Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jim And Sherri Borton. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Jim and Sherri, appreciate you joining us today. Alright, so you had your idea and then what happened? Can you walk us through the story of how you went from just an idea to executing on the idea

Talk about a many year process!

When we first started talking about starting a winery it was after we had been growing grapes for another nearby winery for about 5 or 6 years. We started attending our state wine and grape conference more to learn about increasing production and quality. As we met and talked with other winery owners, we would get excited about the possibilities of doing one of our own. Over the course of the next 5 years, we would go to the conference and on the drive home and for the next few weeks we would discuss things like location (i.e. where to build on our current acreage), what size, what equipment we needed, cost to build/equip, etc. Then after a few weeks, life took over again and we went back to more normal routines at work in the vineyards, hauling kids to sports practices/games, etc.

One winter a property across the road from our home and vineyard came up for sale. It had a barn, a rental property, a pond and a place for more vines. We ran the numbers and purchased it with the goal of converting the 1870s era bank barn into the winery looking over the pond and the hillside vineyard. We hired an architect who was also a winery owner to develop plans on how to convert, modernize and construct a winery in this old barn. As this process was moving forward a neighbor offered up her property so she could move out of the area. At the time it was viewed as another rental property that was next door to our home, but across from the barn so we were thinking of other uses (i.e. overflow parking) as well.

Within 4 months of purchasing the second property the warehouse building (now winery) adjacent to the second property came up for auction. We had looked at buying this building when it was listed for sale about the time we had initially kicked around the winery idea several years before buying the barn property, but decided the building was too expensive. We asked our architect what he thought of the warehouse building and he replied, “I don’t want to tell you how to spend your money, but that building will be waaaayyy cheaper to fix up than that old barn”.

Neither of us were in town for the auction date, so we sent Alex, our then 8th grader son, to the auction to buy the building. At least that is what we tell people. Jim’s dad went along too with the check in hand to make the deposit should he be able to win the bid for what we budgeted for the building. Jim was on the phone with Alex who did a play by play on the auction. Once the gavel was banged down we owned a 104’x48′ pole building with full basement.

Things progressed quickly at that point. We applied for our federal license in May 2016 before we even closed on the building as we were told it would take 9 months to get that approved. We had the architect redirect his efforts to drawing up plans for the warehouse building and developing a construction budget. We then created a detailed business plan and started looking for potential financing to convert and equip the building for wine production and sales.

Financing was secured and discussions started happening with the builder and bank. All was hinging on the federal permit approval. Almost 9 months to the day we received an email from the TTB (federal alcohol regulator) saying they needed revisions to our application and that the agent handling our paperwork would be retiring at the end of the week. Jim took vacation days to turn around the revisions and played email volleyball with the agent until the approval email came through in mid February 2017.

By August 2017 we had a provisional state permit that allowed us to make wine but not sell any on site. That fall we harvested our grapes and for the first time didn’t sell them, instead we crushed the grapes on site, fermented and got the wines to a stable point over the winter. We covered (sealed) our wine tanks in plastic and told the contractor to go… Work started within a month and while there are many stories about and during construction, suffice to say best laid plans didn’t quite work out which delayed our opening by about 3 months over what we wanted to do initially. August/September of 2018 we brought in that year’s grapes to make our second vintage in the building and bottled 2017’s vintage. In October of 2018 we received our final state approvals and finally opened the doors to the public.

Jim and Sherri, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

We established Lincoln Way Vineyards, Inc. in 2008 after planting the first block of Vidal Blanc grapes in 2006. The vineyard was established with the support of a nearby winery needing additional grapes for their operation. The winery owner ordered vines for us to plant and told Jim when he picked up the vines “Jim, you’re going to be a winery someday, you just don’t know it yet”. Jim’s reply, “let me make sure we don’t kill these vines before we talk about a winery.”

We started making wine as a hobby soon after the first vines were planted. Each batch showed improvement and ultimately wines were receiving awards in various amateur contests, not to mention positive feedback from friends and family. Between the wines they have been awarded class winner, Grand and Reserve Champion, Honorable Mention, and various medals at local fairs to international amateur contests.

Fast forward to 2016, five (5) more acres of vines have been planted, and the abandoned warehouse, now the winery building, just down the road from the original vineyard, was purchased at auction. In early 2018, construction to convert the building to a winery began and the winery tasting room opened in late October 2018.

Today, along with our children, Alex and Arianna, and several full and part time staff, we operate Lincoln Way Vineyards. Jim oversees the day-to-day operation of all facets of the company while, Sherri serves as the wine quality control chief (aka Chief Blending Officer), marketing manager and accountant. Alex is the vineyard manager and assists with wine production (Cellar Rat). Ari is a full-time college student majoring in Food Science but helps with wine and hard cider production, wine analysis (Lab Rat) and business operations when she is home from school. Ari will graduate in May and move into a full-time role as well.

Backstory
Jim grew up in an agricultural family as both of his grandfathers were farm owner/operators while his father turned toward agricultural education as a professor at the Ohio State University – Agricultural Technical Institute (ATI). Additionally, Jim was a 4-H member for 10 years, a Future Farmer of America (FFA) member for 4 years and worked for a local farm operation in high school. Due to the economics of farming in the mid 1980’s Jim was advised by his grandparents to find another career and after graduating from Ohio State (both ATI and Columbus campuses) landed in the environmental science, water/wastewater utility business. In this path, Jim has worked at the local, state, national and even international level, in facilities both privately and publicly owned, including starting up and operating the treatment processes at the world’s largest water treatment facility for New York City.

While Jim’s primary career path took him away from farming, he continued to have a strong desire to be involved in the agricultural business sector. The vineyards, serving as a 4-H advisor and serving on the Wayne County Fair Board keeps him rooted in, well, his family’s roots…

Sherri’s agricultural experience was helping in her parents’ garden and canning vegetables. She was a 6 year 4-H member taking mostly cooking and baking related projects, although never found the food and wine pairing project…😉 After graduating from Miami University, Sherri worked 10 years in the wine industry for a wine distributor in Columbus where she oversaw the placement and sales promotion of over 40 premium wine brands as well as conducting inventory for the company. She created marketing materials for wineries as well as writing and publishing a trade newsletter, Le Veraison. Her palate developed quickly as she coordinated the company’s tradeshow tastings throughout Ohio, allowing her to taste through over 200 wines from around the world in a few days’ time. Her business trips to California only helped to cement that wine education is a major component to selling wine and creating an experience for people to remember.

After we wed, we decided to move back to Jim’s hometown near Wooster. It was at this point Sherri switched careers away from wine and marketing and into scrap and accounting. Her current role as Inventory Controller for a national scrap metal recycler allows her to refine her business skillsets which transfer daily to the winery operation. Never having totally left the wine business, Sherri has put on consumer tastings as fundraisers for various organizations as well as groups of friends. She has hosted multi-course wine dinners with her sous chef, Arianna, paring each course with a different wine. Cooking is one of her passions because “when food is paired with the right wine it creates an unforgettable experience.”

At the time of opening Jim and Sherri worked full time away from the winery and both children were active in school, FFA and sports, so it took some effort to find time to not only make wine, but to have time to drink and enjoy it. Thus, “Find Your Wine Time”(R) was born. This has translated into our wine labels and other facets of the winery.

Since opening in 2018 the original nine wines have expanded to 18 wines and a selection of hard ciders with some more wines in the works. Many wines have received awards from state and national competitions and have been recognized by wine writers.

Come visit and “Find Your Wine Time”(R) soon!

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

Most of our initial capital was out of our own pocket via our full-time jobs. We already owned the property, or had a mortgage on it, paid cash for the vines, vineyard supplies at first and even some of our initial tanks and wine making equipment was out of pocket. As we purchased the remaining properties we had local banks as partners for mortgages. Once construction and full-blown winery conversion of the warehouse we went with a Small Business Administration (SBA) loan.

We found a commercial loan officer, where else, but on a golf course. Jim was working a fundraiser golf outing and running a closest to the pin contest. During the course of trying to sell mulligans. In the course of the conversation, Jim found out he was talking to a loan officer and started talking winery. A few emails later, the application process was in motion. Lots of emails and documents after that and the loan closed.

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

As a family owned business, started by a husband and wife, this is more a personal story of boy meets girl, boy blocks girls spike attempt, girl denies the block happened….

We met playing volleyball against each other in a co-rec league. With mutual friends on both teams, the rival teams would bury the hatchet at a local bar. We sat across the table from each other with approximately a dozen other players and struck up a conversation. One of Sherri’s teammates dared her to do a shot and she called for a body shot and asked Jim to participate. Needless to say, Jim asked her out. The rest is history.

Did we mention that Jim’s proposal to Sherri also occurred on a volleyball court, during a match?

Contact Info:

• Website: https://lincolnwayvineyards.com
• Instagram: @lincolnwayvineyards
• Facebook: @lincolnwayvineyards
• Twitter: @lwvineyards
• Yelp: Lincoln Way Vineyards

Image Credits

Ohio Grape Industries Commission, Jim Borton