Philosophy

The vine tells us what we ultimately produce. As stewards of the vine, we simply interpret these individual characteristics in our winemaking philosophy.

Extremely labor intensive vineyard techniques are employed to maximize the potential of every vine. From the selective planting of French ENTAV clones - averaging 2000 vines per acre density - to winter pruning, trellis management, crop-thinning and leaf-pulling, we ensure that the highest quality fruit is delivered to the winery.

Rain or shine, each vineyard block is monitored on a weekly basis to calculate bud break, leaf break, bloom and veraison, leading up to the weeks before harvest when these excursions occur on a daily basis. Sampling each vineyard block, we taste and taste again until that optimum moment of perfect balance and ripeness appears, yielding approximately two pounds of fruit per vine, or two tons per acre. Hand-harvesting and sorting at night into half-ton bins assures gentle handling and protects the integrity of the fruit received at the winery.

PreVail's unique gravity-flow delivery process begins with additional hand sorting of grapes on a 36-foot conveyor belt for the removal of any green material which could impart a bitter flavor to the wine. From here, a vertical elevator belt moves whole berries up into an articulating arm which moves 180 degrees over a semi-circle of oak fermentation tanks, thereby pressing whole berries directly into each tank. Controlled fermentation temperatures with extended maceration periods are utilized to determine the extraction of fruit flavors and rich color.