United States

The Vikings were the first to notice the USA's potential as a wine-producing nation — young Leif Ericsson helmed an expedition to the place he named 'Vinland' in around 1000AD. After several bruising encounters with the local Indian population, the Norsemen settled for a draw and loaded a cargo of grapes and timber before sailing for Greenland.

A thousand years later, the USA is making wine from Hawaii to Texas, but most of the best vintages come from California.

The USA is a bit of an anomaly among wine producing countries. Our consumers drink the widest variety of wines around the world. There is a slight bias towards our own domestic production. And it is this exposure to the world's great wines that drives California and other regions to make wines of comparable quality and variety. As with the waves of immigrants that make up our population, just about every grape varietal has found a home on our shores. Certainly Cabernet and Chardonnay continue to reign as king and queen, but they are sharing space these days with everything from Albarino to Zinfandel.

The USA is constantly experimenting and defining which grapes grow best in which microclimate. Some areas seem only conducive to a limited number of varietals. Long Island, for example, seems to be an ideal spot to produce excellent Cabernet Franc. Washington state, on the other hand, is perfect for several German varieties, especially Riesling. With a country this vast, and ever thirstier and educated wine drinkers, we have the resources to make world class wines at every level.

We have established long-term relationships with a number of wineries in California and Oregon, and recently brought on our own winemaker to create wines from the best fruit that we can source throughout the western wine regions. These wines are among our customers' favorites and we are excited to continue our expansion here at home, while we continue to scour the world for undiscovered gems.