![]() ![]() Either deejays are present or live bands are playing.Īccording to 3rd District Planning Commissioner John Parke, the vibe is notably more young and fun, a necessary adjustment to the market realities confronting a wine industry intent on finding new consumers. Throughout the pandemic, Sunstone’s outdoor tasting area has been frequently packed. But the Cabugoses have also been shifting the Sunstone image, transitioning the tasting-room experience from one dominated by the older whiter demographic to a younger, more ethnically diverse crowd. On one hand, the Cabugoses are embracing the Sunstone brand by partnering with Fred Rice, the winery’s original founder, and his daughter Brittany Rice, the chief winemaker. About half the product will be sold as flower and bud, he said, the other half rendered into oil that can be used to produce makeup, edibles, salves, tinctures, vape oil, sleeping aids, and non-alcoholic wines. The actual processing - typically the most odoriferously intense aspect of the cannabis production cycle - will take place elsewhere and not on the Sunstone premises. The same can be done, he added, with cannabis. Sunstone, Cabugos noted, sells wine made with grapes grown by 15 different vineyards. “Fifty or two, it doesn’t really matter.” What matters, he said, is the sense of the experience and the brand that can be attached. “The experience of walking in a two-acre field of cannabis is not all that different than walking in a 50-acre field,” he said. And the brand, he said, is all about experience and perception. This decidedly small-ball approach reflects a business plan that’s “all about building the brand,” in Cabugos’s words, rather than maximizing production on large swaths of land. Should it turn out that’s not enough, he said he’s prepared to install a new odor-control system, in which the olfactory assault of airborne cannabis molecules are neutralized by essential oils - eucalyptus, lavender, and citrus - shot skyward by vapor jets. But to help prevent that from becoming an issue, Cabugos also agreed to plant only two harvests a year at first, instead of the three he could have gotten. “I want to make sure there are no adverse effects for my own grapes,” he said.Īnd if, along the way, problems arise, say with odor, Cabugos has committed to making the necessary adjustments. And the year after that, another one and a half. Next March, Teddy Cabugos said, he will plant two acres the year after that, he will plant another three. And it will be phased in gradually over a three-year period. That’s hardly anything compared to some of the bigger proposals wending their way through the county’s approval process. And it’s still too soon to say the extent to which Sunstone’s new approach - with a foot in both camps - reflects a broader softening of antagonisms between such strikingly similar but often conflicting industries.Īt maximum build-out, Sunstone will be planting only 6.5 acres of cannabis. They still have to apply for and secure the necessary business permits, for example, before they can begin cultivation. “Not one time!”īut the Cabugoses and Sunstone are hardly out of the woods. “We never had to go to the Planning Commission,” a much-relieved Teddy Cabugos exclaimed after the deal was signed. This week, Teddy and Djamila Cabugos, Sunstone’s new guiding forces, hammered out the final details on a deal with potential appellants led by Tim Crist, owner of the Cinque Stelle Winery and chief executive for Kenai Drilling, a major force in the oil-extraction world of Cat Canyon and areas beyond. Perhaps more remarkable, Sunstone’s new owners managed to negotiate an understanding with seven neighbors - several of whom are big names in the wine industry - and effectively defanged what could easily have escalated into another drawn-out appeals battle waged in front of the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors. This marks the first-time cannabis and viniculture - often presented as intractable foes - will coexist in peaceful commercial cultivation at the same time and the same place in Santa Barbara County. This week, the new owners of Sunstone took it to the next level of improbability, announcing they’d secured the necessary planning permits to cultivate cannabis where for 30 years organic wine grapes have been grown. For 30 years now, Sunstone Winery has provided the Santa Ynez Valley one of its more famously photographed touchstones, shifting from “Tuscan-inspired” villa in wedding albums to “futuristic French chateau,” at least for purposes of one recent Star Trek show.
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