ANALYSIS l Gem State Report
Walla Walla-based Proletariat Wine Co. set to build facility near Boise By Jim Thomssen
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OISE, Idaho — Wineries in the Walla Walla Valley and the Columbia Valley successfully woo consumers in Idaho’s Snake River Valley, requiring a four-hour drive to the northwest. On the other hand, it’s rare to see a vintner based in Walla Walla invest in Idaho, yet that’s exactly what Proletariat Wine Co., is doing. Led by winemaker Sean Boyd of acclaimed Rôtie Cellars, Proletariat is best known for its keg wine program, which now spans eight states, including Texas and the Carolinas. Keg wines have long made sense for restaurants because customers get fresh wine at a value while the restaurateur achieves nicer margins. They can provide higher-quality wine for diners while cutting down on waste, storage and figuring out how to recycle all those glass bottles. Coming out of the pandemic, bars and restaurants seem to be consolidating their wine offerings while focusing on more casual outdoor dining options. The rising cost of bottles and supply chain issues make the economics of keg wines and by-the-glass sales even more appealing. So, why would a company that sells 80% of its production in five-gallon aluminum containers build a tasting room more than 200 miles away from its main production facility near the Walla Walla Regional Airport? Idaho residents make up most of the ownership. Elizabeth Baggerly and her husband, Tracy, were enjoying life in the Treasure Valley in the early 2000s. They built a home and raised their family in Horseshoe Bend, a rural bedroom community in the hills north of Boise. Tracy achieved success as a financial planner and helped launch the Eagle Rodeo while Elizabeth worked for Hewlett-Packard on its Boise campus. Some close friends moved to Walla Walla, so the Baggerlys found themselves visiting that emerging wine region. Those trips, as well as a “vine to wine” education series at Ste. Chapelle Winery on the Sunnyslope west of Eagle, planted a seed for Elizabeth to nurture as she began to transition out of the tech sector. Meanwhile, longtime friend Scott Burum was the manager/sommelier at a Boise hotspot — Angell’s Bar & Grill. He often lamented how having 27 various bottles of wine open
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each night at the restaurant created an immense different once a bottle is opened. They also proamount of waste because once the cork is vided the necessary equipment to the restaurant pulled, the clock is ticking on the quality of any trade at cost to help increase the uptake of the wine. keg wine concept. Another friend, Scott Thompson, a seriRestaurants rapidly warmed up to the idea. al entrepreneur of sorts, was searching for In 2011, there were only about 70 options for something that was more fun than his existing “containerized wine” registered in Washington endeavors. Add in a chance meeting with Boyd state. Today, there are more than 1,000. — one of the Northwest’s biggest talents with Fast forward to 2019. Proletariat was selling varieties native to the Rhône Valley in southern the equivalent of 11,000 cases of wine, most of France — and Proletariat Wine Co., went from it in the Pacific Northwest, and a by-the-bottle a dream to reality in 2011. club was born. “A Tahoe pulled up and asked to taste Rôtie, All this led to the idea of opening a tasting which not many people knew about,” Boyd room to help increase the bottle sales and says. “EB (Elizabeth) has always had the inside spread the word about their wines. With most track on everything wine in Boise and Walla of the team living in the Snake River Valley, it Walla, so we tasted through the Rôtie lineup on a table I made out of a pallet, forklift and some type of cloth. “When we were done tasting I said what would you like to purchase. They said ‘Three of these, three of these and four of these’ or something like that,” Boyd continued. “I brought 10 bottles down in a case. They laughed and said ‘We want cases, not bottles.’ So the Tahoe left as a lowrider and I thought that Boise must be lined in gold! So I became their friend as a pure gold digger!” The focus was to “bring high-quality, otherwise expensively priced wines to wine lovers everywhere … at very reasonable prices.” With an eye toward sustainability and the environment, they concentrated on putting really good wine into refillable containers that were charged with nitrogen to reduce the oxidation that Sean Boyd, acclaimed winemaker for Walla Walla’s Rôtie Cellars, spearheads makes wine RICHARD DUVAL IMAGES Proletariat’s keg wine program. start to taste
