5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Take a breath, let's dive in. Yes we're ready to rock and roll.
Speaker 2:We are ready to rock and roll.
Speaker 1:Alright, Uncle Danny. Yes, you guys, you can introduce yourself to me, your Uncle Danny.
Speaker 2:Alright, so so my name is Dan Coletta. Dan Coletta.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:Which you married into the family.
Speaker 1:Yes, I did marry into the family. Yes, you did. Yes, but that's not why I'm such a fan of either your wine or anything, though. Yeah well, I actually love the wine, and gratitude is my favorite flavor. By the way, that's an amazing batch.
Speaker 2:Gratitude, which is made from Concord grape, and that's one of the largest grape variety we grow up there in the Lake Erie region, which is where Walches is sat.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Which makes the Walchoconcord juice and the jelly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I actually love that. I was happy that I got to see where you guys brought you know the grapes after thinking of them. Yeah, I was there, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:The whole process of how we pick it, put the pickers and we bring them. We load the box and everything on the trucks and we take it away to the plant and they dump it in a big hopper and everything like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's a good thing, it's a real good thing. Now you want to know a little bit about the history of the family grape farm. Right, of course. Now my parents bought that farm at 54. Uh huh. And they raised nine children on that farm, eight girls and one boy, which I was lucky to be that boy?
Speaker 1:Were you lucky or did you have to do a lot of work because you were the boy?
Speaker 2:Well, I did my share of work. I would say you know we all do our share of work. There was pretty. There was a lot of work to do on that time. Back in that time period of time is when you had grapes, but you had cherries, you had peaches, you know you had a variety of things. You had tomatoes where we would grow. So you were all. You had everything on farm. You know you even had a couple, had a cattle, you know we milk cows and stuff like that, chicken. So you had everything. So you were self efficient on there on that. And then, as as we all got older and this and that, when my parents retired, I brought, I came into the farm and took it over at that time and that was in how was it? 1996. And that's when, and my wife Anne and I took it over and we moved, we moved out of the town where we were in northeast and we moved up to the farm and started farming up there.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then we had our five children, and that carries on Now how we built, how we became Silver 54? Yeah, silver 54 to winery is that we always made wine. Ever since I was a kid, my dad made wine, you know, for himself. And then Anne and I did too, and everything, and it came right. It came to that point, but it was Anne. Anne wanted to do it, you know. She says let's start our own little wine, you know she's the one who really pushed it.
Speaker 2:you know, yeah, for the kids and everything, to have a little bit more than just vineyards. Because our farm grew as as as we. When we took it over, we probably tripled in size because we kept buying more vineyards and growing, and growing, and growing. And so we were at the point well, let's, let's plant some varieties of wine grapes, and at the same time we could sell to the winery, but we could have our own winery too. So we started doing that and that's how we became seller 54, which is the year my parents bought that farm in 1954.
Speaker 1:That's one of the first things that I saw when I came onto the property too. Was, you know, at the entrance of the property seller 54 and Welch's, welch's grapes.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yep, you know, one of the things that I love about being, you know, on the land, I love nature. Personally, I love nature and I love traveling. And, because I live in a city, I love when I can just escape from traffic and just being my own thoughts. And the first night that I came there and I saw the stars and I was surrounded, you know, by all the land and the grapes, I didn't want to go back to Florida.
Speaker 2:You are. You are in a mill of a vineyard. I know you're in a mill of vineyard, it's. You're in a mill. Yeah, you have no street lights. Yeah, you look at nighttime, yeah, oh yeah, it's amazing the stars you see at night. Yeah, but that's just. Yeah, in the summertime it's beautiful along the lake front and up there and everything. It's just.
Speaker 1:It's a gorgeous little actually it's a little paradise. It is. That's what I'm saying. I didn't want to. I honestly didn't want to come back and I remember you know telling Mariah I'm like Mariah, I don't want to go back to Florida. I honestly like debated staying there, like I really didn't want to go back and it didn't.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah, it's. It is a beautiful place, but even on that farm, you know, we we like. I think I mentioned that we do have 13 different varieties of grapes now, which were probably about 80% of our wines. We have 15 different types of wines now. 80% of those grapes themselves come off of our farms.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so our neighbor farms around us will buy the other grapes varieties that we need to produce our wines from there.
Speaker 1:So as far as like distribution is concerned, like how do you sell wine when you're a border town, when you're a border town because you're on the New York state line as well, so how does the politics of that work out?
Speaker 2:I mean it is a little tough there, because on one side you've got New York state, on the other side of the county you've got Ohio state, yeah so, and you can't go north because you've got the lake.
Speaker 1:Lake Erie. Yeah, canada's across the street, yeah.
Speaker 2:So the only way we can basically go is south, and that's we take care of Erie County. We are working on licenses to sell in New York state. We're working on that. We do have other entities distributors and stuff in PA that we sell our wine to, and that helps all on sales too. So we do have a good following in that point and it keeps us very busy. Pennsylvania has a lot of wine shows.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so we do travel to a lot of those too. But we are growing for the few years that we've been in for existing, let me see and we've been in there for like two and a half years, yeah, and we have grown so much my children take care of it. Basically, I let the children I got the three girls and my son and my grandson. They'll take care of the business themselves. I oversee it, but you know my grandson, bo, he's the wine maker. He went to school for it. He worked under a couple of wine makers, Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And and that was one of the things that even my wife wanted to do is, instead of him going out to California, she says well, we do have to do that too. You know we have to. Let's keep this family together a little bit and do this and that, and that's what the big thing we have done there, to keep everybody close, keep you know close together and working on that.
Speaker 1:I think it's great when you know as a, as a family, you and your wife are able to provide not just food for now or, you know, shelter until they're 18, but to create a legacy where the entire family can benefit from what you guys have created and you know it goes on to the next generation. The next generation, oh yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, and, and not only that, but as you guys, guys, are all growing, the town is growing with you guys too. I think that's what was impressive, because when I was there and you guys had a show going on, everyone that I met were people from the town, and I love that, because everyone knew each other.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, and that that that's something that it's harder to get. Here in Florida, where You've known someone for generations, you know. This just doesn't really exist like that in Florida, where there I went to a bar that same night and when I was talking to strangers, I mean they all knew who you guys were. I'm talking to me, they're strangers, but they already knew you guys from the 50s.
Speaker 2:That was funny Well you know your small towns, which you know before we got 12,000 people living in it. You know that's a small town and you go 15 miles to the east and then you have area you know, which is a little you know, a little small city but you know it's there. But when you set your roots there and you stay there and it is a very close-knit area you tend to know everybody.
Speaker 1:Yes, the history. But I think too, like there's the good history and then there's like the sporting history, because then, if you are, say that you wrestle, you wrestle in high school. Right, there's a competing wrestling team from down the street, then the grandparents probably wrestled each other and then the grandkids wrestled each other. That rivalry has been there forever.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, and I like that. Oh yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like that, that rivalry, generational rivalry. It's like Romeo and Juliet the families that feed each other.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, it's always been you know your sports like that always came together, like that always. But and I mentioned the three girls, yes, I have one more. You know my other daughter. I had twin daughters too. Yes, and so the other twin. They purchased the golf course down the street.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The golf course very long leg front and so they're more involved in that instead of the winery. So what we try to do is work together with the Benson and stuff.
Speaker 1:So, from a marketing standpoint, have you got? When you guys do events, are you guys able to sell liquor and wine at the golf course, or beer Like? How does that work? Since it's also a border, it sits on the border of New York as well.
Speaker 2:Right, yes, Well, as of right now, we're working on. We're working to sell our product in her clubhouse.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:We're not there yet but we are working to sell that on. In that case there is licenses you can purchase on special events. Yes, so you know we can purchase them on special events, but the salad on the market part of it. We kind of go with a distributor, which we are the process of.
Speaker 1:So for you like in the state of Florida to purchase, like a beer and wine license last by check it was $50,000 to do so. Is it similar?
Speaker 2:Well, it's not like that it's you have to get with a major distributor.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so some of these distributors only open the door up Like a lottery system For applications, maybe twice a year, and so when that door opens up, you've got to have everything. Your eyes dodgy, your teeth cross and everything and submit your paperwork in with all your samples and what it is, and that goes through the distributors and if they like it, they accept you. They don't, they don't, and you just keep on trying, and trying, and trying.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I don't know about Florida how it works down here. I'm not, we're not familiar with the Florida, but I'm more familiar with PA in New York, you know, on theirs. And we are looking in Ohio too, right along the lakefront up there in the Cleveland area, because you know you're talking areas that's right smack in, right smack in the middle of Buffalo, cleveland and Pittsburgh. We're, you know, we're right smack in the middle of that region and we get a lot of people coming up from other cities, especially Pittsburgh we're low to Pittsburgh people that walk down and they love it. You know we get three people up there that's never even seen the lake. They say this is an ocean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I thought it was the ocean too when I was looking at Lake Erie and I had to go on my phone to realize that that wasn't an ocean.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's not a you know, because it stretches from Buffalo to Detroit. Yes, it's huge. I mean you can't see the other side.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know you can go across on a boat before you better be ready for it, because sometimes that lake would be. You know you get rough sometimes.
Speaker 1:Did he? I think, when I was up there, you had just purchased a boat, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, oh yeah, we take it out, we take it out.
Speaker 1:That's how I know, if I come back up there, I'm not going to come back down here, and I'm telling you. I'm telling you, it's just, it's just not all the things that I love in life. It's right there. I love the water. I love not being around a ton of people all the time like that. I love golfing, so I love one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you can. The shores of Lake Erie, it makes a unique for reporting great region is you've got like five miles of flat land. Yes, that goes from the hills, it goes and it goes north and it flattens out all the way to Lake Erie and that lake protects the vines from but ripening, not ripening, but it protects the vines from freezing in the spring. It'll hold back the, it'll hold back the vines from waking up, let's say, and so they won't bud as early, so they'll bud late, they'll bud maybe around the 15th of May. And if they do that, Get ready by October.
Speaker 2:No, you don't hit the dead frost. The frost it'll kill your buds and it protects that vine in that part of it and that's the biggest region. And then we have we have the good clay. We have that clay down there that holds so much nutrients and stuff, and the vine itself, the roots. The roots are very strong, I think they, they, they PSI push is like 300 PSI. So it pushes down, the roots will get in that clay and all the nutrients are in there and it just soaks it up and makes a beautiful vine. Now what's unique about that whole region? Okay, you have that, you have that crop. And then what are the people that's living there? In the summertime they got the lake. In the wintertime they can go up on top of the hill 15 miles away and go skiing all the time. So you know, you got skiing, you got terrific hunting up in the mountains.
Speaker 2:Another thing I love. Yeah, it's just so much you can do in so short of a travel period and you're not far from any major cities at all. You know I can travel to an airport within less than two hours in any direction. So you know that'll take you anywhere in the world. So it is very unique. You wouldn't believe the people that we do get from other countries stuff too that loves the region, you know. But you know it's just, it's just a nice little area. Would I ever leave it?
Speaker 1:No, I mean, I didn't want to leave it and I'm not even from there.
Speaker 2:You know the winter used to be really rough up there, but in the last two years it hasn't been that rough. Yeah, do we get a couple feet of snow at a time? Yeah, but you know what you can deal with that and it's just like this. You know, schools may have a one hour or two hour delay, two feet of snow. They won't even shut down. They're built for that. Yeah, you know they're ready to go. All they have to do is make sure the plows have enough time to get out there and plow the roads. They don't shut down.
Speaker 1:Well, that's why you guys are so bitter at wrestling, because it's the winter sport. One and two, if you're shut in, it ends the perfect thing to do on the inside you know that's why it's funny like growing up. You know the two states that I love for wrestling the college wrestling Ohio and Pennsylvania. Oh, wow, that's my two.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, we've had a lot, a lot of good wrestlers come from, from Erie County, you know. So, yeah, matter of fact, then they have a couple of them, and they have a couple of good football players too, yeah, and they have a couple throughout the colleges. So, yeah, we produce pretty good athletes and the girls too. Yeah, a couple.
Speaker 1:So what is this? This mean, like, this business mean for you, like, like, is it for you? Is it? My kids have it and I oversee it, but and that's it. Or do you feel a sense of accomplishment from everything that's coming out of it?
Speaker 2:Oh I've. It has grown, you know, since I was a kid. I grew up there, yeah, I lived when I got married and everything. I moved to Northeast and had a family there for oh, 15 years or so, whatever. Then I came back up to the farm, but I always was on the farm. Yeah, I really never left the farm, but it has grown so much, it's unbelievable, I you know. I sit back and I think myself well, we did a lot.
Speaker 2:We did a lot to that, you know, and even when my sisters come back up to visit, they can't believe how much it has grown and improved and everything. But that's just. Every business has to do that. Every business has to grow and improve to survive. Anything you have to, you have to, not a bunch, but you know, 3%, 4% every year or something like that. You keep, you keep, dancing, dancing, dancing. You will have a successful business and that's just what we did.
Speaker 1:But I love it. You know, here's, I love marketing. I love the right kind of marketing, you know. And the thing that I noticed and I don't think I've ever said this to you was the reason why I think you guys are also so successful is because all of you are owners, right. So your kids are a part of their owners and they're on top of it. You know, they're putting out the Facebook messages and they're doing the events and they're doing it. You know, like everyone's, I see everyone playing their part and that's, that's beautiful, it's like sure it's family.
Speaker 2:So there, there are moments where people are going to butt heads, but it's in a business, I really believe you have to butt heads a little bit. I mean that's that's a sign of growth when button heads, because it's different ideas so you can. You can grab a few thoughts here and a few thoughts there. I mean it's how you control when you butt your heads. You know, that's the way I believe it. It's everybody. Everybody does everything different but at the end, how's it going to come out?
Speaker 2:at the end, let's grab a little here, grab a little there, and it'll work out that way. Then you have to respect that. I mean you have, you know every, everyone in that business, any business. You have to respect that. Don't just say, guys, no, good this, and that you work together, it'll grow. It'll grow. Respect each other. You got. You got a clear path to success.
Speaker 1:That's the way it is. You know it's funny that you say that, but in a corporate environment they tell you the exact opposite. You know it's oh, you keep the peace. You know, keep the peace.
Speaker 2:But you do keep the peace in a way they're, they're right because you do keep the peace, because you respect each other's opinions, and so you grab them a little here and a little there, and so you're, so you're, you're, you're taking that basket full, full of energy, and you're coming out with a piece of dynamite, which which is that's how you grow. You have to have that, you've got to have that energy. You don't have it. Something's wrong.
Speaker 1:You know one of the things that I hate about you know, corporate environments is that a lot of times I mean, yes, you know, it's true that I don't get to.
Speaker 1:It's not my business, I'm just someone that works for the corporation that's in charge of other people and I get, like you know, like I was saying, you know, in the corporate environment, one of the things that I hate about this generation is everyone's okay with just how things are, like no one's trying to come up with new ideas and no one's trying to improve, and more and more people are lazy and they just don't even know how to finish anything.
Speaker 1:Everyone starts things and they just don't finish it, and that's very frustrating for someone like myself that, like when I started, I was the youngest person when I started and I was privileged enough that everyone that I worked with were people who were retired from management and things of that nature. So early on I was able to just learn from everyone that was older than me. You know, even if I didn't plan on I didn't at the time, I didn't plan on going into management, but I still took the information regardless. And now, you know, you have a lot of people who they say they want to go into management but they don't want the information.
Speaker 2:You know like they don't well, I think some people do want to go into management but they may not have the self-confidence in themselves. You know it might be a little scared a little bit, but this and that you know where they. You know you go into management. You're out there sometimes by yourself and you gotta come up with some decisions sometimes where you're uncomfortable with.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:So it is tough. It's tough to get. You need a good how would I say it? You need a good person behind you to help you out, sometimes Absolutely. You know, and that's it. You know, it's. That's how it goes. Everybody you know. Nobody's born with that. I think you've developed into a management position. You're not born with it, I agree.
Speaker 2:You've developed yourself into a good relation, a good with your employer and employers, and that's where it comes from. You know, I'm almost to the point where now I'm going to be stepping back, you know, and letting then the family run it more and more. Yeah, you know. So that's how we all grow, that's how they're going to grow.
Speaker 1:Is that now? Is that something that's hard for you, or is it something you've been wanting to do?
Speaker 2:Well, I'll tell you. What's hard about the whole damn thing is when we first started this adventure with the winery, we the wife and I we started. She really wanted it going. I was hesitating a little bit. I knew it. I worked out it was a fault.
Speaker 1:Did it bring you back to your childlike memories?
Speaker 2:No, it didn't bring me back to childlike memories. I just knew, man, I got a ton of vineyards out there and I'm doing this and that I didn't know how much work there was. And I got people working and I got, and then I'm going, wow, but she got me going and she did it, but then, you know, she got sick and she passed away with you know cause of cancer. And so we, the kids, rallied and we got it done and got it up and got it going and I give them, I give everyone of my children, even even Corinne with the golf course, you know cause?
Speaker 2:Anne was hopping around the golf course too getting that business going and and, yeah, I think every one of them picked up the pace a little bit and took care of it. And now, you know, I'm getting to the point where I got to start easing back and making sure everything is going nice and easy for the. You know, not easy, but they know the directions they're going in and that's about it. You know. It's just, it's been nice to have Anne around and see it, but hopefully she's going to see, can see it where she's at.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, I think that's what makes great leaders, like what you just said. Sometimes you know being a leader isn't something that you decide yourself, like someone else kind of pushes it even in that direction and everything just comes together that way. But then also like a great leader as someone that knows when to just back off. You know back off because when they back off, that's the time that, like like you said, everyone grows. You know because now they have to make the decisions and learn from whatever mistakes they make, and they get comfortable in that position because now they have experience and the more you have your hand in it, the less experience they'll have. So I mean, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:So I believe everything's going pretty decent right now and yeah.
Speaker 1:So what's a major takeaway? If you had to impart some advice on someone that's young, that's trying to figure out the world right now, what would you tell them?
Speaker 2:Well, you know, there's two different ways to look at that.
Speaker 2:All right, I'm all ears If I was just getting out of school. You got to know which way, which direction, you want to go. You know, if there is a family business, do you want to go in that family business? If there's not a family business and you want to, and you just don't know which way you want to go, the young kids you don't get out of high school, just you know. Do you want to go with a higher education, become whatever you want to become, or do you want to go to a trade school and look and pick up a great trade?
Speaker 2:There's so much opportunity out there and it's wide open for this. You know it's wide open, but you'll get out of it. You got to work hard to get it. If you don't work hard in those three or four years you're in school learning it, you're going to have a harder time getting out. When you get out of, let's say you're done with college or you're done with a trade school and you get into the trades, you get to say you're taking apprenticeship at, are you doing your? Wherever you have to go, you got to work hard for it.
Speaker 2:I mean, I really believe that I mean you listen to your like me old time.
Speaker 1:No say the old time, I think.
Speaker 2:Because the old time will help guide you. It gives them the respect and they'll tell you what they'll give you the world. If you, if you come at them hard and everything, they're gonna brush you off to the side. Boy, you can learn a lot of stuff from them. They'll get tell you the ins and outs and this and that. Then, with your new experience, you got because every, every generation is smarter than the last one. Yeah, that's what, that's where we grow, that's where the growth is, and so they take that old stuff, they put in there with the new stuff and we got better stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah and it's there. It's actually there and it's something that the young kids, you know the younger generation, has to realize. There's a lot out, there's a lot of opportunities out there, it's everywhere, but they have to Sometime. You know, just work with the older guys and girls and go from there.
Speaker 1:You know it's funny. I can tell you for a fact, all of the success that I experienced right now in my career is because I Made the decision to be humble. You have to humble yourself and be open to criticism so you can grow and sometimes you know how, how you, how you get the criticism. It may not feel good but it's, it's something that it's necessary for you to be better. And and and you know, I have a mentor and he's getting ready to retire and a lot of people they see that we have a great relationship, but they don't see the Harsh side of me getting from there to here. They just see the finished product. Same like with wrestling.
Speaker 1:You know, oh, you know, in practice you could get your butt kicked every single day. You probably think you suck Because you're getting, you know your butt kicked by people with more experience. You're getting you know your your wrestling coach is Beating you up every single day and you think you suck until you go and wrestle with somebody your own age and then you realize that, oh, maybe I don't know, and that's that's how you know I feel about. You know, my career right now is that I have gotten my butt kicked so many times in harsh ways. That Makes the problems that I encounter now like see me easy, like, oh, I don't freak out, I'm just like, okay, this is what happens.
Speaker 1:You and you know I think that this generation could use more of that. You know, everyone's just being pampered and they don't know how to overcome. You know, harsh thing, but regardless, you know, I'm just so grateful that I have experienced all those things in life and I'm also grateful that I got to experience and vineyard and be part of the family. And you know, when I first met you guys, you guys all made me feel so welcome. You know, right away, like right away, and I and I just feel so privileged To got you know, get to be a part of all of that and thank you guys for just being great people Not even good, but great people. You know that's what. Maybe that's why I love you wine so much. Yeah, like I just I just felt like right at home, like going there, and this is like almost a decade in now and you know I'm just so grateful to be a part of the family.
Speaker 1:All right so thank you Well thank you.