Napa Valley
Ryan Waugh got the wine bug at the age of 18 when a friend’s father shared a bottle of wine produced during his birth year. It was a 1976 Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon, Lot 2. Ryan tells Robb Report 672 Napa Wine Club “I was only 18, and for reasons I still can’t fully explain, that wine spoke to me. There was something about it—the sense of place, the story in the bottle, and the feeling it created—that stayed with me. That experience became the inspiration behind everything we do in wine. With every wine we produce, I’m still chasing that same feeling: creating something that truly reflects where it came from and, hopefully, gives someone else that same unforgettable connection I felt all those years ago. I kept that bottle and it accidentally broke during harvest of 2003. My wife put it in a shadow box, and it hangs in the entry way at our home.”
Waugh attended Santa Clara University with the intention of becoming a medical doctor, but as fate would have it, he decided that Napa Valley and the wine world were where he really wanted to be. While at university he worked part time at Savannah-Chanelle in Saratoga, California and after graduating he moved to Napa and eventually became the full-time cellar master at Chateau Potelle. He also worked at several tasting rooms throughout Napa and Sonoma and worked harvests in Australia’s Hunter Valley and McLaren Vale. He admits, “I may not have taken the traditional academic path into winemaking, but my education came from working in cellars, vineyards, tasting rooms, and wine regions around the world—and from learning by doing.”
Ryan is the winemaker while his wife Crystal Kettle Waugh is the director of sales and hospitality. She also manages all aspects of the wine club. Together they produce and sell wines made from Cabernet Sauvignon, Riesling, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Zinfandel, and Merlot. They do not sell their wines through retail outlets and have only a few restaurant friends who carry their wines. Most wine sales are direct to consumer through their wine club. Waugh tells Robb Report 672 Wine Club, “We connect on a human level first and sometimes the connection is so strong that we become a bigger part of each other’s lives, and the relationship transcends wine. A large percentage of our wine club (FOWC – Friends of Waugh Club) are second generation, which is a big testament to our consistency and our ability to connect with people, which is what life is all about.”
