We were lucky to catch up with Serena Lourie recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Serena, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?
Coming up with a name is hard! We didn’t want to name the winery after ourselves which is often done in the wine world because if we sold the brand we would lose our name. So, we brainstormed for days and came up with 17 different names – none of which were able to be trademarked.
So we went back to the drawing board. We are in the kitchen talking about how and why we got into wine. We stuck five thumbtacks in a globe marking the important places in our lives that sparked our passion for wine. And boom, inspiration hit and we came up with the name Cartograph.
A “Cartograph” is a visual marking of ideas, either over time or place. The cartograph on our labels is a visual depiction of the journey that brought us to winemaking and the ideas that have propelled that journey.
The five points of Cartograph:
Latitude: 48.19° N, Longitude: -4.30° W
(Pentrez, France)
It was in Pentrez, France, located in the rustic Bretagne region of my family’s homeland, where I developed an appreciation for wine. Every Sunday our extended family would gather for lunch. Lili would make bread, Jacques would bring fish fresh from the morning’s catch, Mamie would harvest veggies from the garden, and Grand-père would emerge from the basement with a sandy bottle of wine. You had to smell and taste every part of the meal which began my incredible journey into wine.
—Serena
Latitude: 44.99° N, Longitude: -93.15° W
(St. Paul, Minnesota)
Most of us can mark the time and place when our fascination with wine first overcame us. Mine came while living in St. Paul. Floating in a small kayak on a lake in northern Wisconsin with a calm breeze rocking my little vessel, the sun was bouncing off the rolling water and I was surrounded by the North Woods. I opened a bottle of 1998 Alsace Riesling. Everything but the wine, with its cacophony of citrus blossom, pear, black tea and petrol aromas and flavors instantly disappeared. I was in the wine. How could a seemingly light and simple wine possess such an explosive combination of flavors and aromas that my remarkable surroundings simply faded into its shadow. It was that moment that somehow so engaged my senses and intellect that I embarked on a journey to learn all I could about wine, how it was made and how I might one day put such remarkable qualities in a bottle.
—Alan
Latitude: 38.89° N, Longitude: -77.03° W
(Washington, DC)
It was in Washington, DC where I had my first taste of California wine. Sitting at a restaurant on the harbor, surrounded by friends we opened a bottle of Shafer Cabernet. I was mesmerized by the complexity of the wine and how blackberry, currant, and dark cherry flavors intermingled with tobacco and leather. The finish captured me and it was in that moment I felt to compelled to learn as much as I could about California wines. Eventually, I made my way to California and one of the first wines I made was a Napa Cab.
—Serena
Latitude: 37.76° N, Longitude: -122.40° W
(San Francisco, CA)
We met in San Francisco, where both of us journeyed following the desire to engage our lives in the pursuit of winemaking. Alan moved there to make wine at Crushpad after producing his first wines in Dry Creek Valley. At Crushpad Alan made his first Pinot Noir to be sold under his Cellar Rat Cellars label. Serena too was drawn to this groundbreaking urban winery where she met Alan and he helped her produce her first wines. It was in this setting while working together, sharing wine while sitting on stoops and talking about our hopes and future, that our lives came together and our dreams for Cartograph took form.
—Alan & Serena
Latitude: 38.62° N, Longitude: -122.86° W
(Healdsburg, CA)
It is here, in Healdsburg, where our journey currently places us, and where we pursue our desire to turn our own journey into wines that will inspire others to appreciate a time and place with wine. For us, there is no better place to pursue producing great Pinot Noir than Healdsburg in Sonoma County. For Alan it is a return to the location where he first made wine, while for Serena the small town and fertile backyard of our new home recalls her family home in France. Most important, Healdsburg is close to the great Pinot Noir growing regions of California’s North Coast where we can carefully apply hands-on efforts through every phase of the grapes’ maturation and ultimately turn them into the place-defining wines we both strive to produce.
—Alan & Serena
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
Alan and I founded Cartograph to pursue our passion for wine after enjoying successful careers in other fields — Alan in public radio and Serena in health care and venture capital (see their bios for the full story).
In 2008, Alan was working at the Crushpad custom-crush operation in San Francisco, making Pinot noir under his Cellar Rat Cellars label. Serena, on hiatus from her job in health care, came to Crushpad to learn the craft of winemaking and wound up working with Alan. During that first season making three wines together, they discovered that they shared two things: a similar palate and the dream of pursuing a life in winemaking.
After a long shift in the winery in November 2008, we sat on the curb outside Crushpad and hatched a plan to make that dream come true. Shortly thereafter, they moved to Healdsburg, toting two barrels — 50 cases — of the Pinot they’d made at Crushpad. That wine became the first release under the Cartograph label, with the front of each bottle showcasing a map of the winding road that brought the couple together to create Cartograph.
Two years later, they opened their first tasting room in a shared space, and moved in 2013 to their own space a block north of the main plaza in Healdsburg. In 2014, Cartograph was featured in the American Wine Story documentary, which showed at several film festivals and is available online via vhx.tv and Itunes. And in 2016, Cartograph purchased its first vineyard. And continuing in the theme of doing something significant every two years, they got married in 2018 and in 2020 began re-planting at their Estate vineyard.
Cartograph strives for sustainability in all aspects of their business. This reaches far beyond the sustainable practices in the vineyard but also to the winemaking process and even the business structure and employment policies. Cartograph is proud to be part of 1% for the Planet, Sonoma Sustainable, and is a certified B corp.
While Alan focuses on farming and sourcing great fruit and making the wine, Serena runs the tasting room and focuses on building the business. Cartograph now produces 1,800 cases of wine annually, focusing mainly on Pinot noir, but including aromatic whites in the style of the Alsace region of France and California sparkling.
Alan and Serena’s goals: to make wines that impress with nuance and subtlety, and to show how elegant wine can be when the winemaking process involves sourcing from impeccable vineyards and using a light hand in the winery.
Where do you think you get most of your clients from?
For us the every best way to find new clients is word of mouth. When someone you knows recommends our wine, you can trust their judgement and that they know your flavor palate. That is so important for us as wine is a luxury product and once you have finished the bottle, the wine is gone but a memory is created. We thrive on people sharing their love of our wine with the people around them. For a small business, word of mouth is key.
How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?
We are very transparent about our brand. We don’t have investors or corporations behind us. Alan is responsible for the farming and making the wine and I’m responsible for the business side of Cartograph. We value our employees and customers and show them as often as possible how much we respect them and appreciate their decision to support Cartograph.
Our Cartograph Circle members are a family for us. We so appreciate their support and want them to understand that it is because of them that we can grow and delve deeper into winemaking. How do we stay connected? We celebrate their anniversary date for joining the Cartograph Circle every year with a mixture of gifts and charitable donations. When they select their wines for the spring and fall release, they receive a personalized letter from us. Circle members have our mobile phones and email addresses and know they can reach out anytime and we’ll respond. And, social media has made it really fun to stay in touch via photos.
In 2025 we will unveil our new tasting room in Healdsburg. Our Circle members will receive a new level of perks as a thank you for getting us to this point. We’re really excited about this!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.cartographwines.com
- Instagram: @cartographwhines