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HUNNICUTT
About Us

What's in a name?

Hunnicutt is my middle name, but it wasn’t until after I released the first HUNNICUTT wines that I learned its true origin. As a young boy I was often teased about this unusual middle name, which bothered me until my father told me about the great General Hunnicutt, a daring and feared presence in America’s Wild West. But years later, when speaking at a dinner to introduce the first vintage of HUNNICUTT wines, my father referenced my grandmother, Nora Hunnicutt, in explaining the origin of the name. When I asked my father about Nora’s relationship to the great “General,” I learned there was no General Hunnicutt, just a tall tale fabricated to boost a young boy’s confidence. General or no general, the Hunnicutt name has now been passed down through another generation to our first daughter, Parker Hunnicutt Stephens.


Story

I founded HUNNICUTT in 2002. I’d spent much of my youth in Napa Valley, where part time jobs included working in the vineyards (de-weeding and catching gophers) and scrubbing tanks and assisting with bottlings at wineries of friends. After graduating from U.C. Berkeley I worked in commercial real estate, but realized that wine was of much greater interest and importance to me. I moved to Napa Valley full time to learn the business from the ground up, and for the next several years I juggled night classes in viticulture, enology, and wine marketing with day jobs at wineries in production, sales and management roles. In 2002, as I continued to work and go to school, I made the leap to develop my own brand, HUNNICUTT, enlisting my good friend and noted winemaker Kirk Venge to make the wines.

In 2010, my wife Seana joined the winery in a marketing capacity, applying her prior experience in advertising with client brands such as Sprint, 24 Hour Fitness and The North Face to the development of the HUNNICUTT winery and brand. Seana, who was introduced to wine years earlier by her father, brings a personal, high-touch approach to her work; she embodies the warm, fun-loving and gracious spirit we strive to create at our small winery. In addition to our day jobs, we are also the busy parents of three young children, Parker, Preston and Beckett.

In 2008 we found a 15-acre site that is now the home of the HUNNICUTT winery. Within a day we put an offer on the property, but it was three and a half years until we were able to crush our first grapes here. In fact it took a year and a half just to dig the 18,000 foot-network of caves. Today, this is where we make all of our HUNNICUTT wines, as well as our sister brand, D. R. Stephens Estate. Our modern yet rustic Tasting Room (decorated with vintage skis and a road bike – testaments to our “off work” pursuits) often serves as the site for entertaining visitors and club members, and the landscaped terrace is where we hold family and club member celebrations.


Team

Justin Stephens

Proprietor

Seana Stephens

Proprietor

Kirk Venge

Winemaker

Annie Corona

Operations Manager

Andrew Bohi

Director of Hospitality

David Robbins

Estate Ambassador

John DeGregory

Estate Ambassador

Mike Dillman

Cellar Master

Salvador Garcia

Cellar Team Lead

Justin Stephens

Proprietor

Justin graduated from the University of California at Berkeley with a B. A. in 1998. Soon after, he began work for a commercial real estate firm in the San Francisco Bay Area. After two years of spending almost every weekend with friends in the Napa Valley, helping at their wineries, Justin realized his true passion was the wine business. Not one to waste time daydreaming, he made the decision to take the next logical step.

He moved to the Napa Valley and began learning the trade from the ground up. Justin’s first job was working as a ‘cellar rat’ during the 2001 harvest at Miner Family Winery. After Miner, he continued his wine business education taking viticulture and œnology classes and working for several other wineries — including Saddleback Cellars and Seavey Vineyards — in various capacities of production, sales and management.

Justin founded HUNNICUTT Wines in 2001 and in 2004 began working for the D. R. Stephens Estate brand – a winery started by his father Don R. Stephens in 1996. Justin is the Managing Partner of Stephens Family Wines, LLC., which now owns both wine brands, as well as Hunnicutt Wine Company, LLC. a company formed in 2008 to develop a custom crush winery in St. Helena. The winery was completed in 2011 and makes wine for 20 other small Napa Valley wine brands.

Justin is married to Seana Kendrick Stephens. They are the parents of Parker (June 10, 2008), Preston (June 1, 2010) and Beckett (May 29, 2012).

Seana Stephens

Proprietor

Seana was introduced to wine at a young age by her father, a wine-lover. Along with her sisters, she was allowed to try sips from his glass at special occasion dinners. Many years later, while interning at a San Francisco advertising agency one summer during college, Seana spent most weekends up in St. Helena and quickly fell in love with the beautiful Napa Valley and her now-husband, Justin.

After graduating from the University of Colorado, Seana moved to San Francisco and dove head-first into the crazy world of advertising. During her ten years of agency life, she worked on brands including Sprint, 24 Hour Fitness, Jamba Juice, HP, Beringer Wines and more.

When she isn’t chasing their two daughters Parker and Preston and a son Beckett; Seana uses her advertising background to help with marketing of the HUNNICUTT brand.

Kirk Venge

Winemaker

As the primary winemaker at HUNNICUTT, Kirk Venge’s solid foundation and passion for winemaking began at a very young age. He grew up in Rutherford, in the heart of the Napa Valley surrounded by some of the best wines and appellations in the world. His childhood memories are steeped in vineyard farming, winemaking and the fragrance of a wine cellar. Some of Kirk’s earliest memories of the winery were when he was four years old helping his father Nils with basket-pressing Cabernet from the family’s Saddleback Vineyard and manning the pump switch on late night barrel racking projects. A game the two of them would play was for Kirk to smell and guess the varietal of wine in a glass when Nils would pal around amongst his peers.

After graduating from St. Helena High School, Kirk ventured off to University of California, Davis to pursue a degree in viticulture and oenology, the study of vineyard management and winemaking. While at Davis, he developed his craft interning with Mumm Napa Valley as experimental winemaker for 5 harvest seasons under the guidance of legendary sparkling winemaker, Gregory Fowler. The experience not only included yeast, malolactic and scion and rootstock trials but the making of premium Carneros Appellation Chardonnay and Pinot Noir table wines as well.

After college and his fourth season at Mumm, Kirk spent the 1999 harvest working with Rapaura Vintners in Marlborough, New Zealand on the South Island. He went back to work for one last harvest at Mumm. That November of the same year he left Mumm and decided to work alongside his father in developing a winery for the Venge Family Reserve wines. Two years later, Kirk shared his winemaking hat with a hard hat to supervise the entire restoration and building of Venge Vineyards at the historic Rossini Ranch property. Nine years later in May of 2008, the Venge family sold the winery and property which allowed Kirk to take the label and branch out on his own.

Kirk’s talent and skill as a winemaker is reflected in the well-balanced wines that he makes. His philosophy of “making wine in the vineyard” is found in every bottle. “Understanding the terroir of a specific vineyard and the hidden potential of that site is imperative to the quality of wine that can be made.” He strives to share ideas with the winery’s growers and work with them to attentively develop the highest quality of fruit that each vineyard can produce. Kirk knows there is no substitute to absolute quality and that the best wines can only come from the best grapes.

Annie Corona

Operations Manager

Born and raised in Napa, Annie’s passion and interest for the wine industry started at a very young age. Spending much of her childhood around food and wine, she worked her way through college in the restaurant industry sharing her fondness for hospitality.  After earning a degree in psychology from CSU San Francisco she returned home to start a career in the wine industry.

She landed her first job at Frog’s Leap Winery as a tasting room associate and was quickly promoted to executive assistant.  Her interest in the business side of the wine industry grew; since then, she has been fortunate to work alongside some of the valley’s greatest Producers.

Annie joins Hunnicutt after spending time at Colgin Cellars, Folio Fine Wine Partners, and Harlan Estate. She loves the feeling of a small winery that cares deeply about its product and its people.

When she isn’t making sure the office is running efficiently, she can be found sharing time with her husband Fred and their three boys, Sebastian, Christian & Adrian.

Andrew Bohi

Director of Hospitality

Andrew was born in Baltimore, MD but only stayed on the East Coast long enough to develop a love of blue crab and the Orioles. At age 11, his family moved to Orange County, CA, where he lived and worked until making the leap to Northern CA and the wine business in 2010.

Andrew came to his love of wine originally through travel, spending the summer of 2006 wandering across Europe and discovering the joy of simple meals paired with wine. He returned home determined to learn more and quickly realized that he had discovered a lifelong passion.

In 2010, he left his job in Southern CA to pursue a career in the wine business and quickly found work during the 2010 harvest at Hook & Ladder Winery. After completing the harvest, he then spent 3 years at Seghesio Family Vineyards, before joining the team at HUNNICUTT as the Hospitality Director.

David Robbins

Estate Ambassador

David’s love for wine was instilled at an early age when his father (a Pediatrician) would dip his pacifier into chilled champagne to soothe his teething pains.  Throughout his twenties, David worked in New York City as a successful recording engineer working with many accomplished artists including Madonna and David Byrne.  It was during this time that he began to voraciously read anything that had to do with wine.  Many producers in NYC even started to refer to him as the “Wine Guy.”

In 1994, David and his wife Letitia visited Napa Valley for the first time and he instantly realized that this was the place for them.  After several more trips over the next few years, they made the decision to quit their jobs, sell their house and head west to follow their dream of wine country living.

Since 1999, David has represented several top Napa producers and became a certified Sommelier in 2009.  His passion for wine is matched only by his enthusiasm in sharing this love with his friends, family and clients.

John DeGregory

Estate Ambassador

A self-proclaimed career nomad, John has spent the better part of three rewarding decades in various facets of the human service industry spanning wine, food and fitness.  A short-lived infatuation with gastronomy brought him to St. Helena in 2000 and the Napa Valley Cooking School where he immersed in a professional cooking curriculum.  A bottle of 1997 St. Supéry Cabernet Sauvignon changed the landscape and launched his trajectory into the wine trade and the rest as they say is history!  John has enjoyed meaningful associations with Beringer, Schramsberg, Clif Family and von Strasser wineries among others.

A native Californian, John resides in the hamlet of Calistoga with his wife Susan and their feline tag team duo Gypsy and Buster!  Celebrating this special “sense of place” that is the Napa Valley drives his leisure pursuits.  When not pouring and/or immersing in a bottle of wine, bike packing and ultra-distance cycling sooth the soul along with a passion for creative writing, public speaking and storytelling.

Mike Dillman

Cellar Master

Mike Dillman Escaped from the small town of Etna California at the age of 18. For the next 12 years he worked in the culinary world within California and Ohio.

He switched gears to a career in the wine industry after working with Les Behrens & Lisa Drink-Ward as they were starting Behrens and Hitchcock Winery. Mike later moved to the Napa Valley and honed his winery skills at the likes of Robert Sinskey Vineyards, Clos Pegase, and Behren’s & Hitchcock. Mike also traveled to Australia and worked at Dromana Estates harvests 99 and 00.

As a skilled tradesmen he was an integral part of helping build both Behrens & Hitchcock, as well as HUNNICUTT Winery when we opened our doors in 2011. He continues to help keep the HUNNICUTT wine cellar functioning as a state of the art custom crush facility.

Salvador Garcia

Cellar Team Lead

Salvador Garcia was born in Michoacan Mexico surrounded by women. He has 4 sisters and zero brothers. Salvador has been a part of the Napa Valley community since the early 90s. His first job in the wine industry was working in the cellar at Frank Family Vineyards. After working at Frank Family he worked in construction for a few years, and realized he missed winery work. He started working at HUNNICUTT harvest 2012 and has been an important part our team ever since.


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HUNNICUTT
3524 SILVERADO TRAIL NORTH · SAINT HELENA, CA 94574 · TEL 707-963-2911 · FAX 707-963-2913 · info@hunnicuttwines.com

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