News Briefs California
Foley buys Chalone estate
Healdsburg, Calif.—Bill Foley and Foley Family Wines have purchased Chalone Estate Vineyard in Monterey County. Foley Family Wines is acquiring the Chalone Estate Vineyard and Gavilan brands as well as nearly 1,000 contiguous acres, with 240 acres planted to vines.
The deal accounts for the last major element of Diageo’s former wine division that it began to sell off in October 2015 with a $600 million deal with Treasury Wine Estates. Treasury’s acquisition did not include the Chalone estate or the former Acacia winery in the Carneros AVA. Healdsburg-based Foley now owns Chalone, Treasury owns the Acacia brand and the Peju family purchased the Acacia winery.
Chalone is the only winery in the Chalone AVA and some of the estate vineyards were planted in 1919. The estate also was a source of one of the triumphant wines of the 1976 Judgement of Paris tasting. "We have incredible wineries and vineyards stretching from Lincourt in Solvang, California up to Three Rivers in Walla Walla Washington. Chalone Estate Vineyard, with its great wines and incredible history, gives our consumers and guests world class wine options along the entire coast,” Foley said in the statement announcing the deal.
Diageo bought Chalone, plus its associated wineries and brands (Acacia, Carmenet, Edna Valley, Jade Mountain, Provenance, Sagelands and Canoe Ridge), in late 2004 for $260 million. At the time, Domaines Barons de Rothschild (Lafite) owned 45% of Diageo, which was building its wine business in California and Washington via a series of purchases.
