Number of Wineries Grows to 8,391 in North America

(Wines&Vines) - New data from Wines & Vines magazine confirm solid growth in the North American wine industry during 2013. The number of wineries grew to 8,391, a gain of 4.3%. U.S. wineries showed two other signs of health as their combined production increased 6.3% and the winery average bottle price rose from $9 to $10.85.

Wines Vines Analytics, the magazine’s market-research team, released these numbers prior to the Unified Wine & Grape Symposium in Sacramento, Calif., as a small sample of the information available in the 2014 Directory & Buyers Guide, now available in print and online formats.

The United States now has 7,762 wineries, led by California with 3,674. Canada has 568 wineries, having gained more than 8%. The net change in North American wineries was 345.

Bonded wineries have their own brick-and-mortar production sites, while virtual wineries have brand names and produce wine at host facilities.

Two Western states and two mid-Atlantic states had the fastest winery growth rates. Arizona counted 14.3% more wineries, Maryland 11.1%, Colorado 7.1% and Pennsylvania 4.8%.

Looking at U.S. wineries by annual case production, seven wineries joined the category of large wineries (those producing more than 500,000 cases) to bring that total to 56. The size categories that gained the most wineries were 1,000–4,999 cases and less than 1,000 cases. These now account for 6,017 wineries.