Gallo buys Clos du Bois, Black Box, Estancia, Mark West, Wild Horse, Franciscan, Ravenswood + 23 more!

More than 30 brands will join the Gallo portfolio, including Clos du Bois, Black Box, Estancia, Mark West, Wild Horse, Franciscan, and Ravenswood.

$1.7 Billion.

Included in the purchase were wine brands: Clos du Bois, Black Box, Ravenswood, Estancia, Mark West, Franciscan, Toasted Head, Hogue Cellars, Wild Horse, Blackstone, Vendange, Rex Goliath, Diseno, Hidden Crush, Taylor Country Cellars, Blufeld, Manischewitz, Wild Irish Rose, Arbor Mist, Milestone, La Terre, Taylor Dessert Paul, Masson Dessert, Capri Cribari Dessert, Primal Roots, Taylor NY Table, Paul Masson Table, Simply Naked, Cribari Table, and V.NO.

Also included in the deal were sparking wine brands Cook’s and J. Roget and Paul Masson brandy. The deal adds about 700 employees to the company, and six wine-making facilities. The included wineries are Mission Bell, Turner Road Vintners, Clos du Bois and Wild Horse in California, Hogue Cellars in Washington, and Canandaigua in New York.

Most of the newly-acquired wines are around the $11 price point. Constellation retains all of its beer brands, SVEDKA Vodka, and several other wine labels including the high-profile Robert Mondavi brand family.

The wine and spirits brands to be sold, such as Clos du Bois, Black Box and Mark West, are principally priced at $11 retail and below, and do not include its Robert Mondavi, Prisoner Wine, Kim Crawford, Ruffino, Meiomi and SVEDKA Vodka brands.

Whoa.

Gallo also become a major sponsor with The Institute of Masters of Wine earlier today. Power moves all around.

Aside from Ravenswood, is there a name on that list anyone around here ever cared about?

And speaking of bad taste: the new “Prisoner” winery/tasting room on Hwy 29 is a disgrace. How Napa County allowed that, I have no idea.

Don’t like any of the brands. Hogue is ok entry level wine from Washington. Never like Clos du Bois wines.

Oh no, are they going to change my Cook’s and Arbor Mist?!

The old vine Zins from Ravenswood still have major relevance, despite the shine that’s been taken off since the high volume bottlings took precedence. The rest is just the same mouthful of mouthwash swishing to the other cheek.

It’s interesting what the Constellation press release stresses: “approximately 30 brands from its wine and spirits portfolio principally priced at $11 retail and below…”

“This decision will help enhance organizational focus on a more premium set of wine and spirits brands that better position our company to drive accelerated growth and shareholder value. In turn, Gallo is acquiring a collection of great brands that complement their operational model and business strategy to provide quality products to consumers at every price point.”

No mention of the price point in the Gallo announcement. (If there were a bingo column for corporate press release cliches, “better position our company to drive accelerated growth and shareholder value” would be in there.)

It’s interesting to compare their portfolios of brands. I can’t say I’d have known how these compared to each other in price.

Contellation:
Robert Mondavi. The Prisoner, Kim Crawford, Ruffino, Meiomi, Simi, Schrader Cellars, Mount Veeder Winery and “new premium wine innovations such as Cooper & Thief.”

Gallo:
Barefoot Cellars, Dark Horse, Gallo Family Vineyards, Apothic (a “premium offering”!), Carnivor, Chateau Souverain, Columbia Winery, Ecco Domani, Edna Valley Vineyard, J Vineyards & Winery, Louis M. Martini, MacMurray Estate Vineyards, Mirassou, Orin Swift, Talbott Vineyards, and William Hill Estate, and imports Alamos, Brancaia, La Marca and Las Rocas.

How about a blind taste off between the Prisoner and Orin Swift? Winner take all!

Touché on both points

I actually enjoy Mark West. I think it’s an easy cheap QPR. Granted, I havent had one in many years now.

I think they can revive Ravenswood VB, Franciscan and maybe Clos du Bois like they did with Louis Martini and in the PNW Hogue was a huge brand, so with that and Columbia now they have a real PNW presence.

Black Box is a good scoops, as is Vendange for the C-Store business and gets them in the box and tetra game.

It’s a really big deal as Gallo has been buying up land and now look to find labels to put wine in and higher quality wine that already have some familiarity and equity.

The legendary Paul Masson??!?!?

Did anyone provide solutions?

Since a lot of these people were my customers I find all of this interesting. Wild Horse was founded by the reggae promoter Ken Volk, who sold out some time ago.
Clos du Bois was started by our then retail customer Frank Woods and various investors. In the early 70s, When everyone else was planting cabernet, he decided to plan hundreds of acres of chardonnay and this served him well. Then he sold out to Hiram Walker, which got bought by Allied Lyons, and didn’t that turn into a Jim Beam brand for a while. Or maybe it didn’t…Finally Constellation got it and sold it to Gallo. There’s an MBA thesis in there somewhere.

Franciscan was owned by the late Justin ‘Silver Oak’ Meyer, who once famously remarked that there was no money in selling wine but lots in selling wineries.

Estancia was the brain child of Agustin Huneuus and made some excellent well-priced wines.

Manischewitz…does anybody remember the SammyDavis Jr ads?? Or the Pacific Wine Company Sammy Davis Jr Mr Entertainer decanter…same in three flavors, Strawberry, Daiquiri,
and 61 Latour??

IMHO Constellation made out like a fat rat with this deal, dumping a lot of dead weight from their bloated holdings… Cheers!

Just wondering if Gallo wrote a check? I’ve been ITB for many many moons and in my experience no one can beat Gallo when it comes to marketing.
For $1.7B - IMHO Gallo made out like a bandit.

Yep, they’re pretty much stocking up on what I would consider mostly junk. However, that “junk” probably sells like crazy to 95% of the wine drinking market. You know, those people that don’t hang out here. champagne.gif

The Gallos are very smart and rarely, if ever, make bad moves.

FIFY!