Family Wine Legacy | Denise McKahn | Barrels and Roots

In this episode of Barrels and Roots, I sit down with Denise McKahn, CEO of McKahn Wines, to talk about building a family wine brand, falling into the wine industry from an accounting background, and learning how to sell wine in a world where the market is shifting fast. Denise shares the moment that sparked her son Chuck’s winemaking journey, a bottle of Cabernet opened at Sunday dinner that basically set his whole career in motion, and how that passion eventually led them to focus on Rhone varietals like Viognier and Syrah. We get into why Rhone-style wines deserve more love, how harder-to-find grapes like Syrah create real sourcing challenges in Napa, and what it looks like to run a small winery during the current wine industry slowdown. We also talk about legacy, family business boundaries, women in wine leadership, wine tasting without intimidation, and why you do not need an estate vineyard to make great wine. If you care about Napa Valley, Sonoma wine, Livermore roots, Rhone varietals, small winery survival, or the real behind-the-scenes of wine sales and marketing, you’re going to like this one.