Carmel Valley winemakers look to form an organization to support its wine community.

Under pleasant skies on Saturday, Sept. 13 a group of some 125 people dined around long tables at the Rancho Carmelo vineyards, sipping local wines, returning for second helpings of paella and chatting casually. Among them were several Carmel Valley winemakers, sharing their bottles.

“It felt like a hometown [event],” says Walter Georis, who opened one of the village’s first tasting rooms some three decades ago. “It was a lovely day.”

The afternoon was also a test. With a group of winemakers preparing to launch an organization dedicated to promoting Carmel Valley Village’s tasting rooms, the questions at hand were what type of event shares the right vibe and could they pull it off.

“The purpose is to bring the tasting rooms together, to highlight the tasting rooms and bring people to the valley,” Georis says the next afternoon. “Yesterday gave us a really good sense.”

Carmel Valley Uncorked is a response to both the international decline in demand for wine – which has the potential of hitting small producers harder than the corporate brands – as well as the perception that even many local residents tend to overlook Carmel Valley Village.

“A lot of times people say, ‘I didn’t know,’” says Kathy Baker of Rombi Wines. “Well, shame on us. We don’t promote as a group. We thought it was about time.”

Baker and the Georises, along with six others with tasting rooms in the community, put together the event. And they did so with a balance in mind.

Georis recalls after opening his spot near the Bernardus tasting room, event planners began contacting him. He was fine hosting parties, but did not want tour buses idling outside.

Plans for Carmel Valley Uncorked are still in the early stages – they own a domain name, but have yet to set up a bank account – but both Baker and Georis foresee no more than three events a year, each with a limited number of guests.

“We’re thinking about how to do this and still keep control of the vibe and the sanity,” Georis says.

As envisioned, the organization would be hyper-local, promoting only the tasting rooms within village boundaries. Baker anticipates launching activities, which would include advertising in local publications, sometime in 2026. She also hopes that all 20 tasting rooms participate.

“We don’t have a chamber of commerce,” she adds. “We want to bring the wine community in the village together.”

Baker stresses that the concept is not in response to the demise of the Monterey County Vintners and Growers Association, which provided marketing support and lobbying for wineries across the county before the board voted to end operations in August. Carmel Valley’s small producers simply face different challenges than Carmel or River Road tasting rooms.

With an organization that promotes local events while embracing the community vibe, Georis adds that “there is a lot of potential.”

The test gathering on Sept. 13 drew an appreciative group. Proceeds benefited the Carmel Valley Improvement Committee.

A pleased Baker couldn’t resist the obvious. “I think everybody is in support,” she says. “It takes a village.”