Outlier Wine Co. offers balanced, flavorful and well-priced wines that make any occasion more festive. With distinctive packaging and memorable names, the wines include White Wedding Proprietary White and Lucky Red Blend. Proprietor and winemaker Derek Rohlffs is recognized as one of northern California’s new rising star winemakers for his single vineyard Bravium wines as well as the very successful Outlier Wine Co. line.
Through his Cherokee ancestry and California upbringing, Derek was drawn to nature since childhood. He pursued this passion in college, graduating in 1993 with honors from the prestigious Environmental Studies program at UCSB. While his degree was a great foundation for winemaking, it wasn’t until several years later that he would find his calling.
Raising money for charities ultimately provided the spark. At fundraisers, Derek had the opportunity to taste many great wines. He became fascinated by wine’s many facets, including geography, agriculture and chemistry, and found many parallels to his environmental studies background. Eager to learn more, he took a stint at a wine shop that featured tastings with great producers. The experience ignited his desire to make wine himself.
Once he began winemaking in 2000, Derek proved to be a natural. Within 5 years, he had developed private label wines for famous chefs as well as his own brands of value wines, several of which became best sellers of online retailers. These projects would serve as funding for his ultimate ambition—Bravium’s terroir-driven wines from great Northern California vineyards—which launched in 2007.
For his Outlier Wine Co. wines, Derek selects fruit with great balance and flavor that can be made into affordable and thoroughly enjoyable wines.
For his winemaking style, Derek takes inspiration from the great wineries of Italy and France, such as Domaine Tempier, as well as Jeff Brinkman, the esteemed winemaker at Rhys Vineyards. Winemaking is focused on the vineyard; in the cellar, less is more. For Pinots, no fining or filtering, to allow the source fruit to remain at the forefront, vine to bottle. And for Chardonnay, whole cluster pressing with partial malolactic fermentation delivers aromatics and freshness. The Outlier Wine Co. wines are blended to ensure consistent quality from year to year.
Outlier Wine Co. is located on Treasure Island, in the middle of San Francisco Bay. The name Bravium (Latin for “reward, prize or gift”) dovetails with Derek’s Sip&Give program that donates a portion of wine sales to worthy charities selected by customers.
Through his Cherokee ancestry and California upbringing, Derek was drawn to nature since childhood. He pursued this passion in college, graduating in 1993 with honors from the prestigious Environmental Studies program at UCSB. While his degree was a great foundation for winemaking, it wasn’t until several years later that he would find his calling.
Raising money for charities ultimately provided the spark. At fundraisers, Derek had the opportunity to taste many great wines. He became fascinated by wine’s many facets, including geography, agriculture and chemistry, and found many parallels to his environmental studies background. Eager to learn more, he took a stint at a wine shop that featured tastings with great producers. The experience ignited his desire to make wine himself.
Once he began winemaking in 2000, Derek proved to be a natural. Within 5 years, he had developed private label wines for famous chefs as well as his own brands of value wines, several of which became best sellers of online retailers. These projects would serve as funding for his ultimate ambition—Bravium’s terroir-driven wines from great Northern California vineyards—which launched in 2007.
For his Outlier Wine Co. wines, Derek selects fruit with great balance and flavor that can be made into affordable and thoroughly enjoyable wines.
For his winemaking style, Derek takes inspiration from the great wineries of Italy and France, such as Domaine Tempier, as well as Jeff Brinkman, the esteemed winemaker at Rhys Vineyards. Winemaking is focused on the vineyard; in the cellar, less is more. For Pinots, no fining or filtering, to allow the source fruit to remain at the forefront, vine to bottle. And for Chardonnay, whole cluster pressing with partial malolactic fermentation delivers aromatics and freshness. The Outlier Wine Co. wines are blended to ensure consistent quality from year to year.
Outlier Wine Co. is located on Treasure Island, in the middle of San Francisco Bay. The name Bravium (Latin for “reward, prize or gift”) dovetails with Derek’s Sip&Give program that donates a portion of wine sales to worthy charities selected by customers.