Meeker Wine

Charles and Molly Meeker bought their first vineyard in Sonoma County's Dry Creek Valley in 1977, and thereafter, in 1984, established their winery -- The Meeker Vineyard -- with Charlie as the winemaker. In its early years, the winery specialized in Zinfandel, Cabernet and Chardonnay. The winery's first red wine release, a 1984 Zinfandel, was an i... nstant success, winning eight wine competition medals and becoming the third most awarded Zin in the country that year. Thereafter, among other awards, the 1985 Meeker Zin was a Wine Spectator "Best Buy", the 1986 Zin was a "Spectator Selection", and the 1990 Zin was included among the Wine Spectator's "100 Best Wines of the World". During this period Charlie was also honored to present a Meeker Zinfandel at one of the famous Windows on the World wine dinners in New York. And Zinfandel wasn't the winery's only success - for example, the Spectator gave a 91 to one of Charlie's early Chardonnays. All this while Charlie was working full time in Los Angeles in the motion picture business (first as an attorney, then as a film producer, and later as a studio executive), so his winemaking career was confined to weekend and holiday trips (many, many trips!) to Dry Creek Valley. Finally, in 1990 when Charlie became President of Metro- Goldwyn-Mayer, this two-career life became too much, and the Meekers hired a full time winemaker for the winery. During the 1980's, Meeker wines were generally distributed in a number of states throughout the country, but this began to change in the early 1990's when Sonoma rapidly became a prime target for wine- tasting tourists. At this point, The Meeker Vineyard winery consisted of a 1,664 sq. foot building with no tasting room and only a tiny wine lab in which to welcome growing numbers of visitors. In an act of desperation, we erected a 40-foot-tall tipi (an authentic Sioux tipi in every respect except size) beside the winery and began using it as a tasting room. This crazy idea worked, and the winery was soon deluged with visitors, such ...Read More