Punchdown Cellars
A custom crush facility on Hopper Avenue, which is where small labels without a winery of their own go to make wine. Not a tasting room.1
Why go
Custom crush is the invisible half of a wine county. A label with fruit and no building rents tank space, a press and a bonded facility, and somebody else's licence covers the paperwork. Punchdown does that on Hopper Avenue, and calls itself Sonoma County's premier one, which is its own word for itself.1 The site would not open past its navigation for me, so who crushes here and what the facility actually holds I cannot tell you.
Order this / avoid
- Avoid: driving out for a tasting. There is no evidence of a public room and this is an industrial address.
Good to know
- 707-541-7373 or info@punchdowncellars.com if you are a winemaker rather than a visitor.1
Verdict
listed — You cannot drink here. Punchdown is a custom crush facility on an industrial road in Santa Rosa, which means small labels with fruit and no winery of their own rent its tanks, its press and its bonded space. Small producers make a good share of Sonoma County wine in buildings like this one, and almost nobody writes about them. Nothing published names the labels that crush here or what the plant holds, and there is no public room, so the rung is the floor.