• Tell me a little about the winery

Clos LaChance was founded by Bill and Brenda Murphy in 1992. The inspiration to start a winery stemmed from their ¾ of an acre backyard Chardonnay vineyard. First vintage was a couple hundred cases of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, sourced from the home vineyard and a few select sites in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The winery bug hit them hard—they loved the lifestyle and were hoping to build a family‐owned and operated business to share with the rest of the family—daughters Cheryl (me) and Kristin. We are now producing 60,000 cases of Estate wines from our vineyard in San Martin (Northern Central Coast), California. The name Clos LaChance comes from the French word for small, enclosed are (like a vineyard) and LaChance is Brenda’s maiden name.

We chose hummingbirds as the symbol for Clos LaChance because they are the only birds that are welcome in a vineyard. They do not eat the fruit….and they are so territorial that they chase away other grape‐eating birds.

• What got you interested and how long has the winery been on twitter

We started with Facebook as our intro into social networking. After going to a seminar at the Family Winemakers Tasting last year, we realized we needed to get on Twitter as a means to communicate whats going on at the winery. We also use it to follow other wineries, bloggers, sommeliers and general wine enthusiasts to see what the latest trends are, what people are drinking. I don’t think we have taken full advantage of what a powerful tool Twitter is….but we are working on it and hope to use it more often.

• I noticed that allot of your staff is on twitter do you use it to communicate with each other or mostly to communicate news about the winery

Being so close to Silicon Valley….we are all tech geeks here and early adapters with cool cell phones etc, so Twitter and Facebook have become a big part of everyone’s personal life as well. As a family owned business, employees are like family—and, we hope—the winery and the wine country lifestyle is more than just a job, its incorporated into everyone’s daily life. So it’s only natural that our employees would twitter about the winery and what’s going on here—we spend half our waking life here (sometimes it seems like more!).

• You have a blog who posts on your blog and what do you post

Mostly it’s me (Cheryl Durzy, VP of Sales and Marketing) who posts on the blog. We also do video blogs when there is cool visual stuff to talk about (harvest, vineyards etc). I try and post when I have something to say…..usually about things that are going on at the winery but also industry topics. I don’t think many people read my blog, but that’s okay. I like to write so it gives me an outlet. My parents always tell me how much they like it (but I think they kind of have to say that…). I am very proud that we are listed in Wine Business Monthly as a good winery blog to read. Once when I wrote about Safeway my blog was on the Wine Business Monthly daily read list. I was in a WSET class and someone mentioned they had read it…..I was blown away.

The Hummingbird Series is a line of wines that are meant for everyday consumption. We hope that when people taste them—their first thought is “wow, I would have paid more for that.” The grapes used for these wines are sourced from the Estate vineyard and purchased grapes as well. These are the wines that are a little more widely available and I think appropriate for the economic times right now. Good wines, good price. Drink now—although the reds would lay down for a few years for sure.

• Are you on Facebook and Myspace and how has social media affected and changed marketing and selling of your wines?

We are on Facebook right now. Haven’t really looked into MySpace at this time, but it’s not out of the question. Social media has certainly kept us more busy…it’s a lot of work. It’s hard to measure monetarily. I think we chose to invest time into it because of the branding opportunities. As someone who is responsible for incoming revenue, I would certainly like to see more $$ coming in because of this time investment. But like any good marketing program, this is for the long term. We like to think we are ahead of the curve….and hopefully that will pay off in the future.

• What are your long term plans for the winery

To have Clos LaChance recognized as one of the top wineries and brands in the Northern Central Coast. To continue as a family owned and operated winery. To make incredible wines from the estate vineyard, and yeah, get a little recognition for them. To have a productive, happy and healthy workplace. For the 2nd generation to run a successful business and hopefully pass it along to the 3rd (my kids—AJ, 5 and Lila, 2….we have time, but my dad is working on early admissions into UC Davis for them already).