Big Price Paid for Sonoma Pinot and Syrah Vineyard
Questions raised by $4.1 million price tag as to whether grape prices will rise for producers, and how it will affect wine prices in the future
Amber Ridge Vineyard in Sonoma County, Calif.'s Russian River Valley has been sold to Nickel & Nickel winery in Napa Valley for $4.1 million. At $130,000 an acre, it is one of the highest prices ever paid for a Russian River vineyard.
"We know it's a lot of money," said Larry Maguire, a partner in Nickel & Nickel, which also owns the Far Niente and Dolce wineries in Napa. But the acquisition fits with the company's focus on single-vineyard bottlings; it has two dozen single-vineyard wines from Napa and Sonoma alone. "We have a lot invested in the single-vineyard [program]," he said. "If you're in [the wine business] for the long term, you have to control the vineyards."
The 31-acre property west of Windsor is planted to Pinot Noir, Syrah and Chardonnay, and comes with a home site. The vineyard, which is also known as Darien Vineyard (named for the property's former owner, Frank Darien), is a source of Pinot Noir for the Dain, Kosta Browne, Siduri and Sonnet wineries, as well as Syrah for Nickel & Nickel. Maguire said that Nickel & Nickel planned to honor its grape contracts with those other producers, and that the company had not decided whether it, too, would produce a Pinot from the property. Most importantly for Nickel & Nickel, though, the acquisition locks up the Syrah it needs now and in the foreseeable future.
Whether the price paid for the vineyard set a record or is setting a trend is hard to say, winery owners familiar with land prices said. But in recent years the high end for Sonoma vineyards per acre has been in the $80,000 to $100,000 range. Prime vineyard land in Napa Valley, by comparison, sells in the $200,000 to $280,000 range.
"I think that's fairly high [for Sonoma]," said Adam Lee, owner and winemaker at Siduri. But the vineyard is a steady, reliable producer of top-end Pinot Noir, he said. It routinely can produce 3 to 3.5 tons per acre, and because it's in a warm site, the grapes ripen rather readily. "If you're a grower and able to get that [size of crop] on a consistent basis, that's a pretty good thing," Lee added.
