Lifestyle Winery Buyers Rebounding?

(Wines&Vines) - Individual and “lifestyle” buyers may be creeping back into the wine business. The trend marks a change from recent years, when most sales and acquisitions in the wine business were made by established wine companies adding acreage to ensure future supply of grapes.

Some recent purchases bucked that trend:

David Edward Sinegal, the son of Costco co-founder and former CEO James Sinegal, bought the historic Inglewood Estate (not to be confused with Inglenook) in the Napa Valley town of St. Helena, Calif., for about $20 million.

The deal includes 30 acres (7 acres in vines), a stone winery with tasting room, a 5,500-case permit, main residence, guesthouse, pool, tennis court, lake, olive orchard and gardens. The new name is Sinegal Family Estate.

In April, Bob Travers sold 465-acre Mayacamas Vineyards to Charles Banks of San Francisco-based private equity firm Terroir Capital LLC, Banks’ wife Ali, and retail entrepreneur Jay Schottenstein and his son Joey. 

Banks is a former co-owner of Screaming Eagle. He has hired Andy Erickson, who once made that cult producer’s $750 red wine, as winemaker for Mayacamas.