37 - Garagiste: Doug Minnick talks winemaking for the rule-breakers

Jul 16, 2018, 06:00 AM

Doug Minnick is the co-founder of the Garagiste Festivals (www.californiagaragistes.com), which bring together small, artisan winemakers and wine lovers in various cities across California.

He loves wine, but not in that snobby, intimidating kind of way that the world of wine sometimes holds.

"Garagiste" is a French term originally used in the Bordeaux region to criticize small-production winemakers, sometimes producing out of their garage.

Think rule-breakers and renegades -- driven by their love of wine.

The Garagiste Festivals connect people with ultra-premium and hard-to-find wines. It also raises scholarship funds for future winemakers at Cal Poly University, San Luis Obispo.

Doug is a garagiste himself, sourcing top-quality grapes for his Hoi Polloi Winery (www.hoipolloiwinery.com) that he owns with two other wine lovers. A plural noun in the Greek language, "hoi polloi" translates to "the masses, the common people, riff-raff."

The label has a tasting room called "Double Trouble" in Old Town Newhall, just north of Los Angeles.

Doug joined me on Olympic & Bundy to talk about his background working in the music industry, the wine industry itself and the benefits and challenges of opening a small-production winery like his, what you'll find at the Garagiste Festival and more. 

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Thank you to Doug Minnick!

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