Micro-wineries try to get a toehold in Napa County
Napa County is still waiting to see its first micro-winery, and proponents say that's partly because aspirants can face some big hurdles.
"We aren't throwing in the towel yet," said Elise Nerlove, whose family wants to establish a micro-winery.
The county created the category in April 2022. Officials wanted to help mom-and-pop ventures produce a little wine and hold wine tastings without building full-dress multimillion-dollar wineries.
Micro-wineries can produce only 201 to 5,000 gallons annually. They can generate no more than 10 round trips a day, and can have no more than 5,000 square feet of enclosed winery space.
Those would be the polar opposites of Napa County's grandest wineries, those with castle-like exteriors or interiors adorned with velvet furniture. A micro-winery host might be a farmer showing off a vineyard and holding a tasting at a picnic table.
In return for accepting various restrictions, applicants are supposed to have an easier, quicker path to county approval. Proponents hoped that establishing a micro-winery might be an easier economic lift.
More than a year into this great experiment, George O'Meara sees room for improvement. He is president of Save the Family Farms, the group that championed the micro-winery effort.
"There's been very little streamlining to it right now," O'Meara said.
Five parties have applied so far for micro-winery permits. Others are contemplating such a move, but have yet to pull the trigger. One might become Napa County's first micro-winery and prove the concept works.
In the south county hills
Nerlove grows grapes on 8 acres in south county hills with distant views of wetlands. Her family makes Elkhorn Peak Cellars wines off site using custom crush and wants to hold wine tastings at the farm, something they see as crucial to selling wine.
"Would you buy a bottle of wine from an unknown producer you have never visited?" Nerlove said.
Napa County law requires that a farm have a winery before it can host wine tastings. Given the relatively small amount of wine they produce, the Nerloves want a micro-winery.
"I have a whole plan ready to go, ready to submit to the county," Nerlove said recently. "I know exactly where I'm going to build my winery. I know exactly what it's going to look like."
She would build a 1,000-square-foot building — smaller than the average house. That would be a place to ferment wine, meeting the wine production requirement for micro-wineries and allowing visitation.
"We're talking about a small, intimate experience," Nerlove said. "We're still talking about a picnic table, essentially. ... My vision is to have people out, walk them through the vineyard, show them what grape growing is about, give them a hands-on experience, and give them the fruits of our labor."
But Nerlove has yet to apply for a micro-winery permit, even though she championed the concept as part of Save the Family Farms. She is the group's vice president.
"Well, the process honestly hasn't been streamlined too much," Nerlove said. "It's the same hurdles. The only concession we were provided was to have the application go past the zoning administrator, versus the Planning Commission."
Her family's plans ran up against another challenge — Cal Fire, the state fire protection agency, revised state minimum fire safety regulations that took effect in April.
One goal is to ensure people can evacuate from wildfires and firefighters can reach fires. Nerlove said a micro-winery is held to the same road standards as a much larger winery. Her family faces having to widen a road at a cost of around $500,000, taking out part of a vineyard to do so.
Establishing an Elkhorn Peak Cellars micro-winery would cost more than a million dollars, Nerlove said. The question is whether so small an undertaking would make enough money to cover that expense.
"I can't invest in something that would put me out of business," she said.
In a Mount Veeder cave
Kevin Morrison has applied for a micro-winery permit for his Hillwalker Vineyards in the Mount Veeder area of the forested Mayacamas Mountains, northwest of the city of Napa.
Morrison has a 4.5-acre vineyard and since 2019 has made wine on his property in a 1,500-square-foot cave near his house. The county allows people to make up to 200 gallons of wine annually at home, but hold no wine tastings.
Now Morrison wants to bump up the cave's annual wine production past the 200-gallon mark, to the point of someday perhaps using all of the fruit from the vineyard. He wants a micro-winery.
"We're always going to be tiny by anybody's standards," Morrison said.
Having visitors is important because of the economics of selling wine as a small producer. It's cost-prohibitive to go through multi-step distribution, he said.
