94pts James Suckling

91pts Wine Enthusiast

Tasting Notes

Bright ruby in color and scented with red raspberry and Darjeeling tea, this lively expression of Russian River Valley and Coastal fruit dispels layers of blackberry and Bing cherry along with subtle hints of vanilla and forest floor. Supple tannins and balanced acidity grace a long finish. This wine was bottled unfiltered and unfined.

Winery Notes

Brother and sister team, Trent and Kimberly Jackson collaborated with their vintner “green thumb” father to found their first label in 1996.  Over time the two identified their unique niche among next generation wine enthusiasts. Outliers from the dominating short list of old school napa wineries, the two saw an opportunity to buck the “en vogue” winemaking style of their day to focus on the unique terroir of their family vineyard.   After all, “change comes first at a small scale driven by the smaller more nimble producers.”

Soon after, cult Winemaker Kirk Venge was recruited to create balanced wines reflecting varietal character and a sense of place.   Passionate about our vineyard site, integral to our clone and root stalk selections, and now 20 years in, Kirk has reinforced their instinct that focus should always be on “sense of place” to understand the nuances that allow us to make great wine.

To differentiate from their small lot single vineyard Jax line, they launched “Y3” to scale and offer more “true to varietal” wines from various AVAs (spanning Napa and Sonoma).   The “Y3” symbol was the cattle symbol used on their grandparents’ cattle ranch, Yarrayne.  The “3” represents three generations of land tilling entrepreneurs.

In 2013, the siblings recruited a third partner, Dan Parrott, a no nonsense individual with a laser focus on balanced wines (historically working in Italian, French and Spanish import houses) and a true burgundian aficionado.  Dan keeps the sibling rivalry in check and runs Jax like a well oiled machine.