E. & J. Gallo looks to California Wine Country to launch premium brandy tasting room

You already know this Modesto-based company as the largest wine seller in the world, but now Gallo has its sights on conquering luxury brandy.

E.&J. Gallo Winery is set to open the California Brandy House, a tasting room for the company's premium artisan brands of the wine-based spirit made in the state. The new tasting room will be opened in downtown Napa on Nov. 6.

The site will showcase the Germain-Robin and Argonaut luxury brands of brandy. Gallo purchased Germain-Robin, made out of Ukiah in Mendocino County, in 2017. That same year the company launched its own ultra-premium brandy label Argonaut distilled out of Sanger in Fresno County.

The company has long been in the brandy business, making its popular mass market E&J Brandy since 1975.

The new tasting room is opening in First Street Napa, a shopping complex with high-end retail and dining on First Street in downtown Napa. Customers can try guided tasting flights, and sample limited and single-barrel offerings not available at other locations. To comply with ongoing COVID-19 safety guidelines, all tastings will launch outdoors in the shop's outside parklet.

To experience the tasting room and to allow for proper social distancing, reservations are strongly recommended in advance. The tasting room will have a gift shop where the full line of Germain-Robin and Argonaut brandies, as well as exclusive releases, will be available for purchase.

Britt West, vice president and general manager of Gallo Spirits, a division of E. & J. Gallo Winery, said in a press release about the new tasting room that there was no better place than Napa for its launch.

"The Gallo family has been devoted to the pursuit of crafting the best brandy for generations," West said. "California Brandy House cements that commitment now and into the future. We look forward to inviting a new generation to discover and explore fine, California-appellation brandies."

Gallo, started in Modesto in 1933 by brothers Ernest and Julio Gallo, is headquartered on Yosemite Boulevard in Modesto. The company does not have any public tastings rooms in Modesto or Stanislaus County, but does have tasting rooms for its brands and labels in other parts of the state.

California Brandy House is located at 1300 First St., Suite 309, in downtown Napa.