In 1977 Flora and Jerry Komes went looking for a retirement home in the Napa Valley. They were looking for a place where they could sit on the porch and watch grapes grow. A quarter of a century later, they and their children are the proprietors of a unique, highly respected family-operated winery and vineyards. In the process they and their children (spouses included) have found a totally new and satisfying way of life.
The property they selected in 1977 had a lovely, sweeping view of vineyards and the Napa Valley, as well as a vacant house built in 1956 for Louis M. Martini and his family and an old stone winery built in the 1880s, which was sorely in need of help. "It just thrilled the heart out of me", says Flora. Jerry, the recently retired president of Bechtel Corporation, also was taken with the property although he is fond of saying "outside of a home, it had all the things we weren't looking for." Their children Julie Komes Garvey and John Komes also were taken by the magic of the property.
Julie was the first to think about throwing in her families lot with the fledgling venture. "My husband Pat (Garvey) and I communicate often and well but when I volunteered to my parents that we would manage their new vineyard property, it was a totally spontaneous comment! Pat loved his work as a college administrator and I have to admit, his resume would not have given any indication that he had any aptitude for vineyard management. Mom was delighted, Pat was shocked and my Dad said, "Don't give up your day job". After more than a year of taking classes throughout the state on viticulture and enology, we decided to make the move from San Jose to the Napa Valley"
John Komes recollects "Somehow, this property just called to me. There were two century-old "ghost" wineries on the property. One became my home but first I had to evict about two dozen rattlesnakes before I could renovate the building. The other stone building became our winery. My background in contracting enabled me to do the renovations and to appreciate buildings that were here. In addition, I had been making home wine for some time before my father bought the property and so I was anxious to see just what we could do with the grapes that were here. It didn't take much convincing to get the rest of the family involved."
And so, just a little over a year after buying the property, Jerry and Flora had two of their three children and their spouses, Pat and Carrie, ensconced and working on their property.
The first crush at Flora Springs took place in 1977, when grapes were harvested that already grew on the estate, which were vinted by friends of John Komes from the Bay Area. But, the real first crush took place in 1978. "About 50 or 60 of our friends showed up, picked grapes with us, and used home winemaking equipment to produce about 200 cases of wine," John remembers. "We'll never forget it-and we'll never do it again." Julie recalls, "They started dropping like flies when it reached 110 degrees at noon."
In 1980, Flora Springs scored a gold medal in the LA County Fair competition for their 1979 Chardonnay and it was then decided that they needed a winemaker to match the quality of their grapes. Winemaker Ken Deis, who finished and bottled the 1979 Chardonnay, was hired in 1980 and he remains winemaker at Flora Springs to this day.
Ken says, "The 1999 harvest marked my 20th year at Flora Springs. It has been an exciting journey. We started with just a few barrels of wine, a used stainless steel milk tank for a fermenter and lot's of dreams. I think that we have realized many of those dreams but the family continues to raise the bar and set higher goals. My philosophy of winemaking is to always let the fruit express itself-oak and winemaking techniques should never overshadow the grape itself."
Over time our family acquired additional vineyards and that provided the opportunity and temptation to produce a wide array of wines", states John Komes. I believe, however, that each additional wine has taught us more about the winemaking process and has made us better at what we do."
Vineyard manager, and Komes son-in-law, Pat Garvey recalls "When we started in this business, 22 years ago, I was farming 50 acres. Now we have 550 acres in 9 separate locations. Each location has its own challenges and opportunities. I work with 22 other wineries since we sell 80% of our fruit to other wineries. This diversity gives me insight in to many different strategies. Pat continues, "The universities have always been the backbone of knowledge for growers and vintners in the winegrowing business. They continue to fill that role but since phylloxera, we have found that we do not have time for that knowledge to trickle down to us. We need to probe, question and even do our own experimentation. Over a decade ago, I realized that we would be doing a lot of replanting and wanted to be sure that we could make informed choices. I started by setting up a trellis experiment. From my standpoint in the vineyard, I wanted to see how practically the new trellis experiments worked; health of the vines, cost, ease of pruning and farming. I wanted to use the wind and the sun to help me grow healthy fruit, free of mildew and mold. In addition, we needed to assess wine quality. Additional experimentation has given us more arrows in our quiver. We no longer depend on a single rootstock, or trellising strategy. We match rootstocks, trellising, spacing decisions, etc. to the soils and vigor of the vines."
These are strategies that winemaker Ken Deis wholeheartedly agrees with. "We have always had several experiments going on in the winery and vineyards. John and Julie are always asking "why?" and that generates experiments. Many of these small lots have set the stage for new wines. I came to Flora Springs with the concept that I wanted to totally barrel ferment Chardonnay. That is certainly a common practice now but twenty years ago it was still a new concept in California. Lees aging, extended maceration, also were introduced as we learned more about our grapes and making wine from them. We were one of the early proponents of deep blending. Trilogy, our proprietary blend, began as a blend of 1/3 Cabernet, 1/3 Merlot and 1/3 Cabernet Franc." Ken continues "Several years ago, we had so many small lots that we were working with that I realized that there were some real advantages to wider, shallower fermenters. We discovered a new, old idea…open top fermenters into which we could jump in and walk around to resubmerge the cap. It is particularly effective with Pinot Noir. In addition, our new plantings have allowed us to work with new rootstocks, new clones, new trellis systems. More than 10 years ago, Pat Garvey planted Cabernet in an experimental block-the difference was only the trellising. I produced 8 different Cabernets. It was incredible how just the trellis system affected flavor, mouthfeel and quality. Now Pat has 13 rootstocks for us to work with."
Julie Komes Garvey, who is the company's communications director says, "We started with a dream of making good wine. Back then, that's all you had to do and people would come. We didn't have the wine background and experience, so we were always asking ourselves, what can we do better and why are we doing things this way and not that way? It was a wonderful way to grow-back when winemaking, and not marketing, could be your ultimate goal."
Flora Springs currently produces approximately 50,000 cases of wine annually and is very much a family affair. Julie remarks, "There was so much excitement about moving up to St. Helena. It was also a little scary to move into a family business. It has been great for us as a family and it has obviously been a successful enterprise. Our business has been built on a mutual respect and trust. We have tried to identify each other's strengths and areas of influence, and then stay out of the way."
Julie continues, "This is definitely a family affair with my brother John Komes taking the leadership of the winery, my husband Pat Garvey heading up the vineyard part of the business and me involved with sales and public relations. And, now the third generation is taking an active role at the winery with John's son Nat running the tasting room and his wife Anne heading up hospitality."
Julie also says, " Our present is very bright and our future brighter yet. We are blessed to have grapes in great Napa Valley locations: Carneros, Napa, Oakville, Rutherford, St. Helena and our new frontier the Pope Valley. We have had a vineyard in the Pope Valley for about 15 years and have found that it has tremendous potential for Cabernet Sauvignon. We are introducing our Wild Boar Vineyard Cabernet this year and I believe that it will turn many heads. We are so excited about this location that last year we purchased the adjoining property and are currently planting it."
Brother John concurs, "Our future is very bright. This spring we are introducing a number of vineyard designated wines. They speak of place. The French call it terroir. I would define it as a unique location where the soils, the vines, the exposure, and the viticulture all conspire to make something unique. We still advocate blending wines as we do with our Trilogy but vineyard designated wines provide the experience of enjoying wine from the roots up!"
Jerry and Flora must be very proud!!