Cline Cellars is a family owned business and running successfully since 1982.  

HISTORY OF CLINE CELLARS

While the rest of the world was in upheaval during the tumultuous days of the early 1970s, family and tradition were very much alive on a bucolic farm in Oakley, California, as Valeriano Jacuzzi - one of the original Italian immigrant brothers of spa fame - showed his grandson Fred Cline how to tease magic from the soil. Fred learned, among other things, how to turn grapes into wine ripe with character and intensity, with full and abundant heart.

Nancy Bunting, herself the product of pioneer family roots, met Fred when they were both students at UC Davis. They married and began a humble winery in Oakley with Fred's small inheritance. Ignoring the hyped-up wine trends of the day, Fred and Nancy chose to restore acres of 100-year-old vines and produce Rhone-style varietals like Mourvedre, Carignane, Marsanne, Roussanne and Viognier. They also planted acres of what would become legendary Cline Cellars Zinfandel.

Today, the Clines own many acres of vineyards throughout Sonoma County, with other properties in Oakley and Tehama County. Passionate about the importance of history, they own and have restored the nearby Dillon Beach Resort, the Mizpah Hotel and Tonopah Brewing Company in Tonopah, NV, and the Villa Laura in Tuscany. They also operate Green String Farm, a 150-acre working farm that produces a variety of fruits and vegetables grown on soil that is tended and nurtured without toxic chemicals. The produce from Green String is used by such culinary luminaries as Alice Waters of Chez Panisse. Their oldest son Ramsey operates the Mizpah Club, a casino and entertainment complex in Tonopah.

A tribute to Fred Cline's maternal grandfather, Valeriano Jacuzzi, one of seven brothers who were pioneers in American aviation and water pumps, and who taught Fred the fine art of old-world winemaking. Jacuzzi Family Vineyards specializes in Italian varietals such as Montepulciano, Sangiovese, Lagrein, and Barbera. The winery, which opened in 2007 across the street from Cline Cellars, is modelled on the Jacuzzi family home in northern Italy.

Cline Family Cellars seek complexity, elegance, power and sense of place in every wine they make.

Cline Family Cellars craft their wines combining timeless techniques and modern technology that work in concert with each varietal, utilizing thoughtful wine growing, gentle handling, attentive sorting, and meticulous blending to achieve wines of great flavour at a great price. 

They star winemaker Charlie Tsegeletos is a master at the art of making stylish Zinfandel, Rhône and cool-climate varietal wines. He works with his team to monitor the vineyards throughout the year and make decisions that affect the winemaking process and brings out the best varietal character in the fruit.

Woolly Weeders

Cline Cellars use over 1500 sheep and 500 goats to remove harmful weeds from our vineyards. Goats aren’t as picky about what they eat unlike sheep, goats will eat the leaves and berries from the vines, while sheep tend to stick to the ground cover. Sheep and goats are brought out in February to March to clean the vine rows. Sheep alone are used in the summer months (July-September) to help leaf vines so sunlight can ripen the fruit and to clean up the summer weeds on the land's surface. The animals are put out together once more in November to clean up any residues after harvest

Pest Control

Pests come in all forms- but none are really truly pests, they are all indicators of the health of an ecosystem. The night owl and the day hawk are the predators of the gopher and mice and these predators maintain ecological control, just as the spiders swarm up on the grasses to the canopy of the vines feeding upon mites and leafhoppers.

The vine as all other organisms has a complete immunological system, if its nutrition is in balance it will not be sick, and it will not get bugs. Cline Cellars rely on nature to control pests with no use of harmful pesticides.

One weakness which Cline has yet succeeded in understanding is powdery mildew, this is managed with bi-weekly applications of naturally mined organic sulfur-free of contaminants at roughly 7 pounds per acre.

Our Wines

Bridgehead Zinfandel 

The most refined and elegant of our nine Zinfandels. Spice, bright blackberry and toasty vanilla flavours join with fine-grained structure, balanced acids and smooth tannins. This wine will age beautifully over the next 5 to 7 years.

SPECIFICATIONS

Our Bridgehead vineyard is named for Bridgehead Road in Oakley, California, to which it runs adjacent. This vineyard consistently produces one of our most individual and refined lots of Zinfandel. Planted by Italian immigrants well before the turn of the century, the vines are head-trained, dry-farmed in sandy soil and engulfed in a unique band of cooling air from the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers this produces a stunning, concentrated harvest.

Heritage Zinfandel

Heritage Zinfandel is big and flavourful, with notes of chocolate, sweet berries, spice and coffee. It’s another big-boned Zinfandel Cline Cellars is known for. The wine’s acidity and tannins are firm, but balanced, creating a luscious wine.

SPECIFICATIONS

The prized 100-year-old Big Break, Live Oak and Bridgehead vineyards in Oakley, planted in deep, sandy soil, dry-farmed and head-pruned, as they were 100 years ago.