Napa Growers Launch 2010 Grape Sales

Online marketplace already offers wineries 84 lots and 1,284 tons
 
 Napa, Calif. -- The Napa Valley Grapegrowers has launched its Napa Winegrape Market for the 2010 harvest. The online tool, a “Match.com” for grapes, is designed to match premium winegrape growers with winemakers seeking to establish new connections in a changing market.

The service is free to Napa Valley Grapegrower members and costs a fixed fee of $50 to $250 for other grape suppliers, depending on lot size. Neither buyers nor sellers pay commissions.

The marketplace was established three years ago, but it really came into its own during last year’s difficult market for uncontracted grapes. It’s expected to be even more popular this year. “It should get a lot of use this year,” says Garrett Buckland of

Premiere Viticulture Services
in Napa. “A lot of people have uncontracted fruit.”

The Winegrape Market offers users the ability to post, edit and archive lots, as well as the option to post those lots automatically and free of charge on the industry’s most-visited online classified marketplace, winebusiness.com. Items from the Winegrape Market appear with the Napa Valley Grapegrowers logo.

For grape buyers, the Napa Winegrape Market provides a large if not comprehensive listing of winegrapes available in Napa Valley. By using the search criteria and sorting tools, grape buyers can quickly search the available lots and get detailed information about them, including variety, vineyard name, AVA, clone, rootstock, contact names for the seller and vineyard manager and tons available.

For sellers, the market provides an inexpensive way to market their available grapes to a broad set of potential buyers.

As of May 4, 84 lots were listed, totaling 1,248 tons, with Cabernet Sauvignon leading at 35 lots, and Merlot second at 11 lots. Postings range from 1 ton (for a home winemaker) to as high as 140 tons; presumably sellers will deal in partial lots.

Vineyards range from Carneros to Calistoga, and include well-known growers such as Palmaz Vineyards, Hewitt Vineyard, Trefethen Family Vineyards, Pahlmeyer and Stagecoach Vineyard (owned by Krupp Brothers Estates).

Buckland says many of his vineyard-owning clients use the service. “They sold at least 100 tons through it.”

He finds it especially useful since there are about 450 wineries in Napa Valley, and it would be impossible for small growers, many of them absentee owners, to contact them individually to find markets for their fruit.

It works the other way, too. With hundreds of small growers in Napa Valley, finding the optimal fruit is an even bigger challenge for wineries.

One grower who has used the service is Miles MacDonnell of Round Pond Estate in Rutherford, which farms about 360 acres of vines and sells 95%. “We’ve listed a fair amount of fruit in the last two years with good success,” he says. 

He adds that the majority of the estate’s fruit is sold under long-term contract, but there’s always some that doesn’t have a home. MacDonnell admits that it’s more difficult now than it has been in years past. “Tools like the marketplace are pretty important.”

Round Pond also uses a broker, Turrentine, for sales. MacDonnell estimates about 50% is sold through each channel.

Steve Fredricks, president of Turrentine Brokerage, notes that the online services really are just lead-generating tools. “They don’t give the parties other market context information like what else is available or competition, and don’t help negotiate contracts.”

He also points out that growers don’t pay to list their fruit with Turrentine. They only pay if the fruit sells.

NVG executive director Jennifer Putnam says 142 sellers posted lots last year, but because the association doesn’t get involved in the transactions, it doesn’t have details on the tonnage sold.

She can report that during the past month, off-time for most transactions, the website traffic logged 460 visits and 2,437 individual page visits.

Buckland says that a couple of his clients will be posting grapes shortly, but he thinks most will wait until they have a better idea of their crops this year. “I think we’ll see the most postings starting about mid-June.”

Visit napagrowers.org for more information, or contact the Napa Valley Grapegrowers at (707) 944-8311.