Grace Family Vineyards heals the planet via wine

The name of this winery popped out at me while browsing through a book on interesting wine factoids. Grace Family Vineyards planted their vines in 1976, long before Napa was known as a wine growing region. It also turns out that the owner, Dick Grace, and his family have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to children’s charities in Mexico, Nepal and India as well as helping the homeless of San Francisco and constructing health clinics around the world through the Grace Family Foundation.

The Grace Family Vineyards is a very small Napa Valley winery focused on extremely high quality. It is one of the most unique wineries in existence due to it’s owner, whose son Kirk manages the vineyard which is farmed organically using biodynamic techniques. Grace has adopted many Buddhist beliefs and tries to use the winery and its profits as “a catalyst for healing our planet."

The Grace family hand paint large format bottles which are then donated to charity auctions. One bottle fetched over $90,000 at an auction serving Boys and Girls Clubs of America a few years back. I think it’s so inspiring that this family is doing what they love and giving back in such an enormous way.

I’ll probably never get a chance to swish a Grace Family Cabernet around in my mouth, but I like just knowing there are people out there who are swishing, and that their swishing is benefiting others less fortunate.

Huge Cheers to Dick Grace and his family!