taught me how to make wine um and he uh and neither one of us are classically trained in winemaking which i think is a plus um yeah and my uh head winemaker was a welder when he started it for me and he runs my all my wine now so i mean we're definitely come from the old school old farming background and i think the biggest thing

with chuck and similar to me is that we're both dreamers and if there was any one thing that that chuck influenced or taught me was i would ask him questions you know when i was younger like hey what do you think about this and he'd go i don't know try it i don't know try it and i would be like that concept i think if it was a takeaway with chuck is that he's an absolute um he's a dreamer and i've always been that way myself so we've always connected because we're very our brains are constantly moving I mean I think we're both you know super ADHD and I know I am I know him well enough I think his mind works that way too we're very very driven and we're always thinking about what we can do next what we're like this about that and if you're a

classically trained winemaker not that there's anything wrong with anything it's wonderful um but you don't you you you have it's like a rule book right you're given this book like and and it might be you know in your industry too right it's like yeah this is what you do well if you don't follow those rules i mean typically the people that are the ones that are on top are the ones that steer out of that lake, you know? I mean, you can't live in these things. And we've messed up wine before. I mean, but so what? You know, we've learned some things and some proprietary things over the years that, you know, I mean, people looked at me like I was absolutely insane. I mean, that worked for me. And they're like, you can't do that. I'm like, yeah, I can. Why not? I mean, radical shit. I mean, so, but. Well, owning an agency named Radical, this is all relating really well. This is why we're kindred spirits. I think we started following each other here. I'm feeling the parallel now.

He's a passionate, extremely hardworking man that always is dreaming and pushing the envelope, always pushing, pushing, pushing. And I think that's what makes greatness, right? I mean, like I said, he didn't show me how to make wines. I mean, we've talked about wines, and I appreciate the compliment about our wines have similarities. And, you know, it's funny because we've been making wine for so long it's um you know what do they say a blind squirrel finds and finds a nut every once in a while or whatever it is it's like uh you know i think we've we've we've we've been extremely under the radar and that's just the way we roll uh we We don't, we're never beating a drum very loud. We just do what we do. And, you know, if you talk to people in the industry, they know

who I am. I'm super aggressive. I've been very aggressive my whole life with them. I've always pushed distributors in different different different respects than most of them do and you know being that I was so young when I started it was interesting I had to lie about my age around in the beginning because I was only 22 and all this happened because I wasn't supposed to be the head of this wine company at that age my uncle was so i was kind of just dropped in at a really young age i mean we like i'd lie about my age and a lot of my stuff was on phones back in the day like i was very aggressive and i knew what i wanted i knew where i wanted to go and

and we made wines that were you know good but we never uh you know it wasn't until you know i think if you're in an industry or or drink any of these wines a lot of people know these wines but probably don't associate with me right and i've never been it's like i need the glory yeah because i didn't even want to name that brand austin hope and it started back in 2000 when i when i my we make a a roan line so we make a srog and oscar vedra those type of grapes from our state vineyard where we're at right now. And it was actually Chuck Wagner

that pushed me to use that name back in 2000. He was looking at it and I had, you know, I've got a drawer full of labels and names. I mean, I'm always creating things all the time. And he's like, I think you should use Austin Hope. And I'm like, I don't want to use Austin Hope man that's not

that just sounds like you're egotistical great name I am like the most giving biggest heart guy in the world and it just felt uncomfortable I thought weird and thought about it for a while and he kept pushing

on me he's like can you use that name it's a good name he's like it sounds good it's authentic it's real it's you and I'm like I don't know so I finally did it on the wrong ones and that was you know I said okay so I did it and you know over the what 10 20 years you get comfortable with it and now it's just a brand right now it's like it's it's odd it's like yeah we going to talk about Austin Hope. And it's like, I am Austin Hope. This is weird. You get it. I get it. Oh, I get it all. And I'm glad Chuck pushed you to it because let me tell you,

I've been branding some of the largest companies in the world my entire career. It is a beautiful name for a wine. And I got attached to it. Like, I literally, the first time I had it, it was purely the name. It's like Austin Hoop Cabernet. That sounds like a badass Cabernet. And I'm going to digress for a second. The relationship of the Caymus comment to this coming from someone that considers themselves, I have a ton of wine. I have 500 bottles in our house. And so, but I'm not a connoisseur. You know what I like about you and camus it tastes damn good like so that's the connection now whether or not there's a profile or this that another i know a rich delicious wine and there's the connection but but back to the

brand yes very i'm glad chuck told you that because it's a perfect name. So when we released the Austin Hope Cab, it had been in making for several years because actually we went through kind of a struggle. I made some poor choices on management and kind of took my half the ball because we were doing really well. Then I jumped off and built a distillery in Kentucky Kentucky and so I wasn't paying attention to what was happening and we kind of went south really fast and I was like all of a sudden I surfaced and the money was all messed up and sales were going down discounting was happening so I had to kind of cut ties with that whole scene and clean up and

rebuild the company and get it back to profitable and which was it was a you know pretty big life lesson for me that I'll never forget and I guarantee you won't happen again but so when we did that if we would I mean you know we were really what I the the root of this brand is, to your point, what you said, Rich, good drinking wine. You've got critics all over the world that are going to tell you this, tell you that. Then you've got these connoisseurs, which personally, I'm not a connoisseur either. I know what I like and what I don't like. Personally, I'm not a connoisseur either. I know what I like and what I don't like.

Yep. And that's one of the biggest things that anybody that works for me in sales is if they have any slight pretentiousness, they're not working with us. Because to me, I tell them all the time, I say, demystify wine. Make it approachable. Make it easy for people. Because it's already an intimidating thing, right? I mean, you're like, uh. Because, you know, I mean, pick a business. I couldn't just jump in there and start telling you what i like and don't like and

how it should work and i mean why it's like that right plus it's for years it had this aristocratic kind of feel to it and it was just you know you didn't want to be embarrassed nobody wants to be embarrassed that's the bottom line right so you go you know you're out with your lady and you're like oh merlot oh it's not merlot it's merlot yes trying to produce some of those roan varietals too good grief you kidding yeah right yeah yeah no i know and that's the thing so we've we. So we're super really aggressive on education, demystifying. You know, my dad had a – there was a guy back in the day who used to sell grape suits.

And he was one of the guys actually that was really helped with the white Zinfandel movement from Sutter Home. He worked for them. We sold white Zinfandel to him back in the early 80s. movement from uh sutter home he worked for him we sold white zippity up to him back in the early 80s and he and he said uh he says boys let's not make this too complicated this is not the holy grail it's a beverage that accompanies food and it holds up today it's like it's so true i love that so when was the first year of of austin hope cab what was your first year of Austin Hope Cab? What was your launch year? So 2015 was the first vintage.

And a big whopping score from the Wine Enthusiast didn't hurt, 97. Was it a blessing and a curse? Let's just go down that path. So first year is 2015, 97 from Wine Enthusiast. Wonderful or terrible? It's got to be more wonderful i'm sure but uh let's talk about that a bit well it that the brand was uh what has been in my head and i've been planning on something like this

for seven years prior to that so i went and found we've been studying soils and really was wanting to create you know we always shoot for the highest goal we said we want to you know and my team didn't even know about this yet so this was me still working behind the scenes not telling even my winemaking team what we were doing so we just we went and found new vineyards because i know what the best sites for uh best soils are for cabernet in this area because i've studied my whole life and because of technology and analytics and being able to test soils and grapes and wine for tannins and all these things that you can go down around forever this has been in my head but i want to create this you know the standard for luxury cabernet pastoralist cabernet um and i want to be able to create it that's it's a drink as well because one of the

things i don't like about cabernet is that um they they know a lot of people haven't figured how to do the tannins tannins can be so harsh and so aggressive and and have a bite you know and and it's like scotch right so a lot of people don't like scotch, but they'll say they do because they think it's cool. And it's like, you know, you get that really hard wood. Oh, yeah. Right? And I still believe that half the people that drink scotch really don't enjoy it, but they feel like they're like,

yeah, yeah, it feels so good. It dries my mouth out so good. I'm like, how's that good? How's that good? That's not good anyways to kind of get to your point we we really practiced and then i i kept making the wine and we figured out how to make tannins become um subtle and soft but analytically still very high so it would have the age potential it had

the weight and the density that tannins create but not have that drying hard feeling um so we developed this basically i mean and and and through a couple different proprietary things that we do and then um just really finding the right soils and using the right barrels and use it like there's so much goes into it but anyways um so just prior to releasing this wine, you know, and again, go back, I'm kind of reshaping the company. We basically took the company, dumped it out, cleaned house, had a whole new team, new finance team, new everything. And I went to my distributors and met with all the presidents of one big organization and cause they have a big convention every year. And so you pin them down cause they're all there from every state.

It's like purgatory for them. But anyways, we go in there and I had dinner with them and I said, okay guys, this is what we're doing. I'm going to make this a Cabernet. It's going to be 50 bucks. It's you know, we're going to make a fair amount of it and we're going to, we're going to grow it. And this is going to be the standard of luxury Cabernet for pastoral rules. And I believe in it. And so it's going to happen. And one of the presidents will remain nameless.

I don't want to piss him off anymore. I've already teased him enough. He says, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. That's a lot of wine. And you know, that's a lot of money from this region and you know we we support you but you know don't go indexing my state off your goals and i'm like i said i am gonna index off of your state and he goes he says he says well you're gonna have to get a 97 or something to pull this shit off oh my god and i told myself i will a 97. So I don't know if it's a self-professed or whatever they call that. You willed it to happen. I did.

But to your point, to your question, it was alarming, quite honestly, because we put so much time, money, love, dedication into creating this and a ton of money in this because, and we went around our distributors. It was really interesting, but I remember I was just right off the road right here when I got a text and

I was like, holy shit. I pulled over. I mean, I literally pulled over. I was like, are you serious right now? I'm like, I don't think that Wine Enthusiast has ever given anybody a score that high from this region. And it turns out it was the highest rated Wine Enthusiast publication. And there were 30 years of publication that had given them a score. Why not?

I'm like, you know, and I'm not a score guy per se, but, but it is a validation. That's real, right? I mean, it's from a, you know, a very seasoned, you know, wine critic that it tastes thousands and thousands of wine a year. So, I mean, for them to say that, it was just like, wow, this is crazy. And, and then, but it was interesting at that point, it was really, it definitely helped light a torch to a couple different things. One was, prior to this, so we did a very aggressive promotion on the wine. So on-premise is what they call restaurants and off-premise would be retail chains, just so you got the jargon. But so we were very focused on on-premise and true ways to build wine brands is on-premise

because a lot of times you'll see brands that blow up it's not that that's just being forced in there right it's uh they're really big companies and if they go to a distributor and they say this is what's happening they put all this marketing dollars to it they they you know incentivize all the sales people and next thing you know like a brand like josh it's on it's everywhere right you can't walk into somewhere and not see a brand like josh it's on it's everywhere right you can't walk into somewhere and not see a brand named josh so that's forcing something into the marketplace and sometimes they last and sometimes they don't but they you know they've got to hit the right player profiles etc but traditional ways that i've grown up doing it is is you put it in the

restaurant you need restaurants to pour it by the glass. And then the consumers will tell you. And that's what was happening with this brand. We put, you know, it's an expensive bottle of wine, but what we did is we put incentives in place to where restaurants could buy it at a reduced price to be able to afford to pour it by the glass. So next thing you know, consumers are like, and they just loved it we hit the flavor profiles

that was the key right we did what we intended to do you know to create a cabernet that everybody can enjoy and it was a reasonable price right because we did blind tastings and everything we do we always we do blind tastings where we taste it against harlan we taste it against screaming eagle all blind before we even bottled this wine like Like, do we fit in these frames? Are we as good or better than, you know, a $50 bottle of wine from Napa to a $1,200 bottle of wine from Napa? And we thought we did. And obviously we did. So then the score hit, and then it was like, all of a sudden the distributors were like, yeah, man, we're on this. We're kicking ass. I'm like, dude, what?

And come on. We're realist five months. Yeah, you're like, holy cow. You called your own – I wouldn't call it a bluff. You knew you had something great, I mean, but called your shot there. It's kind of like aiming to – what was the famous baseball player? I don't know. Dave Ruth, yeah.

Dave Ruth, the lefty old or whatever. Yeah. It was special, right? I mean, and then we followed up. And then it just went – I just kept going, you know, and now it's like – it's to a point where, you know. But then it just kept – you know, I kept going. I appreciate you know the history of it, right?

I mean, nice. Oh, yeah. We've gotten – you've followed it up with 95-plus scores since, which is pretty unheard of. It wasn't a one-hit wonder. I have a question. I've been drinking for so long but only know so much. How do you keep – I know it probably comes from the same fields

and all those things. How do you keep the profile so consistent there's definitely nuances i mean i have all of these at home from 15 to i don't have any of the 18 yet um but how do you how do you maintain i'm sure there's processes but that consistency of flavor that's a that's the key right that's what everybody's trying to figure out right because our competitors were I mean we've already found out that they've been testing our wines and because we've got you know we're we're pretty connected so we here's the great wine because we work with laboratories and we know people that work at different wineries and yeah people are trying to figure out our

formula and you know it's not a formula it's a and that was when you know you go back that seven years right that was that was why it took so long because not only is i think it's important that you can be consistent but be able to grow if you if the market dictates growing then you need to be able to can i scale this um and continue to make the same quality wine? And also, this goes back 20 plus years. We've been figuring out how to work with barrels, what barrel profiles, what yeast do we use? We've got our own cultures of yeast. And we've really been playing with this for a while.

And around Liberty School, right? I mean, it's a great bottle of wine and it's always consistent. I mean, and we've really gotten very good at that. So when we stepped it up to go into this, you know, the higher end Cabernet game, it was super important. And it's not easy, believe me. I just came from the winery earlier tasting wines. And that's what we do. We open a bottle.

And so now it's not a formula formula but in a sense it is a formula because we deal with you know mother nature but we know the soils we know how to manage tannins like nobody's business and we know what oak works because oak is a is something that is definitely influenced in the wine but i would say we're i would say we're very good at managing oak because oak can get away from you very quickly yeah and but to get integration with oak flavor get the good oak flavors and not the raw hard ones that's the hard thing so i think uh you know we feel good we've been able to grow every year you know we did a 15 guy great score 16 followed up with a great score then 17 we were a number 10 wine of the world for wine enthusiast which was crazy because that's you

know that one blew me away even more because it was uh you know they taste 24 000 wines all that's across varietals right i mean number 10 in the world yeah so the editors and critics uh yeah they taste 24,000 wines a year and then they throw in what they think their best wine the best hundred wines they tasted that year and then they all go around and around and that was the text that blew my mind. That was like, I mean, the 97 already, you know, totally screwed me in my mind. I know it will only be third place because the 95 and the 20 and the number 10, those are probably one and two, but number three can be most popular at the Alford family parties. So, you know, if we could get that on the website,

it can bring you some more business. I know. So, number one in the world within the Alford residence when we have parties. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, I know you'll cherish that one. But in all seriousness, though, congratulations on all of that. It's got to, you know, you put your heart and soul, you put your name on it. And to have all that hard work kind of, you know, justified or, you know, again, not even being a score person, which I feel that from you. And I already see that from you, but it still has to feel good.

And, and, you know, even to your team, I mean, you know, like sometimes those things, you know, even, you know, managing teams and stuff like that, you know, means it's kind of pat on the back for them of like, you know, justification and things like that. Right. I agree. I think it, you know, I think it, you know, it's like, uh, I did horrible in school, right. I got pulled out of school at one point. And, you know, so grades were just there, right.

So you take them for good or bad or whatever, but it didn't mean much to me, but, um, to, to validate, you't mean much to me but um to validate you know i mean this is a you know worldwide publication that validates something like that on multiple things you know years in a row and i mean yeah our team walks proud i mean and it's interesting because you know i've had some of the best publicists in the world i've had you know we've done marketing we've done advertising we've done you it. And I'm always five years ahead of where, um, we should be. And I could, that'd be a whole other podcast and things that I can tell you we've done. It's just crazy. It blows your mind. I, that was like, uh, in-house marketing lady yesterday. And she's like, I told her what

I was doing with this new brand. And she's like, yep, you're five years ahead again. And I'm like, ah, shit. But it's total validation, right? It makes people feel good that, you know, on the team and, you know, they're walking prouder. I mean, you can see it. But what's interesting to me is like, you know, we've been around for so damn long and we've been successful, but it's like, it's almost like we're a new winery,

which is kind of, it's kind of, it's uncanny it's funny and and and I've talked to people about it it's like like and we've helped you know bring more notice to Paso which is that makes me the happiest because honestly that they guess the key that you'll take away as you get to know me is that I'm a consummate you know marketer of passive I talk passive first in a second because we're this did it can't just be one person that's great and faster we all have to be great we all have to get people to come here you know and so I do feel that we've we've we've helped get a lot of attention. I mean, just in Southern California alone, it's insane.

Like, I joke with people when they come up, I'm like, where the hell you guys been, dude? Where you been? Seriously, you're three and a half hours away. You've never heard of us. And now all of a sudden, we can't keep you out of our tasting room. You want to drink out of this Cabernet. And they realize that like, oh, I love these other wines too and i'm like dude where you been yeah exactly so how is that you know and i do like we're gonna have to have some follow-ups i think we're gonna i'm gonna create a wine segment with uh with austin hope if he's down for it as part of our like maybe bi-monthly uh if we can keep you interested uh uh, cause I think we can dive deep in a lot of these areas, but I am fascinated by the whole Napa Paso.

I'm sure you guys felt like, you know, the redhead stepchild that you weren't by the way, but yeah, but you know, I'm sure that's been both rewarding and I am curious, you know, if that is kind of how it felt.

It's, you know, I mean, we, we used to joke, I mean, years ago, we'd always say we're the bastard child of Napa. You know, they come down by grapes from us and they take it up there and blend it into their, you know, Central Coast or California Appalachian or some of the Napa wines. Cause you can blend in, you know, a certain percentage of other regions and wine and consumers wouldn't even know. And by law, um, no um now yeah we were always a bastard job and then it was just like you know again

people just fly right over us it was all about Napa all of a sudden it's like it's changed like in the last you know four years three years really i mean it's uh to see all the people coming here and discovering it, it makes me happy. We are a world-class growing region. There's no question about it in my mind that we can compete. We are competing. We can compete on a world stage. People ask, what's our goal?

I say, global domination. That's it. It's all right. here's what's cool because and I think with three more people here right they get here maybe maybe they came because they want they they heard about awesome of camera they love awesome of caverns so we get in here then we show them all these other varieties that we do and all these other things and we send them to our neighbors. The diversity in our region is ridiculous, right? I mean, we've got 11 sub-ABAs that we've developed, but it's still passive. But we can, I mean, I've got a neighbor that grows PNOR that if I

blindfolded you, they came from Burgundy because it's a very cool region that where he's growing it. Whereas if you go 10 miles East, I mean, if you grew a PNR out there, it's going to taste like shit. And we can grow Syrah where I live in the Templeton Gap District, which is the coolest sub region in Paso that tastes like a Northern Rome, more leather, more blueberry, more structure, meat game kind of qualities. I can go 15 miles east of here and I can grow a Syrah there because it's the warmest region

in the area that will taste like Shiraz, bubblegum, fruit, right? So it's just, it's an amazing region that i think we're just scratching the surface on what we can what we can do and uh it's exciting though i will say that treyana cab's a damn good bottle of wine too you know like i should i should tell you this, but I'm honest to a fault when people get on my ass about it all the time. So Triana came about as, that was my practice wine for Austin Hope. So that's why I started that brand. So if you go back where I said I've got to be able to do consistency and be able to scale, if you're going to make a

real brand that's you know going to be a legacy brand and so we asked how that brand started and I made it a dedication to the three men that were you know super influential in my life my father my uncle Chuck Wagner and so that one we kept doing it doing it doing it and then once I felt okay we got it now we're just going to turn it up a little bit um with the austin hope that's how that brand started so you're absolutely right that's a kick-ass bottle of wine for the price yeah and that's the other thing we didn't talk about is pricing because we're uh you know one of the big things for us is is uh i always want to over deliver and and and you know one of our like models or ethos if you will is uh is to you know deliver an honest product for for a good price and you know too often in this

industry mainly you know and not just in the north but here as well people will just put a number on it and i don't like i don't i've never asked you like where do you come up with inside dollars I don't know well I mean it's like we run our company like a business I mean it's it's it's a real business we we analytically look at things this is what it costs great just what it costs barrels this is what it costs people and then we put a good margin on it and that's that's what we sell it for we don't just double it because we feel like doubling it. It's like, but you know, I mean, the marketing is fine. And all of a sudden it goes along with it is interesting. But if you, I really do believe if you go through all of our brands, you 90% of the time,

everybody will feel like they got more value or more flavor, more, more value than for the, for the price, which that's, you know, that's the end result or end goal. So we're's you know that's the end result so we're you know a couple more things and we'll save some for the next round uh but where's the where's this all headed you know both we're what's your pronostications for both the industry i mean you know i know you're someone that kind of pushes against the grain a bit, maybe with the industry and with the Hope family wineries. I mean, what any kind of tidbits on where you see things going or changing holistically and then, you know, where you see the winery going? Domination. I was in Europe.

It's not that long ago. I mean, we're pushing into other markets, and we're already in some of the Asian markets, and we're pushing hard. I mean, I really want, when I say global domination, I mean it as in passive. I want the world to know passive. I know the world knows Napa Valley, great,

but I want them to know passive. I mean, just as they do, they know Bordeaux or Rhone or whatever. So that's my goal mentally. You know, it's where I think the world's going. I think that, you know, contrary to the media that, you know, always just wants to spin things into a negative light, which I can't as a whole nother podcast i think that i think wine is is finally becoming a culture um whereas i don't know about you i don't know how old you are but when i grew up wine was an honor on our table every night

um but at our house wine is on our table every day so So now my daughters, I can pretty much assure you that that new generation now has seen that. Right. So yeah, I think you've created where my goal and my, my, my thought is I think it will be like, I think it's only going to grow. I do think that you're going to see,

you're going to see a lower quality wines. I think they're going to slowly really have to bring their game up because what's happening is the consumer is getting educated, right? And that's never happened before. You know what I mean? You think about like the awesome Cabernet that we've produced that we've hit something that consumers enjoy. And this is what I enjoy.

Like we talked about earlier, i don't want to try and cabernet this like it's just like yeah you you're told this is good like okay but i don't like it and i think that you know through not only through internet through social media our society talks more than has ever talked before, whether it's whatever platform it is, face-to-face, phone, texting, like communication and information is flowing so freely that you can learn about a wine so quickly. You can learn about a region so quickly

that our consumers become more educated. And so I think the consumers are going to continue to demand higher quality products so i don't think that uh you know the average wines are going to continue to go i think that everybody's got a step of the game because our consumers i think are becoming more educated and you know it's going to take a generation it always does you know i mean it's like the next generations and all this talk about the millennials and stuff i mean that's just driving me bonkers i'm so sick of hearing that we can't market to them we can't do this we can't do that i mean you know what they'll find their way i think people are i think

why the that particular audience is is is uh not being not not or people say they can't market to them because everybody's trying to do and so so they're, they're pushing back because they're like, dude, leave me alone. Like, and, and we don't, we don't, we don't do that. We just saw our story. I'm like, I mean, this is who we are. If you like our wines, you like our wines. If you don't, okay, move on. But I think that, you know, they'll, they'll go just like us.

I mean, I wasn't drinking wine at 16, 20 years old. I mean, I wasn't, I was drinking booze, beer. Yeah. And that's just, that's just that's this life man so i don't think anything's changed i think it's uh and we're not everything's always cyclical right it just keeps coming around i keep looking back at things that keep changing and it's uh it's interesting so i think i think you're going to see wine consumption can continue to rise but i do think you're going to see wine quality continue to rise because that's what the consumers are going to dictate yep i agree and i think uh the uh the low the low guy on the totem pole has you

you you to blame personally for making a killer wine at a great value um well cool man i i really you know i think we could go on for two hours i'm feeling this vibe that you know we could just keep on keeping on but i'm gonna hold you to maybe uh getting back together um for another episode here um and i mean are you how's how's the impact you know i've been kind of staying off the whole pandemic discussion for the most part with most of the guests but has that any impact or anything of note? I mean, you guys are probably rocking. It might be increasing sales of people at home, but have you guys seen, I know it's probably hurt your tasting room a bit, but you guys just kind of ready to. We're, you know,

it's interesting because we're definitely off. I think, you know, this is what may be a bloodbath for us April this was okay first three months were obviously great we did good again we built our built brands on premise on restaurants nationally on all of our brands put together we were like 56 58 percent uh restaurants so uh that's a big impact on us right over half our business so we had to quickly shift to get to retail um and to get retail authorizations it's just like any other business right i mean i can't go into um into target right now and start talking about selling on the summer line right now they're gonna be like okay well thanks for pitching it now. So we'll look at maybe next summer.

Supermarkets are the same way. So we're pitching, we've already pitched for two months ago for fall for supermarkets just to get into their sets. So we had to shift to different manners. And, you know, we're fine, but I think we're going to be off probably by the end of the day. We'll probably be off 10%. Yeah.

Because our team has been able to push into independent retailers where we could force our way in. But I think what we've also done has been super progressive. I think we were early on in the progressive with the Zoom stuff. I mean, I've done, you know, Zoom things for, I'm doing one Friday for OC Wine Mart. I've done them for, we've done some things with Morton's. We've done it with steakhouses across the country and just trying to be interactive. We do Zoom tast uh by appointment with uh with one of our wine advisors our tasting room um but you know the retail part of business that we did have has increased which is i think going to help our business i mean stabilize the the bosses in the restaurant

um but definitely it's it's uh you know i mean that's again the media right me it's like everybody's drinking more and more and more i'm like yeah, yeah, they're drinking more, but I don't think people realize how much wine is consumed in restaurants. It's insane. I mean, it's a big hit, right? So, but our tasting room, we were an early group that, from my point of view,

we started going straight to our audience like I went through depression and then kind of job woke up I'm like dude what are we gonna do right because we didn't furlough one employee which was you know pretty scary for us and we didn't take any of the PPP stuff so we just got to roll the dice you know we've got 60 people that work for us so it was spooky but I wouldn't got our taste rumors that okay let's get smart let's do stuff my wife and i started thinking and so we started to start communicating with our audience and you know we already do social i mean you know that's fine i mean we've got our hookah and wines

that we do that my wife and another person run and then uh and my instagram is just you know random and all over the place so it's do you look for in that? And then we started creating cooking videos because I cook a lot. So I started making cooking videos. And then I started, I showed other purveyors, like that are wine club members and used a beef from one of them, cooked a tenderloin. And then I cooked squab from one of my buddies that's got a big squab co-op in the valley.

And I just started talking started talking and just being real you know like we are and and found that and my wife would make a playlist and put it into this we offered you know penny shipping and our direct business is actually is is doing great it's doing fine it's really weird i mean we don't have anybody in our tasting room and it's it's a bummer and it's sad because we have such a cool tasting room. It's outdoor. I mean, it's super chill, but we're doing good. And we started, we were one of the first to start doing curbside pickup. We started home delivery right out of the get-go. As soon as this happened, we just, we immediately switched.

And now people are starting to do it more. But I mean, Christ, last Saturday, there was a line for curbside pickup. I came down and actually poured some people some taste. So, you know, adapt. No recant, right? I love it. Well, you know, I'm trying to ignore the media personally. I think there's a lot of fear spreading going on, but we'll save the politics for, you know, another time.

You pretty much summed it up where i'm at i think it's you know i think there's just the fear is what pisses me off i stopped watching the news a month ago and it's uh it's it's you know there's no answers there's no real things and it's and it's a shame to see how see people in such fear and that's my biggest biggest thing it's like come on man i mean you know we you know, we're, we're, we're a herd society. We've always been and we've got to protect the weak, but we've got to move on with our lives. I mean, you're, you're, you're just, you're hurting people in different ways. You know what I mean? Yeah. And they go on for days, but yeah.

I told my wife that, you know, the second day of the quasi lockdown that the biggest point is, is no one going, you can't create a bigger problem than you're trying to solve? I think that's the bottom line, isn't it? There's no easy answers here, but you can't create a bigger hole than

the one you're trying to get out of. Anyway, I digress. Hey, man, it's been awesome. Huge fanboy over here on the wines, of course, but have from afar noticed, you know, a little bit of the Rebel attitude and the kind of approach. And it comes through in a delicious wine, but also, you know, a great guy.

And I really appreciate it. And I know our listeners are going to be thrilled to kind of hear a little bit of that backstory. The Chuck Wagner stuff's fascinating and, you know, just look forward to kind of growing our friendship and talking down the line. I love it, man. Thank you so much for reaching out. It's a moderate flatter that you did. It's super cool. Like I said, I like what you're doing. And thank you for having me, man. This is cool. Sweet.

Well, this is Ryan Alford for the Radical Company podcast. You can follow along at radical.company or find us on Instagram at radical underscore results. We'll see you next time. To learn more about Radical, visit radical.company on the web or follow Ryan on Instagram at Ryan Alford. Thanks for listening to the Radical Marketing Podcast.