Napa, Calif. -- A new custom crush facility joins the few other wineries in Napa Valley wholly built in a cave. Bacchus Caves construction company is about half-way through boring a new cave for Custom Crush Napa off Soda Canyon Road overlooking the Stags Leap District.
The cave winery is being developed by Ryan Waugh, a self-taught winemaker and entrepreneur who has been making wine for 14 years, almost seven under the Waugh Cellars brand. The 20,000 sq.-ft. facility will process 300 tons a year (about 18,000 cases).
He signed a 99-year lease for the cave site with owner Gary Haugh, who is building a house on the 42-acre parcel. It cannot legally be divided. Waugh says, "I wanted to build a high-end winemaking facility for professional winemakers who want to build their brands." It's not aimed at newcomers to the valley creating "lifestyle" wines.
So far, he's signed up three other wineries as well as his own, but can't identify two of them as they're presently working at other facilities and don't want their suppliers to read about the change in the media. The other is Redmond Family Winery, owned by Scott Mangelson, the vice president of sales and marketing at New Vine Logistics, who has a vineyard in St. Helena. It plans to make 2,000 cases, and the other unnamed customers have signed up for 5,000 and 6,000, he says.
Custom Crush Napa will charge $2,800 a ton for processing initially. Waugh says the four brands will be enough for now. "We want to leave some room for us to expand."
Waugh founded Waugh Cellars in 2001 and now produces 3,000 cases of wine annually under contract at Silverado Wine Studios, the former Silverado Hills Winery now owned by Bill Hill. He makes a Russian River Chardonnay, a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon and his best seller, Dry Creek Zinfandel. He also makes smaller quantities of Pinot Noir, Syrah and Cabernet Franc, which are sold exclusively through the Friends of Waugh Cellars wine club. He will launch a new wine brand from Sonoma, Six Degrees, this fall. He has also contracted for additional Napa Valley fruit.
The cave at Custom Crush Napa will obviously include barrel storage. A number of small caves built off Atlas Peak and Soda Canyon roads are used only for barrel storage by wine companies making their wine elsewhere.
Those familiar with Napa County's strict environmental regulations will be surprised to find that construction is proceeding during the rainy season. Caves are regulated by the state and federal government, which take precedence over county rules. Waugh is able to remove the tailings and is constructing a plateau outside the cave entrance. He intends to plant an acre of vines in the tailings partly as landscaping, partly for erosion control, and partly out of curiosity, he admits. "It's primarily ground up volcanic soil, so should be a good medium for the vines."
Much of the construction of the cave has been straightforward, but the road header drill encountered granite in the center arm of the cave, and will have to blast to make reasonable progress. The cave will include a 6,000-square-foot fermentation room 20 feet high, which Waugh says is 1.5 times that of the Staglin cave in Rutherford.
Like all wineries, Custom Crush Napa had to get a permit from the county, and like all new wineries, it restricts visitors to appointments. However, he was allowed unlimited 50-person events, 17 activities for 100 or more people, and a couple more a year for 200 people. The road is currently unpaved but that may change.
The views from above the cave, which is cut into a saddle away from Napa Valley, are stupendous, and he's building a level site for parties and visitors. The site is high above Regusci Winery, but also overlooks Stag's Leap Wine Cellars, appropriate since a taste of that's winery's Cask 23 Cabernet inspired him to change his major from pre-med and become a winemaker at Santa Clara University.
