COMING FROM NORTHERN CALIFORNIA WITH NINE GENERATIONS OF FAMILY IN AGRICULTURE, you’d have to say Rob and Jolee Wallace had deep roots in California farming. So what made them opt for viticulture in Oregon? Had they dreamed of owning a vineyard and winery? Not really. As the story unwinds, it’s apparent that it’s more about team than dream.

Rob begins, “I started out farming rice back in the late 80’s with my brother. Then we split up that company and I started growing tomatoes, peppers, wheat and corn—mostly row crops but some field crops. I was eighteen/nineteen when I started that business.” Fifteen years later when Rob set his sights on property to the north, he and Jolee were married with three children. “We had young kids and were struggling on a big farm at a time when the industry was a challenge. When the Oregon opportunity presented itself, we came here and looked at it. It’s beautiful here. Who wouldn’t want to live here, right?” The Wallaces took the leap and opted into the Oregon venture with partner Lee Traynham.

Jolee recalls it was tough to separate from family. “Our twins were eight and our daughter was five. I think it was a very hard adjustment. Their grandma lived down the street and my parents lived close. Rob has ten brothers and sisters; he’s the youngest of eleven.”

In 2000 when Rob took over, Del Rio Vineyards was already one of the largest tracts of wine grapes in the Rogue Valley at around 180 planted acres. That winter about half of the vines died due to a hard freeze. But a few years after replanting those vines, the Wallaces started to expand. Today their combined vineyards total about 460 planted acres.

The Wallaces faced another challenge—trying to market the tonnage they were producing to the existing wineries in the state which, for the most part, had very limited production. Highly variable crop yield year to year made contracting the entire harvest difficult. To absorb that portion of the harvest that wasn’t contracted for sale, the Wallaces decided to produce their own wine by custom crush agreement. The Del Rio brand was born, and in 2001 the Rock Point Stage Hotel, built on the property in 1864, was renovated to serve as a tasting room. “It was very, very small,” Jolee says. “Our cellar was only a couple hundred cases.”

The Del Rio estate winery was added in 2004. Rob notes that capacity has gone from 28,000 gallons originally to over 600,000 gallons today. “In this business it’s kind of a rule… you’re not allowed to plant grapes unless you plant tanks to go with them. Because whether you’re growing sugar beets or tomatoes or peppers, if the market goes south, then buyers are going to have trouble taking that product. Unless you have a facility of some sort to take up surplus and market it at a later date, you’re going to have issues. Bob Caravan (founder of Bridgeview Vineyards and Winery) told me the guy with the most tanks wins. He was dead right.”

Before long, the Wallaces were bottling their wines under three different labels. In addition to the original “Del Rio” brand, there is “Rock Point,” retailing at a lower price point, and the “Jolee” label, offering a semi-sparkling Muscat and a red table wine on the softer, fruitier side. “Jolee” is the biggest seller of the three. During the month of October, the Wallaces partner with Asante to support breast cancer education by donating $10 of the proceeds from every case of “Jolee” sold through the Del Rio tasting room.

But there’s more to it than just growing grapes and making wine. Rob explains, “We have the farming company, the construction company, the trucking company, a winemaking company, a distribution company, a retail company, an events center—I mean it’s a lot. We have teams that cover all of that and Jolee and I kind of oversee it without killing each other. We don’t just sell grapes and wine. We sell processing, farm work, bulk wine, private label work, all kinds of things. When they did freeway construction out here, it literally shut our tasting room down but it didn’t slow down our business because we have so many different things going on. We have a lot of diversification and we have an extraordinary team that keeps all of that running.”

Jolee smiles. “Many people have stopped here over the years to sell us business plans, trying to help us set a goal for five years, ten years.”

“The plan,” Rob says, “is to keep moving forward.”

Jolee adds, “We’re pretty organic and flexible. If the team wants to go in one direction, we go in that direction. We’ve had so many great ideas from our own people. That’s what makes it work.”

©Southern Oregon Wine Scene – from the Fall Winter 2019 issue