Don Sebastiani & Sons next year will break from a four-generation focus on wine to introduce products in three new non-vino categories.
Or, to put it another way – anyone for nuts?
Company president Donny Sebastiani described the company’s foray into flavored nuts, ultra-premium tequilas and specialty bottled water as a grab for a greater footprint on your entertaining tabletop.
Is Sebastiani serious? Bored with wine? Or just testing the waters with these three new endeavors?
“We’re really committed to this,” said Sebastiani. “These products were carefully selected and we’ve been thinking about and working on this for a long time.”
The line of flavored nuts will be introduced first, in early 2016, with the water and tequila to follow later in the year. As of today, only the nut line has been trademarked, and in what is either marketing genius or folly, they are calling the specialty nuts “U Gottabee Nutz.”
The specific dry-roasted flavors are yet to be finalized.
“We are testing them to make sure that they really go well with wine,” Sebastiani said.
The specialty water line will be sourced outside of California, in a nod to the current drought. Pure water will be infused with the juice of various wine varietals, but have zero calories and no alcohol content. “It will be a way for people to enjoy something special but non-alcoholic with a meal.”
Sebastiani said that his father has been wanting to do a line of waters for almost 20 years.
The line of premium tequilas, he added, enables Don & Sons to offer a different choice to go with a meal or a cocktail beforehand. The exact tequila formulation is still on the drawing board.
There isn’t a specific demographic target in mind for these products, Sebastiani said.
“We spend a lot of time thinking about conviviality and a mindset,” Sebastiani said. “The moment is our target, not a specific age bracket – that lifestyle moment when you get home or have friends over and open a bottle of wine.”
He said, wine “doesn’t exist in a vacuum.”
“We want to elevate the moment and inspire a memorable experience,” said Sebastiani, “beyond eating as a transaction.”
With the popularity of Sonoma Valley as a destination for lifestyle tourism, Sebastiani noted that people look to Sonoma for cues on trends in entertaining.
All three of these new product lines are geared toward a premium audience because, as Sebastiani explained it, “The country is split with more people at the top of the economic spectrum and more people at the bottom. Aiming for the middle isn’t very logical anymore. So we’re developing premium craft products that are still affordable.”
Parsing the expanding Sebastiani dynasty in Sonoma Valley is complicated. Don Sebastiani senior, it seems, continues to be involved in everything – and there are some ownership overlaps. But Donny oversees the day-to-day operations of the Don & Sons company, whose wine brands include Pepperwood Grove, Smoking Loon and Aquinas. Donny Sebastiani’s older brother August runs The Other Guys, whose brands include Hey Mambo and Leese-Fitch, among others. August has already jumped into the spirit market. His 35 Mable Street line, launched in 2011, includes Uncle Val’s Botanical Gin, Masterson’s Rye Whiskey and Kirk & Sweeney Rum. The Sebastiani family no longer has an ownership stake, however, in the winery that bears its name on Fourth Street East.
While this is the first foray outside the wine category for Don & Sons, there have been a handful of successful specialty food start-ups in Sonoma Valley bearing the Sebastiani name – Donny Sebastiani’s sister launched Mia’s Kitchen pasta sauces, which are now sold all across the country, and cousin Jon Sebastiani’s successful Krave Jerky line sold in early 2015 to Hershey for $315 million.
The Don & Sons team works out of a stylish office across from Maxwell Park. The hip, young bustling staff does all of the logo, packaging, marketing, sales, operations, recipe development and testing in-house. Right now, Don & Sons has 90 employees, 30 in Sonoma, 30 in Napa and 30 who work regionally around the country.
Delving into these new categories has been an eye-opener for Donny Sebastiani and his team, in a good way.
“I was used to the arcane rules in the wine business, and they are different, but similarly arcane, in the liquor business,” Sebastiani said. “But the food and water business is a breath of fresh air. We’re finding it invigorating to be facing such different sets of issues.”
Adds the Don & Sons president: “We will always be a wine business first and foremost, but our wine brands are giving us the platform and opportunity to do other things. And as a benefit, it is likely to pull our wine business forward as well.”
Email Lorna at lorna.sheridan@sonomanews.com.
UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy: