For Napa Valley Grapegrowers’ 50th anniversary, founders recall group’s roots

Howard Yune, Napa Valley Register

Photo by Howard Yune

Before there was a group called the Napa Valley Grapegrowers, there was a group of grape growers who were trying to ensure their livelihoods in the Napa Valley.
Friday evening, before the wine industry nonprofit gathered for a banquet to celebrate its 50th anniversary, two of its founding members reflected on a very different Napa Valley that gave rise to the Grapegrowers — a community in which farmers struggled to have their voices heard.
Ren Harris and Andy Beckstoffer — two of the 10 men who formed the Grapegrowers group in 1975 — met with reporters at the Foley Johnson Winery to look back at the wine world in which they and their industry came of age.

​Despite the rising fame of such local winemaking pioneers as Robert Mondavi, Mike Grgich and Warren Winiarski, grapes in the 1970s were but one farm product among many in the Napa Valley, often overshadowed by fruit and nut orchards, dairies and even Christmas tree farms. The modern-day web of hotels, resorts and fine restaurants that lures throngs of tourists to the Napa Valley was nonexistent.

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