Leto Cellars

Leto Cellars was founded in 2008 by long time Napa veteran winemaker Brad Warner and his wife Lisa. Their first wine was a Chardonnay. While not owning any vineyards, they work with small family growers in select locations – mostly within Napa Valley.

Brad was born in Sebastopol in neighboring Sonoma County and was raised on the Mendocino coastline of Northern California. He wasn’t really sure what career path interested him after graduating from high school. Part of his extended family owned Warner’s Creamery (known for ice cream, operating in the 1950s and 1960s) at 1910 Mendocino Avenue in Santa Rosa; the site is now home of O’Reilly Auto Parts. They introduced Brad to a couple living in St. Helena at the time who were friends of the family. This couple leased (from Chevron) and ran a gas station in St. Helena. They were looking for someone to manage this gas station and offered the position to Brad.

After two weeks Brad realized running a gas station wasn’t something he was interested in doing for very long – fortuitously, an Italian neighbor, Alfredo Santi who had worked at Charles Krug since the late 1940s invited Brad to come with him to the cellar. This was 1967. Brad’s first winery job in Napa was at Charles Krug cleaning the tops of tanks. As Brad jokes, “I started at the top in the wine business”. It is now in the 2020s and there are very few winemakers still active in Napa Valley who assisted with winemaking in the 1960s.

While working at Charles Krug he was still helping manage the gas station. Vintners would stop by to fill up their tanks; they were the who’s who of Napa Valley at the time – including Louis Martini, Joe Heitz and Robert Mondavi who had just opened his brand-new winery in Oakville. Brad had met Mondavi prior while working at Charles Krug. One day Robert Mondavi stopped into the gas station and invited Brad to come see his new winery.

That first visit turned into a job as a cellar foreman position at Robert Mondavi Winery. For some time, Brad was working 7 days a week for both Mondavi brothers – dividing his time between Charles Krug and Robert Mondavi wineries. He is certainly one of the only ones if not the only one who held down two jobs with the Mondavi brothers.

The invite from Robert to visit his winery turned into a nearly 30-year career working at Mondavi until 1999 working his way up to Mondavi’s Vice President of Production, and then Director of Property & Facilities. It was also a career that afforded him visits to other wine regions including Bordeaux and Burgundy in France, further broadening his winemaking perspective.

Brad became winemaker for Sawyer Cellars in the late 1990s – a role he continues with today.

And of interesting note; Brad’s career at the gas station has come full circle. In 1997 he purchased the old gas station that provided him his first job in the Napa Valley, and he continues to own it today.

After many years of working for Robert Mondavi Brad noticed new wineries would often borrow wine making equipment. In 1991 he started his own company, Rutherford Equipment Rental which focuses on renting a variety of wine making equipment to other wineries and vintners. The name of the company is in homage to Rutherford, where was living at the time. His first equipment was a pressure washer for cleaning winemaking equipment and several tanks. As demand grew, he would purchase more equipment.

His early marketing efforts were by both word of mouth and through someone he hired to physically drop off flyers advertising his services to area wineries. While referrals should still be a part of any healthy business, how times have changed in regard to dropping off flyers. We remember the flyer marketing efforts when we ran a small Internet Service Provider back in the 1990s and used to made trips up and down the state tacking flyers onto bulletin boards at various colleges and shopping centers.

Along with equipment Brad and his team also provide consulting advice when needed – especially relating to wine filtering equipment. Much more recently he started another business called Transition Equipment whose primary services including buying and selling used wine making equipment. And he operates Warner Winery Consulting; with more than 50 years making wine in Napa Valley, his perspective and expertise covers all aspects of cellar needs. Lisa is an integral part of the operations of this business.

One of his products is quite interesting – the Airocide air purifier was developed by NASA essentially to provide a germ-free environment in the space shuttle. It has no filter and has proven itself an excellent solution for eliminating airborne mold spores – especially helpful in environments containing higher humidity. While working in the cellar at Sawyer Cellars Brad noticed a proliferation of mold in various parts of the winery. After implementing this product, he noticed within two weeks nearly all the mold had been eliminated.

And Lisa is very much involved helping run Leto Cellars. She loves the freedom that not owning vineyards brings to the business – “the freedom to play and experiment” as she says, “and then if the wine is beautiful, we will bring it to the customers.”

She grew up in Petaluma (neighboring Sonoma County) in a family where wine was not part of daily meals. Her interest in wine was not until much later in life. Her appreciation for food came first; initially from watching food shows on public television. She loves to cook and says, “I love the power of food – not only it’s obvious characteristics but it can create an instant community with people coming together to enjoy a meal and the conversation it brings.” Noticing her interest in food, her father said something to her one day like “perhaps you should check out this wine industry thing.” So, she did.

Like Brad, she applied for a secretarial position and was accepted at Robert Mondavi Winery – her position involved two duties: typing purchase orders on typewriters and clearing cork orders through customs. While not being directly involved in wine making or hospitality, she always felt like Robert Mondavi Winery made sure all their employees, no matter what their roles were felt as if they were an integral part of the wine industry.

Her ‘ah moment’ regarding wine involved pairing a Robert Mondavi Fume Blanc with food. She realized how the two could complement each other. And it was at Mondavi that she also met Brad.

Choosing names for wineries can sometimes be difficult based on already existing winery names. In Greek Leto means “hidden from view” or “the hidden one” – this ties in well with their story in several ways. Their winery is in an industrial park and is certainly hidden from view – away from all the vineyards and wineries up valley. In addition, the single vineyards they work with are often under the radar. And they thought about it in another way after Brad bumped into Tim Mondavi at a Premier Napa Valley auction event in early 2016. Tim mentioned to Brad that his career has always been helping other vintners – defining more of a background role then a visible role. And not related, but Leto means summer in Russian.

During harvest, Brad picks the grapes by taste, not chemistry, but always validates his picking decisions by checking the numbers of both natural acidity and pH.

Select Wines
Whites
In 2022 the grower for their Sauvignon Blanc called and informed them because of the drought, they had extremely reduced yields and would not be able to sell them grapes that year. So Lisa and Brad began searching for another vineyard source; they discovered Notre Vu Vineyard, a 710 acre estate near Windsor in neighboring Sonoma County. They continue to work with this vineyard for their Sauvignon Blanc.

The 2023 Leto Cellars Sauvignon Blanc Sonoma County is was fermented in stainless-steel medium gold in color; immediately upon nosing this wine, the first aromatic hit we wrote was pineapple, but there is plenty more going on here including aromas of grapefruit, granadilla, orange blossom, ripe honeydew melon, tropical guava, lychee, white nectarine and as the wine evolves in the glass, prominent notes of vanilla and caramel The bouquet is saddled more towards tropical scents offered from warmer locations but with some herbal essences inherently expressed by this variety. Bright, balanced and beautiful, the palate offers flavors of pineapple, honey crisp apple, peaches, yellow nectarines and crushed vitamins. This wine features a long, flavorful and fleshy filled finish. It drinks very well by itself.

The 2019 Leto Cellars Sauvignon Blanc Napa Valley is medium straw color in the glass; the bouquet sports sweet/sour aromatics including of pineapple, citrus blossom, freshly cut grass, gooseberry, kiwi and a lemon zest. On the palate this wine is creamy and rounded in texture with a persistent brightness and flavor filled finish lingering with notes of lemon/lime, peach and nectarine. This wine was sourced from a hillside vineyard in Pope Valley. After fermentation, the wine was aged in stainless steel tanks; only 115 cases were produced. This bottling would pair extremely well, chilled, while sitting curbside on the streets of Bangkok eating a spicy chicken foot salad.

The 2013 Leto Cellars Chardonnay was barrel fermented using indigenous yeasts and underwent 50% secondary fermentation. These grapes were sourced from a historic vineyard in St. Helena they have worked with since their first vintage. These old vines were first planted in 1973, are dry farmed and the yields are low. The bouquet is appealing with rich aromatics including white pineapple, baking spice, baked apple and minerality nuances. The wine is balanced and rounded on the palate without heavy viscosity. Good acidity complements the richness of fruit. Clean finish.

Reds
The 2021 Leto Cellars Merlot, Mt Veeder Napa Valley is 100% varietal and was made entirely from free-run juice. This wine is deep ruby in color; the bouquet is dark and savory including aromas of pipe tobacco, menthol, old cedar box which hasn’t been opened in a long time, spiced plums, red licorice, cherry and a hint of dried bay leaf. Both red and dark fruited on the palate, this wine offers flavors of red cherry, currant, cranberry and plum. It shows extremely youthful at the time of our tasting, less than 3 years post vintage, especially in terms of its texture. The grainy and granular tannins fully coat the palate lingering with a dusty and drying character and a note of dried tobacco leaf, both of which ultimately outrun the fruit on the finish. This is a serious mountain Merlot sure to please Cabernet Sauvignon enthusiasts looking for a bit ‘more’ from their Merlots.

The 2019 Leto Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley is deep ruby and nearly opaque; the ripe and sweetly fruited bouquet offers aromas of dried black figs, black cherry, boysenberry, dark Pakistani mulberry, cassis, and assorted baking spices including cinnamon and cardamom. There are no woodsy spices contributed from its oak aging, in part attributed to Warner’s judicious use of new oak barrels. The palate echoes the bouquet to some extent and reveals flavors of plum, dark cherry, dark licorice, chocolate, boysenberry jam and blackberry preserves. We love the texture on this wine, featuring a noticeable density of tannins but with a polished and chalky character.

The 2012 Leto Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon is 100% varietal sourced from the same vineyard in St. Helena as their Chardonnay, also from dry farmed vines. This is the inaugural vintage of Leto Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon. Ruby red in the glass, initially it shows an earthy/slightly dusty component to the bouquet – it is dark and brooding with hints of toasted cedar. The wine is superbly balanced with a palate that is all about the fruit rather than the oak. The balanced slightly dusty tannins linger along with a red cherry, red currant tartness on the finish.

Two other interesting wines that Leto Cellars has produced in the past, including a Pinot Noir from Mt. Veeder growing at an elevation of 1850 feet close to where Brad and Lisa live and a Riesling sourced from old vines in Rutherford; these were not yet finished wines during our first visit to the cellar in mid 2016.

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Tastings are for wine enthusiasts; this is a rare opportunity to sit down with a long-time winemaker and taste through the wines in a very relaxed setting. Total production is about 1,500 cases annually. They mostly sell direct to consumer but have one client in China, a small wine club in Japan and the wine is available at select restaurants and wine shops in Los Angeles and a few retail outlets in Napa Valley including at Wine Country Connection in Yountville. They do not maintain a wine club, primarily because they do not want to be on a schedule of having to release wines at a certain time. Rather, they evaluate each wine on its own merit and will release them when they feel they are ready.

For more information, to schedule a tasting, to join their mailing list or to purchase current release wines, visit: www.letocellars.com