Located outside of Olathe at 5482 CO-348, Cottonwood Cellars was established in 1994.

One of Colorado’s oldest premium wineries, Cottonwood Cellars, is an old-world style, family-owned winery with a vineyard, Cottonwood Vineyards. The owners are Keith (the Winemaker) and Diana (Marketing) Read.

The winery began operation in 1994. The first grape vines (five acres) were planted in 1995 and has increased yearly to the current 22.5 acres.

The vineyard at Cottonwood Cellars. (Provided photo)

A new building was added in 1998 for barrel aging, case good storage, and the tasting room.

“My husband and I were working in IT in California and retired at age 45,” says Diana. “We decided we wanted to move out of California and since my husband often hunted in Colorado, we looked for property here. We ended up buying a 52-acre farm outside of Olathe in 1989. Naturally, the next question was what do we do with a farm? My husband thought it would be nice to grow grapes and figured if he was growing grapes he might as well do create a winery.”

Montrose Business Times: What’s the biggest challenge of running a family-owned business?

Diana: It’s a lot of work. Most people think grapes just grow and need no work. However, it is very labor intensive. In spring, you prune everything to make sure the grapes grow their best advantage.

Then you prune and maintain the vines throughout the summer. In the fall, we bring a crew of 15 – 20 people to harvest the grapes.

All the grapes are taken to the winery for crushing and then on to the fermentation process. Each wine is aged for at least a year before it is ready to be bottled.

MBT: What types of grapes do you grow in your vineyard?

Diana: We grow all our own grapes and use all our own juices except for the cabernet sauvignon – we are too high to successfully grow those grapes — so we buy them from Talbot’s in Palisade, Colorado.

Cottonwood Cellars produces red wines and Chardonnay which are oak-barrel aged one to two years and bottle aged at least one year prior to release.

Off-dry white and blush wines are slowly fermented in temperature-controlled tanks over several months to ensure maximum fruit flavors and quality stopping fermentation to retain 2% to 3% residual sugar.

The winery offers Merlot, Pinot Noir, Lemberger, Chardonnay and Gewurztraminer vintages, although we have had other vintages in the past.

The red wines are aged in French and American oak barrels. The Chardonnay is fermented sur-lees in American oak barrels.

These wines are barrel-aged 1-2 years and then bottle-aged at least one more year before release.  The longer they age the better they taste.

The off-dry (residual sugar) white wines are fermented in poly tanks under controlled and cool temperatures slowly over several weeks.  They are released annually in the spring.

We bottle our wines under two labels — Cottonwood Cellars and Olathe Winery. Cottonwood Cellars is our primary label and Olathe Winery the secondary.

We use the Olathe Winery for lighter wines and unique pressings. For instance, we make a dessert wine – a port called Tawny Merlot — that is under the Olathe Winery label.

MBT: Have you any challenges in producing wine?

Diana: Luckily, we haven’t had many challenges in the actual production of our wines. When we moved to Colorado, we bought a bunch of books on growing grapes and making wine and my husband read up on everything.

Then he apprenticed himself for a year to a gentleman in the area to learn how to make the wine. We started with three vintages and would add a new wine every year until we reached roughly 20 wines per year.

Now we are getting close to retiring again and aren’t making as many wines. We do have plenty of wines in storage and are now starting to clear out our stock. Fortunately, our wines age well and just get better with age!

MBT: What is the biggest challenge in your industry today?

Diana: When the law passed here in Colorado allowing grocery stores to carry wine and beer it really distorted the wine industry.

Prior to that law, we sold directly to liquor stores and to the public. Unfortunately, it is very difficult for a smaller operation like ours to get noticed by the big grocery store chains, especially when we are easily undercut in price by California and European labels.

MBT: Do you offer tours of the vineyard and tastings? What days and times of year?

Diana: We start offering tours and tastings (and selling wines) Memorial Day weekend and may remain open until December (weather permitting).

We are open Wednesday – Saturday 11:30 – 5 p.m. Guests can call for an appointment at 970-323-6224 if they’d like to arrange a private tasting.

We are also part of the Harvest Host program. The program allows RV owners to come and stay the night on our property and have a private tasting and tour.

MBT: Have your wines won any awards?

Diana: Over the years, our wines have won many awards. Early on, we competed frequently in the San Francisco International Wine Competition.

We won a Gold Medal with our Cabernet Sauvignon, as well as a Silver Medal for our Lemberger — which isn’t a stinky cheese. It’s a very nice red Austrian grape that likes to grow at high altitude.

We also competed in many Colorado competitions where we earned Best of Show. The point of entering competitions was to get our labels known. Now that we are established, we don’t compete as much.

MBT: Aside from your winery, where can your vintages be purchased in the area?

Diana: Cottonwood Cellars and Olathe Winery labels are available in Palace Liquor in Montrose, as well as The Jug in Olathe.

Plus, quite a number of stores on the Front Range offer our labels.

Jen Wolfe is a freelance contributor for the Montrose Business Times