Now that nearly two dozen assets from the bankrupt Vintage Wine Estates portfolio have changed hands, some buyers reveal the future of North Coast, Central Coast, Pacific Northwest wineries and brands and the Midwest.

Vintage, headquartered in Santa Rosa, filed for Chapter 11 reorganization on July 24, with $400 million in debt and $425 million in assets. The Delaware Bankruptcy Court approved eight asset sales totaling $140.6 million. Wines and spirits from the Deutsch family $16 million bid for Ray’s Station winery in Hopland is still awaiting review in court.

Jay Adair, owner of Adair Winery and executive chairman of auto salvage empire Copart, has ambitious plans to breathe new life into the five wineries purchased in mid-October for $85 million: Kunde Estate, BR Cohn, Clos Pegase, Girard and Viansa Sonoma. .

Adair, who has been in the wine industry since the late 1990s, plans to invest more than $25 million to upgrade facilities and create a more cohesive and experiential brand across the entire portfolio.

“We’re going to make them younger, hipper and more exciting,” Adair said. “These brands have been a little top-heavy and neglected, and we’re going to change that.”

Adair’s vision includes implementing a consistent food and hospitality program across all tasting rooms, as well as enhancing packaging and winemaking across all brands. He plans to unify wine club programs, creating a more exclusive, experience-driven membership model.

“It’s not about getting wine at a discount,” Adair said. “We want our wine club members to be brand ambassadors, having access to special events and activities that create a real connection with the vineyards.”

Adair’s newly acquired wineries currently produce approximately 100,000 cases per year. His goal is to get that figure down to 400,000 cases, but he acknowledged the wine club would likely only account for about 10 percent of that total volume.

Adair is more interested in creating a sense of quality, rarity and exclusivity around the wine club experience than in simply generating high-volume direct sales to consumers.

“I want people to come and have a phenomenal time enjoying the properties, and that goes to another level when they become a member,” he said.

With this in mind, he seeks to bring back the music festivals that BR Cohn was known for.

In addition to the five Vintage Wine Estates properties, Adair also plans to establish his own Adair Winery in Suisun Valley, a lesser-known appellation in western Solano County that is also part of the North Coast wine region. There, he invested heavily in a 12,000-square-foot winery and hotel complex, inspired by the work done in the Suisun Valley by Caymus owner Chuck Wagner.

“Suisun Valley reminds me of Napa in the 1970s,” Adair said. “It’s a close-knit community and we want to create a space that celebrates the agricultural heritage of the area, with gardens, olive trees and educational experiences for visitors.”

The Adair Winery project, scheduled to open next year, will include a wine tasting room, as well as event spaces and a pavilion for concerts and festivals. Adair tapped famed winemaker Thomas Rivers Brown to craft the wines.

“It’s a long-term investment for me,” Adair said. “I’m not looking to flip these properties or extract value from them. I want to create something lasting and enjoyable for generations to come.”

“If chicken wine is a trend, dogs might be better”

Foley Family Wines & Spirits has acquired five new wine brands totaling approximately 150,000 cases for $15 million: Bar Dog Wine, Cherry Pie Wines, Cosentino Winery, Swanson Vineyards and Sonoma Coast Vineyards.

The deal included Sonoma Coast Vineyards’ Bodega Bay tasting room.

“It’s a beautiful and unique place with more than 11,000 visitors each year and 1,400 wine club members,” said Shawn Schiffer, president.

With Cosentino and Swanson comes 2,000 more club members, and shipments began last month.

What interested the Foley company with Cosentino was Lodi’s range of quality wines at an “accessible” price around $15 a bottle. Swanson, at about $27, “is a great addition to our Napa portfolio where we have strong luxury brands like Merus, Silverado and Foley Johnson,” Schiffer said.

The biggest wholesale brands are Cherry Pie, the popular California Pinot Noir wines ($25 to $30) and Bar Dog ($12), with a portion of the profits going to the Petfinder Foundation.

“If chicken wine is a trend, dogs might be better,” Schiffer said. “They are the most popular pet in the United States – 65 million American households own one – so we are going to lean into the brand with a little humor and tap into that passion.”