Was there a specific wine, moment or place that unlocked your passion? What did you study in school and what were you doing before you started in the wine industry?
Rebecca Moore: Growing up in Napa, I always enjoyed wine but had a career as a litigator and so had NO intention of doing anything else. Several things occurred in my early 40s that resulted in an early mid-life opportunity to reinvent myself.
In the winter of 2010, I came up to the vineyard my parents had built in order to clear my head and never left! After spending several years looking for a legal position in Portland, it became clear that I was no longer meant to do that work. In the meantime, I had taken a position running a high-end barrel club that used my parent’s wine and realized I LOVED working with their wine and telling their story.
SO, basically, I came home one day and suggested to my parents that, rather than sell the vineyard to fund their retirement, they allow me the opportunity to take the business over and grow both the grape sales and the, then very small, wine brand. I remain eternally grateful to this day that they agreed.
How has being in the wine industry changed you?
RM: Being able to care for the land is SO much more fulfilling. I was born on a cattle ranch in Colorado, but never got to grow up there and was always a little sad about that… you can take the girl off the farm but not the farm out of the girl! I love shepherding a product from Dirt to Glass that tells a continually changing story and evokes so much emotion is beyond priceless.
What’s your favorite part of being in the wine industry?
RM: The community– there is nothing like it anywhere I would venture.
Looking back, was there something in your past that led you to wine?
RM: Fate!
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