Ryan Bogle ~ The Winery, Operating Sustainably and What's to Come

Jody Bogle sits down with her brother Ryan, who serves as Vice President and CFO of Bogle Family Wine Collection, to discuss his role, winery operations and the company’s focus on sustainable winemaking. Ryan shares his pathway into the family business, why the family decided to invest in a new state-of-the-art winery in Clarksburg, how they are operating in an eco-friendly way and what vision the family has for the future of the business.  

To learn more about Bogle Family Wine Collection visit boglewinery.com.

Transcript

00:00 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Right now we're producing roughly 2.8 million cases a year. I think we could probably get to roughly 3.5, but, like I said earlier, we have space to grow and so on that footprint. 

00:22 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Welcome to the Bogle story. I'm Jody Bogle and I'm so happy to be sipping here with you today. My brother, ryan Bogle, is joining us. Ryan, thanks for doing this. I know you love getting in front of the camera. 

00:36 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Love these. These are some of my favorite things to do. Glad to be here. 

00:41 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Sisters get to. You know, I twist his arm a little bit, but he's here. Thank you, ryan. So, ryan, did you always want to be involved in the family business? 

00:49 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
You know, growing up, I think you know, like you, it was a much different company than what it is today. You know, when we were young, you know, growing up working out in the vineyards, you know the vineyards being kind of the real driver of the company. You know it was something that I enjoyed doing. And then when I got into high school and you know, the winery started kind of taking off, you know it started growing. I always, you know, there was other avenues that kind of opened up once the winery got larger, and so it was always in the back of my mind when I went to college I decided to, you know, study in econ and get an accounting degree, because I kind of thought that that was an avenue that would lend itself. I could apply those skills back at the winery. So, yeah, I mean roundabout way, yeah, I kind of always envisioned myself coming back and working. 

01:39 - Jody Bogle (Host)
And today you are the vice president and CFO of the corporation. So what does that look like on a day-to-day basis? 

01:47 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Day-to-day basis. I mean, there's just like with all of us. We all wear so many hats, so there's really not a set daily schedule. It involves everything from the mundane reconciling accounts or working on banking, but then also having meetings know, having meetings with yourselves more and our upper management. 

02:08 - Jody Bogle (Host)
I'm glad you do all the reconciling of all the accounts. That's not my forte, so today I think it would be great if you could talk about our winery in Clarksburg. The winery was built in 2011,. Or our first crush was 2011. 

02:24 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
It was built in the two years previous to that, but talk about why we needed to build the, the winery, and what our winemaking looked like a little bit before that yeah, so as as we were growing like I said, you know, 1998, 99, it was as the wineries kind of started taking off and we you know, we're, you know we'd outgrown the production capability of, you know, the original winery which is at the home ranch, and so we'd started outsourcing a large percentage of what we were doing. 

02:53
I think we were making wine at eight or so wineries around the state. You know we were doing a lot of barreling down in Livermore, doing a lot of crush down there as well. We were barreling wines over in Russian River Valley as well. So the winemakers were putting a lot of miles on the car. All the wine was being made to their specifications, but it was just all being kind of done. A majority of it was being done remotely. So it was kind of important for us, it was really important for us to kind of be able you know a majority of it was being done remotely, so it was kind of important for us, it was really important for us to kind of be able to bring it all home. 

03:28 - Jody Bogle (Host)
And have it all under one roof. Yes, why Clarksburg? 

03:32 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
I mean. So we looked around, we looked around at different areas. We thought, well, maybe Lodi, we could find a, you know, find a parcel. That was, you know, right off the freeway, easy access. But you know, it really didn't feel right. 

03:45 - Jody Bogle (Host)
We also looked at American Canyon. Right, we looked at American Canyon. We looked at a lot of different areas. We looked at some other. 

03:50 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
you know some other facilities that were for sale or had been mothballed, but none of it felt like home. So it was really important for us. From my perspective, you know, it was important to do it in Clarksburg. From my perspective. 

04:04 - Jody Bogle (Host)
you know it was important to do it in Clarksburg and we didn't do it at the home ranch because of the building restrictions there. So the property is just three miles, kind of as the crow flies, from the home ranch. What was important when designing the winery for that location? 

04:18 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Well, I mean really, the real benefit to that location was just, it was a blank slate, it was just an open field. We were actually fortunate to be able to work with the county and get the land zoned ag industrial. 

04:34
The county was actually looking for a large grape processing facility. They wanted to have a large grape processing facility in Clarksburg so we got the area, we were able to get the parcel zoned ag industrial and so that right there is going to allow us we can kind of continue to expand the winery and you know we're not working under, you know, your typical conditional use permit. Anything that we do in that parcel, as long as it's ag-related and related to processing grapes, we're able to do it through a basically just easy permit check. 

05:11 - Jody Bogle (Host)
And it's a little easy to expand. That's great. So when you guys were looking at building the winery, what did you do? How did you even know where to start with this blank slate? 

05:20 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
So, really, you know, having worked with the other wineries around the state, well, first and foremost, we started with an engineering firm out of Sonoma, summit Engineering, and they designed a number of wineries. This was their largest single winery facility to date they've built. And so, to start, we kind of went around the state and toured Didn't you guys see like 20 or 25 different wineries? 

05:51 - Jody Bogle (Host)
I don't know the number. You lost track. 

05:53 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Yeah, I lost track, but you know we did that and you know that's the nice thing about the wine industry also is to you know it is. For the most part people are open and they're willing to share. So we went around the state and kind of looked at winery facilities and kind of pick best practices, kind of cherry pick best practices from all the winers who we visited. 

06:12 - Jody Bogle (Host)
So what makes Are winery different? Is there anything that makes it different or sets it apart? 

06:17 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Different. I would say the one thing that we do that wineries of our size don't do is this single vineyard. You know, we operate like a very small winery, just on a very large scale. Most wineries we visited that were of any size comparable to ours. You know they didn't have the number of small tanks that we have. They would have, you know, lines of 50,000-gallon tanks and 100,000-gallon tanks. 

06:42
They wouldn't have the 7,000-gallon tanks and the 750-gallon tanks which we you know, we need to be able to make your small lot of wines for the wine club. 

06:53 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Yes, I know Everybody loves it when we ask for more wine for the wine club. What's your favorite? Do you have a favorite thing about the winery? My favorite is the ramp. I love being able to walk up the ramp and, for those of you who haven't been out to the winery yet, when you come out and have the tour from Ryan or Warren or Eric Offit, our winemaker, it's just remarkable. It's the highest elevation in Clarksburg and you can see for miles and it's just. It's very cool up there. 

07:21 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
I think my favorite you know, my favorite aspect of the winery is probably the barrel, the barrel room, I mean it's just it's. You walk in there and you really kind of puts into perspective our barrel program. 

07:32 - Jody Bogle (Host)
How big is it? 

07:33 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
So it's a 200,000 square foot building. It's 800 feet long, so the capacity of the barrel building is roughly 100,000 barrels 800 feet long, so two and a half football fields, two and a half football fields. 

07:46 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Full of barrels. That's impressive and when people see it, I think everyone has the same thought. Just wow, eric Offit is going to be on to talk about the barrel program on a future episode and I can't wait to hear from him directly about that. I know he feels so passionate about the Barrel Program. So at the winery, the winery is certified sustainable. Talk a little bit about what makes the winery sustainable and how that's different from our vineyard certification. 

08:14 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
So the winery certification is through the California Sustainable Wine Growing Alliance, with the program that we use to certify our vineyards. California rules they don't certify wineries, so the California Sustainable Wine Growing Alliance is actually a certification arm. It's basically their wine institute. So it's a certification process that we have to go through every year. It's audited by a third party and they track everything from energy usage, water usage, new technologies that you're implementing. 

08:50 - Jody Bogle (Host)
So it's actually two completely separate certifications and two separate processes. Correct, that's not easy. Yes, wow. So you mentioned water. Let's talk a little bit about water efficiency at the winery. What are we doing? And you know it's such. You know, water is such a hot topic. You know what are we doing at the winery. 

09:08 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
So at the winery we operate off of well water. So every you know ounce of water that we use we have to pull from the well and you know it costs money. You know to run the pumps and so we're very cognizant of how much water we're using. You know we don't want to just be pumping and pumping and using water recklessly, but you know for the most part, you know we run our numbers and you know, for the audit every year and we're in the you know, the top 25% of you know efficiency. It's also fortunate that we do have this new facility. It was designed in a way that we don't have to use as much water as, say, some of the older facilities do, and then every ounce of water that's used out in the cellar is actually reclaimed. We have processed wastewater ponds that we then, you know, process the water and we reuse it for ag irrigation on the field next to the winery. 

10:07 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Wow, so everything was designed with that in mind. The beauty of designing a new winery is that you get to design with things like that in mind. Correct, Talk a little bit about power too, I mean. In the same vein, powering the winery and the warehouse has become a big part of top of mind. Are we doing anything to reduce our carbon footprint? 

10:29 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
We are so power-wise. You know, all of the pumps that we put in were, all you know, variable frequency drives. I mean high-efficiency VFDs All the lighting is. I mean high-efficiency VFDs, all the lighting is LED on occupancy sensor. So the entire facility was designed to lead. 

10:49 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Silver standards. We didn't go through the lead certification, but it's all designed to lead Silver standards. 

10:55 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
That's fantastic. So yeah, the energy usage, again like with water, because it's a brand-new facility, everything was designed to be as efficient as possible. 

11:06 - Jody Bogle (Host)
And didn't you just finish a second round of solar installation? 

11:10 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
correct. We are currently working on the second round of solar installation. So when we originally designed the facility, we sized a 350-, 350 kilowatt solar array on the roof of the barrel building. And that was built to basically accommodate another 650 kilowatts, and so that is actually being installed. 

11:31
knock on wood hopefully this year where it's going through the permitting process and PG&E has to. You know, a lot of their equipment out in our area is a little antiquated, and so we're working with them to get our permits in place. We did just install solar up on the distribution warehouse up at Carlin Drive in West Sacramento and that will actually offset 100% of the energy usage at that building. 

11:58 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Wow, it's 100%. 100%. That's incredible. So you mentioned the Carlin Warehouse. Yes, when we originally built the winery, we had anticipated doing everything there, you know, cellaring, barreling, crushing, cellaring barreling, bottling and warehousing. Where did the Carlin Warehouse come from? 

12:18 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Well, when we looked at you know, you know how much wine we actually have to store and Eric didn't want to give up his barrel warehouse just for case goods storage we decided it would be a better idea to house it offsite. We thought about building a secondary building on the winery premises for case goods. But one of the other problems is trucking. A lot of the over-the-road trucks that come from the distributors. They have the sleeper cabs and they're just a little bit too long to get to and from. 

12:49 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Park Street, out off of those levee roads. 

12:52 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Yeah, a little bit safer to have them just go to the industrial park More convenient, fewer emissions. 

12:58 - Jody Bogle (Host)
It really works for everybody. Yes, and at our Carlin Warehouse in West Sacramento. That's where the marketing and the sales team's offices are, as well as all the warehouse distributions, so it's pretty incredible how big is that warehouse as well as direct-to-consumer. 

13:14 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
You're right, and your DTC up there. Special labeling for your export sales too. 

13:20 - Jody Bogle (Host)
All the things that I bring to the table. Yes, so yes. 

13:24 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
You asked how big the warehouse is. It's 220,000 square feet and so roughly we can, we can store about a you know 1.2 million cases in there. 

13:34 - Jody Bogle (Host)
So, going back to the winery, is there anything? Are there any new processes or any new equipment that we're going to be bringing in in the foreseeable future? 

13:43 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
I mean, we're always looking at, you know, new innovations, new technology that we can use at the winery. Right now we're looking at a replacement filter for our old kind of RotoVac, old diatomaceous earth filter. We're looking at a filtration system that kind of does away with that for, basically, employee welfare. I mean, the diatomaceous earth is, you know, our employees have to wear masks when they use it. It's just kind of a dirty, dirty filter media. 

14:09 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Didn't you used to have to get in the tanks and shovel that? 

14:12 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
stuff out. Yeah, a long long time ago, when you were small, you could still fit in there. And then, yeah, I mean we're also looking at an upgrade store bottling line. There's always something going on with the facilities. 

14:24 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Here's a couple questions that I think you know we'd be remiss if we didn't talk about. Right, how many cases can we produce at the winery, or are we producing now, and what is our capability Right now? 

14:36 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
we're producing roughly 2.8 million cases a year and all the brands are made there, all brands, even Elemental Even Elemental. We did have to make some tweaks to the— Just a few. 

14:46
Just a few tweaks to the bottling line in order to be able to bottle that. But you know that's a tough question. I mean, there's certain, I guess, choke points where, if you know on our total capacity and what we could produce, on our total capacity and what we could produce, I think we could get to three and a half as we're currently configured with you know different, you know bottling at different times and being able to open up tank space for crush. But I think we could probably get to roughly 3.5. But, like I said earlier, you know we have space to grow and so on that footprint, you know we could grow six, eight million cases. So yeah, there's lots of blue sky, even with my little small lots and my little 7,000 gallon tanks, even with your small lots. 

15:35 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Yes, how many employees work for Vogel now? Ryan? 

15:40 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
We're roughly at 150,. I believe employees full-time employees, and then you know, that number swells a little bit when we get into harvest. We bring on about 25 temps or so. 

15:52 - Jody Bogle (Host)
And it's safe to say, we're the largest employer in Clarksburg. 

15:56 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
In Clarksburg. 

15:57 - Jody Bogle (Host)
yes, and what's really great is I think it's so funny. Clarksburg is such a small town, there's no stoplights. I think it's so funny Clarksburg is such a small town, there's no stoplights, and so people driving out off of Jefferson come upon the winery and just are shocked by oh my goodness, what is this out here? It's important to note that it's not open to the public. We obviously welcome sales staff and industry folks when they're out in the area to come and see it. We want them to come have a tour with Ryan or Eric Offit and to see it, because once you see how we make wine out there, a lot of things kind of fall into place. 

16:33 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Remember when we first opened it we were kind of reluctant to even show people from the industry, you know we didn't necessarily want them to know how big we were, but now it really is. It's a point of pride, the way we are making wine there, being able to show people that barrel room, show them the small lot tanks show them, just the winery in general, the quality of the team and the care that goes into it. 

17:01 - Jody Bogle (Host)
I've had people say to me who do a lot of winery tours, people in the industry, and their comment is always it is so clean and spotless and everything is in, working, repair and everything, just the high quality of everything. There is always such a point of differentiation for folks who do a lot of winery tours and, like you said, the winery is definitely a point of pride. One last question Everyone's getting this question Are you ready? 

17:30 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Maybe let's see. 

17:31 - Jody Bogle (Host)
What's your weekend? Wine, tune and food. 

17:36 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
Weekend wine is Well. Again, it depends on I guess that goes to the food. If I'm having a steak dinner, it's the juggernaut cab, but just sitting around the house, maybe watching a show, maybe the Bogle Mainline Pinot Noir is probably my go-to, my tune. 

17:58 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Tune or tunes Tunes. 

18:01 - Ryan Bogle (Guest)
You know, I like Black Keys radio, and then food. Like I said, I'd like a nice steak on the weekend with the juggernaut cap the simple pleasures. 

18:11 - Jody Bogle (Host)
Yeah, all right, thanks, ryan, yeah thank you. Thank you for listening to the Bogle Story. We are happy to have you be a part of it.