The rainbow-colored gay pride flag will be flying high above Sonoma City Hall next weekend, showing that Sonoma is a welcoming and inclusive place, according to Out In the Vineyard co-founder Gary Saperstein.
And for good reason: June 17 to 19 is Gay Wine Weekend in Sonoma.
Seven years ago Saperstein, then general manager of the girl & the fig, and business partner Mark Vogler worked at Treasury Wine Estates.
While Vogler was asked to put on a new event at Chateau St. Jean, Saperstein noticed an increase in LGBT tourism and in more gays making the move to Sonoma. Hence, Vogler thought it was the perfect time to bring the LGBT community together.
They realized that nobody was marketing to the gay community, hence the beginning of Out In the Vineyard, a wine country tourism organization that caters to gay people with superb tours of vineyards, restaurants, wine trains and more.
Their first event attracted 350 people, gay and straight. Two years later the business partners were getting loads of calls asking what vineyards, wineries and restaurants they should visit on their own.
Now in its fifth year, with their next three-day event coming up, Saperstein says, “We are putting heads in the beds which means TOT tax, as well as people dining, shopping and purchasing wine – and some visitors become long-term wine club members while they are here in town.”
Saperstein added that this year’s event begins on Friday, June 17 with an opening reception and expo at MacArthur Place from 3 to 6 p.m. That same evening winemaker dinners will go on throughout Sonoma.
On Saturday wine tours will depart from the host hotel, MacArthur Place, and take guests to some of Sonoma’s finest wineries. Saturday evening, the weekend’s signature event Twilight T-Dance (the “T” is for T-shirt) is being hosted by Chateau St. Jean Winery in Kenwood.
Sunday the annual Recovery Brunch and Wine Auction will take place at MacArthur Place with Chef Dana Jaffe and crew providing a scrumptious and seductive brunch to entice bids in their auction of items such as a pair of tickets to see Barbra Streisand perform at the SAP Center and a full-on wedding for up to75 guests at Bloomfield Farms in Petaluma. One hundred percent of the monies raised from the auction benefit Face to Face, the Sonoma County HIV/AIDS Network.
Gay Wine Weekend winds down with the closing Pool Soiree at MacArthur Place.
For Information and Tickets go to www.gaywineweekend.com.
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