As Alameda residents debate the pros and cons of a proposed development plan including roughly 5,000 homes for the former Naval Air Station Alameda, now called Alameda Point, the Rosenblum family, of Alameda's Rosenblum Cellars, is growing their unique winemaking incubator in a former aircraft hanger on the site.
In August, Matt Smith of Blacksmith Cellars will move his boutique winemaking operation back to Alameda, sharing space with other small-lot wine producers in the 40,000 square-foot converted airplane hangar leased by the Rock Wall Wine Company, which is operated by Shauna Rosenblum, the daughter of Kent, who previously founded Rosenblum Cellars, also in Alameda. Rosenblum Cellars was sold to Diageo Beverages in January of 2008.
Smith's relationship with the Rosenblum family goes back several years - from 2001 to 2004 he leased space from Rosenblum Cellars to make small batches of wine from lesser-known varietals such as Chenin Blanc and Torrontes. He produced just 150 cases of his first vintage in 2001.
But as Rosenblum Cellars' business grew, their need for space squeezed Blacksmith out of their shared space just across Main Street from the former base, and Smith made wine for a while in Oakland, then SuisunCity. Smith thinks of time in terms of vintages - he produced four vintages while away from Alameda.
"I wanted to stay in Alameda and move to Alameda Point," Smith told me, "but I couldn't afford and didn't need to rent 40,000 square feet of space just for my business." With no staff or employees, he is largely a one-man show, producing and marketing his own wines. His wife, who works full-time for a major bank in San Francisco, does the books. The opening of Rock Wall allowed him to move his winemaking, wife, and two children back to Alameda.
With a chemistry degree, Smith began working in the wine industry at Beaulieu Vineyards in 1996, working in both the lab and the cellar. It prompted him to dive headlong into winemaking, bringing his family with him. In 1998, he left Beaulieu in Sonoma and his wife - pregnant with their second child at the time - quit her job, and they moved their family to Fresno. At FresnoStateUniversity, building on his chemistry degree, he took a crash program in oenology, the art of wine making, securing a four-year baccalaureate degree in just two years. Smith said "When you're taking twenty credits per semester in oenology, there's no doubt the whole family is in the wine-making business." His children, now ages 9 and 11, have helped out this summer for the first time, labeling bottles for a couple of days.
The business is "basically breakeven" and his wife's income supports the family. He's been in an expansion phase, shipping 1,500 cases last year, and due to the recession, he's been shifting to lower-priced white wines in the $15 to $20 per bottle price range. But the lower margins on these wines means he has needed to increase production to generate the same profit. Smith buys his grapes from all over Northern California, a necessity, he says, to find the best fruit for each of the dozen varietals he produces. Over half of his production is sold in the EastBay, and he is focusing his energy on a fairly new idea – “pre-sold” production to custom order for local restaurants.
Area restaurateurs, such as John Thiel of Pappo, on Central Avenue in Alameda, are asking Smith to produce custom blends which are privately labeled exclusively for their eateries, sometimes even taking part in the blending process. The restaurants then commit to buying a production run of the custom blend, which gives them something unique to offer diners, and a boutique winery like Blacksmith Cellars some level of certainty. Thiel, whose Blacksmith-produced ‘Chateauneuf du Pappo’ was a hit with his customers told me by email that “Matt is an excellent winemaker.” Smith has custom products for other Alameda restaurants in the pipeline as well. Dan Marshall, of Du Vin Fine Wines on Santa Clara Avenue in Alameda told me “I’m a huge fan of Matt’s wines. I was the first retailer to carry his selections several years ago.”
Matt Smith, who must market and deliver the wine he makes says this model is very efficient from a marketing point of view, and very “enviro efficient” as well. By directly targeting retailers and restaurants in Alameda, Smith says it minimizes the environmental impacts resulting from shipping finished product afar. It also lets him participate in the “buy local” movement – the grapes, though not grown in Alameda, are turned into wine which is produced and consumed in Alameda.
It doesn’t stop there - Matt Smith’s brother Dave, at 29, eight years his junior, followed Matt into winemaking after graduating with an English degree, and is now the head distiller at St George Sprits/Hangar One Vodka, also located at Alameda Point, just four hangars down from the Rock Wall Wine Company. With his brother, wife and two children all now participating in winemaking and distilled spirits, Matt Smith concedes that both family and Alameda legacies may be in the making.
“I love Alameda,” he told me. “I love the sense of community which we didn’t feel we could achieve anywhere else.”
A press conference about Oak Knoll that was announced by Councilmember Larry Reid's office for 10:30 am today was cancelled. Last week, Pat Mossburg, …
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Winemaker returns to Alameda after a four-vintage hiatus
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