Napa Valley’s 2022 & 2023 Cabernet Sauvignons

BY ANTONIO GALLONI | DECEMBER 19, 2024

Napa Valley is very clearly at an inflection point of tremendous change on many levels. Shifting consumer preferences, vintages with markedly different and at times challenging conditions, and an evolving market are all topics that are front and center in any discussion of Napa Valley today. “May you live in interesting times,” the ancient proverb says. These are definitely interesting times. My annual report covers the bottled 2022 Cabernet Sauvignons and the nascent 2023s from barrel.

Proprietor Tom Futo and longtime winemaker Jason Exposto presented a memorable collection of wines.

 The 2022 Growing Season & Wines

“Apocalyptic.” That’s how Futo winemaker Jason Exposto described the Labor Day heat spike in 2022. It’s as good a descriptor as any.

Although 2022 will mostly be remembered by those critical days in early September when the mercury reached unprecedented levels, the early part of the year was dramatically different. Two thousand twenty-two was quite cool and dry for most of the year. Many producers reported small canopies, low cluster weight and small berries, likely the result of accumulated water stress. Others pointed to water reserves from rain during late fall of 2021 as a mitigating factor. Summer saw a few small heat episodes.

Heat was forecast around Labor Day, something viticulturists and winemakers in Napa Valley are accustomed to. The duration and intensity of that heat, however, were not at all anticipated. When all was said and done, heat persisted for as much as a week in some spots, with temperatures that climbed above 120°F, conditions no one had ever seen before. But understanding the 2022 vintage and the resulting wines requires a more in-depth analysis.

Harvest time at Wheeler Farms, always an exciting time of year.

The 2022 harvest breaks down into three distinct parts. Some vineyards were ripe or close enough to being ready that winemakers simply pulled the trigger and brought the fruit in. At the other end of the spectrum are sites where fruit was further behind in its ripening curve and therefore protected enough from the heat that it was able to sail through and then hang in the aftermath, a period marked by very cold weather and spells of rain just after the heat subsided.

Things were much more complicated for sites that were reaching peak ripeness just as temperatures soared to their most punishing highs. In these cases, fruit literally roasted on the vine to the point where quite a bit of fruit was lost. Merlot was especially hit hard. Further complicating matters is the reality that many wineries rely on outsourced picking. Intensely warm years often result in condensed harvest where many producers are simply not able to pull their fruit off when they want to despite the best of intentions, as was the case in 2022.

Bettina Bryant and winemaker KK Carothers continue to move their wines in the direction of finesse.

The wines are naturally all over the place. Those made from fruit picked before and after the worst of the heat are clearly the most successful. Wines from the middle of the harvest are much more complicated. Diligent sorting was an absolute necessity.

With a few exceptions, the 2022s are lighter in color, body and tannin than wines from typical years. Intense heat bleached color, degraded the tannins and resulted in wines that don’t have the dynamic energy of the best years. Brix levels soared to uncharted levels, meaning many of the 2022s required adjustments in the cellar. These include the addition of water and acid, the bleeding of musts for very light wines and tannin additions, among other techniques. Some wines are surprisingly fresh, suggesting that perhaps some 2023 juice was blended in. Alcohol levels vary quite a bit, depending on when the fruit was picked.

Other wines were simply too penalized to be bottled. Intense heat caused some grapes to ferment on the vine. The risk of high volatile acids and other bacterial outbreaks was elevated, so much so that ETS, the laboratory that provides analysis for many wineries, urged producers to immediately protect their fermenting musts with SO2. Ultimately, several producers decided not to bottle some or all their wines. Winemakers took different approaches in the cellar. Some found the wines hard to extract and therefore gave the wines more time on the skins than they typically would. Others shortened time on the skins for fear of extracting bitter tannins. Winemakers who could used Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot to bolster their blends.

In tasting, 2022 comes down to a wine-by-wine analysis. This is not a vintage that can be discussed with broad strokes. Some wines are superb, others are highly problematic, and many are in between. Two thousand twenty-two follows other vintages like 2017 and 2020, where severe heat resulted in blocked ripening. Of course, both of those vintages were marked by intense fires. In tasting, the 2017s and 2020s feel like slightly incomplete wines, as if something is missing. The best 2022s don’t come across that way at all. They are lighter wines, to be sure, but the best show excellent balance and taste like wines where the volume has simply been turned down. Readers will find much more information in the accompanying reviews and producer commentaries.

The Togni estate vineyard on Spring Mountain, just after harvest 2024. These remain some of the most impressively built, ageworthy wines in Napa Valley.

A First Look at 2023

Two thousand twenty-three saw the return of much more normal conditions, although what constitutes “normal” today is debatable. In any event, abundant rain early on and cool weather throughout the year resulted in an exceptionally late harvest. Some winemakers told me 2023 was colder than 2011, minus the rain during harvest. A blast of heat at the very end was essential in helping cooler, late-ripening sites achieve full maturity, a concern that had started to mount as fall progressed. In some spots, grapes hung so long that tannins began to deteriorate. Frost early on in some spots adversely impacted yields. Generally, though, 2023 is a high-yielding vintage.

A year ago, the mood surrounding 2023 was euphoric. A stream of emails from public relations agencies and trade associations cited varying versions of a “once-in-a-lifetime” vintage. The enthusiasm was understandable. The last Napa Valley vintage without fires or some sort of shock weather event was 2016. In tasting, the 2023s are beautifully aromatic and refined wines. It is, without question, a vintage with many beautiful and exceptional wines. For now, I don’t see 2023 as a truly epic vintage, but time will ultimately tell. The late harvest means many wines were especially embryonic when I tasted them this past fall.

Ric and Toby Forman at the family estate in St. Helena.

The Market Today

It is no secret that the wine market has hit a bump. In 2024, for the first time I can remember, some fruit was not harvested at all. To be sure, top sites found buyers, but past the elite level of vineyards, things are much more complex. “This is the worst market for grapes since 2008,” one of Napa Valley’s most respected vineyard managers told me, echoing the sentiments of many of his colleagues. In 2008, the diagnosis was simple. The economy was recovering from the subprime meltdown. Episodes like this, while traumatic, have a beginning and, eventually, an end. Today, trying to understand the reasons why the wine market has slowed down is much more complicated. Most likely, various factors are at play. The solutions, or the way out, are not nearly as obvious as they were fifteen years ago.

With regard to Napa Valley, wine prices are very high. Some of that is the result of grape prices that have accelerated too fast for what those prices imply in bottle prices that the market is not accepting. Post-pandemic, hotel prices are through the roof. Nearby Sonoma, once less appealing in terms of options for the inquisitive oenophile, now offers many more choices for wine, food and lodging than at any time in the past. The last 10-15 years have seen a proliferation of new projects, many of them of exceptionally high quality. When I looked at my first Napa Valley report recently, published in 2011, I was shocked to see how many wineries I cover today that I did not cover back then. It’s a crowded market. Lastly, today’s consumers, especially younger consumers, do not want to be tied down to buying large amounts of wine from a single winery, rather they want to explore the full breadth of what is available to them.

I was surprised to see this photo of Warren Winiarski and John Kongsgaard at the Kongsgaard home because I took it after visiting Winiarski’s Arcadia vineyard during research on our Coombsville map. It was a poignant reminder of how curious and dynamic Winiarski remained in his later years, and of all the people he influenced.

Whether the current slowdown reflects a temporary situation or broader, more secular trends remains to be seen. Business is down for many, if not most, wineries. Of course, some of this depends on perspective and, specifically, whether comparisons are with the post-pandemic boom years or pre-pandemic times. Either way, tourist traffic in Napa Valley is way down. Even the casual observer will notice the lack of congestion on major roads like Highway 29, including during times of the day when most of us do anything to avoid 29. Eateries that used to have lines outside their doors rarely do. Restaurant reservations are easy to come by. Most recently, Chef Thomas Keller announced the closing of his Mexican-themed restaurant La Calenda, citing deteriorating economic conditions. But it’s not gloom and doom everywhere, as evidenced by several recent vineyard transactions and major new winery developments, some of which I discuss later in this report.

Personally, I do not share the pessimistic view of wine that is currently being bandied about. But I do think the wine industry as a whole needs to change its approach to consumers, the way it engages with consumers. To be clear, the same applies to wine publications like ours. Tough times require thoughtful action and leadership. I expect we will see quite a shakeout in the next few years. Bigger winners and, unfortunately, bigger losers.

My tasting at Abreu covered vintages 2023, 2022 and 2021.

Current Trends in Napa Valley

One of the great privileges of this job is tasting with proprietors, winemakers and consultants on a regular basis. Those conversations inform several major trends I have begun to observe:

I. The Rising Influence & Importance of White Wine

I am convinced that the greater precision in today’s wines, in Napa Valley and elsewhere, can be traced back to a growing interest in white wine.

When I started my serious interest in wine, about 30 years ago, pretty much all the wines most people considered reference points were red. Bordeaux and Burgundy featured heavily, with a few wines from Italy, Spain, the Rhône and Napa Valley thrown in. Whites were limited to the occasional bottle from Burgundy, Alsace and Germany. Sure, I may be oversimplifying a bit. But not much. Today, it’s a different story. Those key regions still matter, but today, grower Champagne and whites from around the world have claimed their spots alongside them. This mirrors growing consumer interest in white wine.

Today’s young winemakers have grown up exposed to all of this, in a world far different from that of the preceding generation. They travel more, taste more broadly and generally have a much deeper understanding of what is happening in other regions than their predecessors did, all while working in a world that is no longer dominated by the critical voice of a single individual.

Many of these producers now make white wine. Not surprisingly, their reds are being influenced by this new learning. Making white wine is much less forgiving than red wine. Farming must be more precise. Harvest dates are absolutely critical because the optimal window for picking is much narrower. In red wine, a variation in the timing of harvest mostly affects style before it affects quality. In the production of white wine, a mis-timed harvest can dramatically impact the final result.

Longtime winemaker Elias Fernandez has done a tremendous job at steering the ship at Shafer, gradually shifting the wines toward greater freshness over the last few years.

II. Ageability Matters

It is no secret that wineries can no longer develop on direct mailing list business in the United States. With no more than a handful of exceptions, wineries are being forced to build new markets in Europe and Asia. As wineries start to build that presence, they are meeting a whole new group of trade buyers and consumers who are also new to Napa Valley wines. That audience has grown up on reference-point wines, most often the reds of the Old World. These buyers place a great deal of importance on the ability of wines to age and to improve over time because that is what they have been taught to appreciate and seek out. Proprietors and winemakers have begun to take notice. That’s a big shift from just 10-15 years ago, when many owners, winemakers and consulting winemakers paid little, if any, attention to ageability. “My Cabernets are ten-year wines,” a well-known consulting winemaker told me back then. “That’s what my clients want, and that’s what I give them.” I don’t take an issue with consultants. They are professionals who are hired to do a job, much like an architect is hired to design a building in their signature style. The ultimate responsibility for quality and style of wines rests exclusively with owners.

Nevertheless, the greater focus on structure and ageability today is a huge positive. There is certainly room for wines that are delicious out of the gate and that offer their best drinking young. But those will never be truly pedigreed, serious wines that can stand next to the best wines from around the world. Never.

Winemaker Brittany Sherwood turned out a spectacular set of wines at Heitz Cellar. As always, the Heitz wines are released later than most.

III. Making Great Wine Alone is No Longer Enough

For many years, decades in some cases, wineries could count on a few simple recipes for running businesses with success. One option was to scale a winery to produce volume with the infrastructure needed to push that wine through several channels, including distribution. Another model focused on much smaller production, with an emphasis on extreme quality and direct sales to the end consumer.

Wineries including Harlan Estate, Dalla Valle, Screaming Eagle, Colgin and Bryant got their start in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I am too young to have tasted most of those wines on release. However, I have tasted more than my share of early- and mid-1990s Napa Valley Cabernets over the years to have some sense of how exciting these wines must have been back then. Around this time, many well-known estates fell into a period of complacency, turning out overly technical wines informed by the academic concepts of the day. Other wineries had issues with hygiene [sanitation?]. In 2021, when I tasted the 2001s at age 20, I was shocked to see how many wines were marred by technical flaws such as Brettanomyces, which are exceptionally rare today.

In that context, the new generation of wines found a willing and accepting market. These Cabernets were made in small quantities and by new wineries shrouded in the sort of mystique that was possible in the pre-internet era. Dubbed “cult” Cabernets, the wines gained notable fame, helped by the lavish attention Robert Parker bestowed on them. Although it has become popular today to criticize these wines as overdone, that is a view I do not share. The best wines from this era remain absolute stunners.

Fast forward to today. Consolidation in distribution is a significant obstacle for all wineries that need the representation and reach this channel once offered. The number of brands in Napa Valley has grown significantly over the last decade. Wineries with established mailing lists have an entrenched and loyal customer base. For these wineries, the challenge is renewing the base as older customers age out. That’s a significant issue. Young wineries face a consumer demographic that is intensely curious and very happy to move on to the next hot thing when it inevitably comes along. 

More recently, some of the bigger players have woken up. No longer content to turn out middle-of-the-road offerings, these producers have hired talented young winemakers who are well versed in today’s contemporary approach to farming and making wine. These big players can leverage their well-known brands and tremendous presence in the way smaller wineries simply can’t. They also have something the small players do not, and that is gorgeous physical spaces where they can offer the sort of experiences that today’s consumers crave. The recently re-opened Louis M. Martini winery in St. Helena is a stunning spot where guests can enjoy the new Martini wines in a historic building with striking modern appointments. Robert Mondavi Winery has a new space in the city of Napa and is scheduled to open their hospitality center at the To Kalon Vineyard in 2026 following a renovation that will cost more than $100 million. Martini and Mondavi are examples of legacy brands that are now making outstanding wines and can now offer their fans a complete experience, with bottle prices that are reasonable by Napa Valley standards.

Tasting the entire BOND range across three vintages yields notable insights into the evolution of style here.

Of course, visits and tastings do not have to be grand to be impactful. I see many smaller wineries offering tailored, intimate tastings, vineyard visits, library tastings and all sorts of other programs that move the consumer closer to wine. Blankiet, Heitz and Realm are among the wineries that offer fun and educational tastings. Cathy Corison regularly pours library vintages for guests at her winery. Many other winemakers offer vineyard tours and other highly personalized visits. I am sure there are numerous other examples, these are just some that I have come across.

The overall direction, though, is clear. Making great wine alone is no longer enough. This is true for every winery. For those that have not crossed this bridge yet, the only question is when, not if.

Erin and Massimo Di Costanzo represent the new generation of winemakers in California. Their cool-climate Cabernets from vineyards in Napa Valley and nearby Sonoma are vivid and distinctive.

I tasted most of the wines in this report in late September and early October 2024, with follow-up tastings in our offices in New York in the weeks after. This article focuses on Napa Valley but also includes wines from neighboring appellations made by winemakers based in Napa. Because of the sheer size of this report and our desire to provide meaningful, in-depth coverage, tasting all the wines at once is simply not possible. We will be publishing updates to this report in the coming weeks.

© 2024, Vinous. No portion of this article may be copied, shared or re-distributed without prior consent from Vinous. Doing so is not only a violation of our copyright, but also threatens the survival of independent wine criticism.

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