Peninsula People Dec 2017

Wine
for the
millennials
Peninsula’s Kristin and Stephen Jolley produce a wine aimed at the happy hour generation
by Richard Foss
Some families have been in the wine business for so long they’re said
to have wine in their veins. Peninsula winemaker Kristin Jolley is
among them, though her family’s history is less glamorous than most.
“My grandfather was a winemaker in the town of Orléans, near Paris. I
remember my grandma saying, ‘I would never touch that wine, it was so
gross. Your great grandfather would make it in his underwear with his dirty
feet, and all of his friends would get in there to stamp the grapes.’ Nobody
took over the family business, and his wine press is a floral centerpiece in
the town square. So I grew up with the stories, but it was much later on
that I got into wine.”
Kristin and her husband Stephen own Happy Hour Wine Company. The
brand is focused on selling easy drinking wines, which after only two years
are available in 23 states.
Kristin, a Redondo Beach native, studied supply chain management in
college and was working for the Fresh & Easy grocery chain when she had
an epiphany.
“I thought, there’s a happy hour at every bar and restaurant, but there’s
not a brand called happy hour. If there was, you could have happy hour
any time, anywhere. I came home one day and told my Stephen I wanted
to start a wine brand called Happy Hour.”
The trademark had already been registered, but Kristin couldn’t find any
evidence that the owner was doing anything with it.
“The phone number was right there on the trademark website, so I called
him and said, ‘I’m Kristin, and I want to buy your trademark.’ He said he
wasn’t interested in selling it and hung up on me. I called him every month
for a year and a half, and every time our conversations got a little bit longer.
He had a little beer company in Florida that did business there and in New
York. Finally he asked, how old are you? I told him I was in my early 20s,
and he said, ‘I’m 92.’ So I said, you have to sell me this trademark and you
28 Peninsula • December 2017