Steve Lohr says being an engineer helps maintain his family winery.

By TOM MARQUARDT and PATRICK DARR 

We’ve tasted some very expensive wines we truly love, even if they are beyond our means. Splurging on wine is easy if you have the bucks; discovering a low-budget gem is magic if you don’t. 

Like most consumers, we are in constant pursuit of a wine that over-delivers on what’s called a high quality-price ratio. Think Bogle’s Petite Sirah, J. Lohr’s Seven Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon, Wente’s Morning Fog Chardonnay, and Columbia Crest’s Grand Estates Merlot. How is it that these producers can deliver a consistently good wine for about $15 while others charge three to four times as much? 

Steve Lohr, president and CEO of J. Lohr Vineyards & Wine, knows a thing or two about pricing wines. He was helping his dad, founder Jerry Lohr, pick grapes when he was just 10 years old and now serves as operations president and chief executive officer. He’s seen the operation grow from 280 acres to 4,000 acres spread across four appellations. A handful of wines became 40. A few thousand annual cases became 1.3 million cases, distributed in every state and 44 countries. Other family owned wineries–notably E&J Gallo, Charles Krug and Jackson Family Wines–have enjoyed similar success although some of their vast portfolios span across brands. 

At the heart of the massive portfolio are J. Lohr’s estate wines—the largest of eight tiers. The seven red and white wines sell for $15-20. They’re well made, approachable, and delicious. J. Lohr Seven Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon is the largest-selling Paso Robles-grown cabernet sauvignon and continues to earn rave reviews from critics. We’ve seen this wine for as little as $13-15, yet it’s still aged 12 months in expensive oak barrels. The J. Lohr Riverstone Chardonnay and Falcon’s Perch Pinot Noir have also been consistent winners year over year. Even many of the wines in its elevated Vineyard Series sell for $25-30. 

Lohr said the profit margin on the Seven Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon is higher, due in part to scale, than on chardonnay, which calls for barrel fermentation, lees stirring, and other costly, labor-intensive steps.  

Owning their own vineyards also helps keep costs down, Lohr said. “We have been acquiring land for decades,” he said. “We didn’t overpay.” 

It also helps to have an eye for efficiency, which comes from his training. He and his brother, Lawrence—J. Lohr’s chief operating officer—are civil engineers by education. Even his winemaker is a chemical engineer. “We really get into details on how to do better. We just have that engineering mentality of how to do it on a small scale first and then blow it up.”  

Scale plays a critical role too, as J. Lohr can negotiate prices for fermentation tanks, oak barrels, and equipment. The $7 million check he wrote for 95,000 oak barrels would make most producers choke, but at this scale it’s just another cost of running a business on this scale. While other producers might take shortcuts, such as adding grape concentrate and oak chips, J. Lohr insists on quality, with profits coming from volume sales in grocery stores, wine shops and restaurants. 

Alas, Canada’s boycott of American wines has hit them hard, and he’s hoping for a truce soon. Like other producers, J. Lohr has also been ripping out vines to adjust to reduced consumer demand for alcohol. But Lohr said they’re holding the course rather than cutting back so drastically that they lose their audience. In 2024, 222 commercial wineries closed; in 2025, hundreds more filed for bankruptcy or closed. J. Lohr Vineyards & Wine, celebrating its 50th anniversary, doesn’t plan on being one of them.