Banshee Wines
Banshee Wines was founded by three friends – Noah Dorrance, Baron Ziegler and Steve Graf – who shared a passion for wine and a lifelong dream of owning their own winery. Their fascination with wine started early in life. While their peers were drinking Milwaukee’s Best, they had an affinity towards collecting European wines and hosting dorm room wine tastings. Post-college, each pursued a career in the wine industry, ranging from importing wines, to winemaking, to distribution and sales. Their paths ultimately converged in San Francisco and in 2009 they pooled their money together to make the first vintage of Banshee Wines’ Pinot Noir, which sold out in three short months. By the end of the year, Banshee Wines was their full-time pursuit.
The main focus for Pinot Noir is on the cool, rugged, coastal areas of the far Western Sonoma Coast, including Coastlands, Emmaline and Rice-Spivak vineyards. Each of these sites has a unique combination of their specific oceanic influence, soil type, elevation, age and exposure but the common thread is that they allow a Pinot that achieves power without weight. The remote Sonoma Coast doesn’t tell the entire Banshee story, as choice sites elsewhere play an equally important role including vineyards such as Tina Marie in Russian River, Hurst in Sebastopol Hills, and Sullivan on Sonoma Mountain and Blakeman and Broken Leg vineyards in the chilly Anderson Valley appellation.