A Conversation With ... Andrew Pennington

You have your vineyard and winemaking facility all on one site here in Carthage. Tell me about the size of your production.
There’s over 10,000 liters of tanks sitting in here; that’s equivalent to roughly 4,000 gallons. So, we’re very boutique. Everything I do is handpicked. All of our wines are hand bottled. I usually make everything in about 100 cases. We produce about 15,000 to 20,000 bottles [annually]. All the grapes get fermented in these big tanks. This facility was built just for this production. We have an amazing community that supports us.

What kind of wine do you produce?
We do roughly six different types of wine: three dries, three sweets. And some low-lot specialty vintages. We do a crimson cab and a norton that only get released to wine club members. There’s even some single-barrel varietals of wine that I only do 300 bottles. The reason I do low lots is because I can control the fruit. We do buy fruit from other vineyards. I really want to know what my growers are doing with their vineyards, so when I pour a glass of wine, I can tell people where these grapes have been and what they’ve done. Because the grape is where the story begins.

What’s your background in winemaking?
I’ve been a winemaker for the last 18 years. I was a head winemaker when I just turned 21. About a year later, we started planting some vines. Year after year, we constantly got a little better, did a little more grapes, did a little better in the wine production, things just kind of took hold. As I grew that brand to a certain size, it was wonderful from the cash evaluation of it, but they were concerned about quantity more than quality, so I pulled back.

You started on your own with winemaking through Pennington Wines in 2022, but you began growing grapes to sell many years before that. Tell me about the growth of your vineyard.
When I started, there were 66 vines of six different varieties, and that was 2010. Starting in 2011, we realized we really need a little bit more production. At that point, we went to two acres. We planted a white variety and a red variety. Our Norton, Missouri state’s wine grape; our Cayuga white, that is a big, beautiful riesling style wine. Of course, that wasn’t enough. So, we put in another two acres. In 2013, we started planting another block with 888 vines in it. Everything you see out here, these holes have been hand dug and these vines have been hand planted. I’m a wine grower, not a winemaker. The reality of what we do is that good wine is just well-grown grapes. You cannot take a bad grape and make a good wine out of it. It’s like trying to take a rotten apple and make a good apple pie out of it. It’s just not going to happen.

Tell me about this year’s climate and how you think that that’s going to impact the crop.
This is a particularly important time of year because that’s when that fruit starts to set. The temperature is going to really dictate what’s going to happen. Everything is doing really well. I’m a little concerned about the temperature fluctuations, according to just bud break and freeze potentials. But the nice cool evenings with the nice warm afternoons are really going to give us a beautifully ripe, full wine. You’re going to see a lot of aroma and texture out of these wines this year.

Other than your wine club, you sell through wholesale partners. What stores do you work with, and do you have plans to grow distribution?
We do try to spread ourselves out because at my last winery, we made some great wines, but you could only find it in one location. I want people to have the access to great wine. We try to connect with small, community members trying to make a relationship of selling wine. I’d much rather sell them a little bit of wine every month than a whole bunch of wine. I never want wine just dusting on a shelf.

Missouri was at one point a crucial part of U.S. wine production before that industry was lost during Prohibition. What is the state of the industry now?
Missouri was the biggest exporter at the turn of the century for wine. We are solely responsible for saving the French from the phylloxera, with a bunch of help from other scientists. But really what that was was a strong foundation of quality and community. No matter if I’m talking to my friends that make half a million gallons, or the guy down the road that will make 100 gallons for his little farm winery, they really just care about wine. When we get together a couple times a year to try each other’s wines, we just taste these wines and then we see how to make them better. We want everybody to experience Missouri wine, to experience our passion, our connection, our desire to just craft an excellent wine. Really what it boils down is the rocks. We’ve actually added a lot of top soil, but even these beautiful Nortons are literally on only two to four inches of soil. That hard minerality in Missouri terroir is just like in Champagne in France. It really gives you that gorgeous minerality, that texture, especially when you’re drinking the chambourcin.

California is the king of wine production in the U.S. Do you think Missouri wine could grow to rival that, and what would it take to get there?
It takes dedication; it takes passion. It’s manufacturing and economic factors. If you remember drinking cabs when you first started drinking wine, they were 12%, 14% alcohol. People used to love vintage cabernets from the Central Valley, but now go buy a cabernet right now, it’s 16%, 17%. What’s occurring is there’s climate change. Temperatures are getting a little warmer, so that means grapes and regions that grew particularly well for maybe your father’s life and your life are really not growing well for us now. I think there’s going to be a shift in that market in the sense that people will be looking for more unique wines. I think it’s also a combination of how we as consumers want to buy. If you have the option of buying a bottle of wine that was handcrafted or from someone that’s never even touched it – a lot of that big box wine is so automated. I really think what it’s going to take for Missouri to be more nationally pronounced is really just a dedication to continue. Just trying no matter what to grow good grapes. There’s some massive vineyards in Missouri. And there’s a ton of us. I think it’s more important to have 100 of us than to have just one massive entrepreneur. The craft element is where Missouri could really shine.

Have you won awards for your wines?
Last year we sent our 2022 chambourcin off to the Finger Lakes International Wine Competition, and that is a big competition with wineries worldwide. The announcement came out, and I hope we get a mention. Our Ruby Sky won the bronze medal, our [Forager] won a silver ... and our Chambourcin 2022 [won] double gold. Our 1,200 bottles of wine that we produced off that vintage brought home a double gold from the international wine competition. In the last 48 months, we have won over 15 different awards for our wines. I really think that’s just a pursuit of quality.