Matthiasson Family Vineyards, Jill Matthiasson and Steve Matthiasson

In 2022 we had some successes, and some other goals are frustratingly slow. One of our goals is to address gender inequality in vineyard and wine production, and one big success was that we were able to continue to train and support our new (as of 2021) female vineyard crew leader. Our harvest interns were also four out of five women, for the second year in a row. Another goal is to mentor BIPOC, queer, and other marginalized people in the industry, and to that end Steve spent another year with the 280 Project trying to open doors and decode the industry, along with sharing a love of viticulture. Steve also started teaching a class at UC Davis on organic viticulture for any students who are interested, and the 280 Project apprentices were able to attend most of the sessions. 

Our goal of moving to 100% renewable power is slow going, we ordered two electric Monarch tractors, but the expense and permitting associated with the charging infrastructure is a big hurdle that is still in progress. We hope to have that in place later this summer. Likewise in the winery, we purchase MCE Deep Green 100% renewable power, but needed an emergency generator for supplemental power for our chiller during harvest, which was the opposite direction for us. We are now working through the permitting system and hoping to be able to handle the expense of upgrading the power to the winery and getting off of the generator for 2024 harvest (we are probably stuck with it for 2023).

We had a setback in 2022 on glass procurement, and had to resort to imported glass due to shortages. This stimulated us to try to be more scientific in figuring out how include carbon footprint in our glass sourcing (not weight, our glass is already light, but factory fuel source, recycled content, and transportation impact). This is not easy information to dig up, and will probably require a concerted effort by multiple wineries, but should make a big impact if we can get more transparency in that supply chain and include that information when evaluating different glass suppliers. So that is work in progress.