A Rocky Road for Ross Outon – Winner of PBS The Winemakers (Season 1)
For those who are willing to make significant sacrifices to live their dreams, there are often many paths, some with more rocks than others. When it comes to Ross Outon, winner of the 2009 PBS reality show The Winemakers (Season 1), I’m reminded of a quote from Morgan Freeman’s character Red Redding in the movie The Shawshank Redemption, “Andy Dufresne, who dragged himself into through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side”. Winning the reality show The Winemakers may sound like a fast pass to winemaking nirvana, but for Outon, his rocky road included starting and stopping filming for two years, divorce, losing his home to the bank, loss of his job, the unexpected death of his beloved dog, threats of legal action to obtain his prize money, other prizes never honored and post-harvest unemployment. But while all of Ross came out “clean,” at least until his arms are elbow-deep in the first bins of the next vintage’s black Pinot Noir grapes. This is the story of Ross Outon.
In 2006, Ross’s wife passed him a flyer announcing the casting call from Austin, Texas, for the PBS reality show The Winemakers.. At that time, Ross had worked at various levels of wine retail for 11 years with stints at a grocery store, wine wholesaler, and a respected local liquor chain, Twin Liquors. He was ready for the next step in the evolution that came from him and the show offered endless possibilities. At the audition, Outon stood out among the applicants professionally drawn, taking the stage in his black T-shirt sporting cropped red hair, tattooed arm sleeves, and a chest-length red goatee. After six months passed with no contact with the show, Ross assumed he didn’t get the part. But finally the call came.
The 12 contestants were split between six men and six women. Six wine professionals and six enthusiasts, six from California and six from other locales within the US. The show was filmed at Justin Vineyards outside of Paso Robles in central California and focused on Rhone varietals such as Syrah, Mouvedre, Grenache and Viognier. The contestants, whom Ross described as “12 wine lovers who were inherently jovial,” first met on set in the fall of 2006. Ultimately, filming for six episodes spanned two years, had a rotating cast of judges and was not ready. for broadcast until 2009.
As with many reality shows, contestants were given wine-related tasks such as harvest work, food and wine pairing, business plan development, and eventually blending their own wine for judging. Each episode resulted in one or more contests being eliminated by the judges. Ross stood out immediately, for his confidence and knowledge of wine, plus tattoos and goatee. “I left the first shoot knowing I could win,” Ross said. And win he did.
Three contestants remained for the final episode. They were judged on their wine marketing business plan, the wine label, and of course, their wine. Ross was chided for his wine label and the name 45RPM, a tribute to Austin’s music scene, for not being “adventurous” enough for what the judges perceived as an adventurous wine. However, the wine, a blend of Garnacha, Mouvedre, Syrah, Petite Sirah and Zinfandel, earned high praise from the judges. One judge spoke of being “moved” by the wine, while another compared it to “a fine Rhône wine…and might have been misled into thinking he was drinking a Coates du Rhone from France.” Ross appreciated such praise for a rookie winemaker from Austin, Texas.
The extended filming schedule, extensive travel between Austin and California, and work in Austin affected his marriage which resulted in a separation from his wife and a lengthy divorce. The divorce settlement was complicated by the fact that it took Ross over two years to receive only a portion of his prize money from the show’s sponsor, Crushpad. Furthermore, the “two-week all-expenses-paid trip to the Rhone Valley to discover the wonderful wines we make there,” offered to the winner in the final episode, never materialized.
Crushpad offered Ross a commission contract based on the sales of his 45 RPM wine. Crushpad would make the wine and distribute it and Ross would get paid. Between 7,000 and 8,000 cases of what Ross described as “inferior bulk wines” were blended from what he used to make the original 45RPM. The wine sold for a much lower price than Ross expected, which lowered his share. 45RPM sold out pretty quickly once the show aired. Even at the lower price, Ross would earn about $50,000 in commissions. The prize, which was to be a lump sum, was paid only in part over two years, in 20-30 small arbitrary installments after threats of legal action.
To make matters worse, Texas alcoholic beverage laws do not allow a wine retailer to receive revenue from a wine producer. Once the first delivery arrived in his mailbox, Ross’s sales position at Twin Liquors came to an amicable end. At this point, winning The Winemakers had cost Ross his marriage, his house, and his career in wine selling even though he only had a small portion of his prize money and no French wine tours. Ross said, “If I had only received half of my prize from Crushpad in one lump sum, I could have moved to Sonoma, bought some grapes, and made a few hundred boxes. It would have been so much easier.” Ross remained as determined as he was during his audition to become a winemaker, even if he started at the bottom. Ross considered winning The Winemakers “a sign that he was on the right track.”
Though he didn’t know it at the time, Ross’s luck was about to change in the fall of 2009. The Food and Wine Foundation in Austin asked Ross, who had just won The Winemakers, to co-host a dinner with the acclaimed Sonoma Pinot Noir. producer and former Austinite, Adam Lee of Siduri Wines. The two Texans hit it off and Ross appreciated the fact that Adam, like him, is a self-taught winemaker. After Ross expressed his interest in moving to Sonoma to make Pinot Noir, Adam said, “Why don’t you come work for me?” Five months later, Ross “showed up at Adam’s door” to work as an intern during the next harvest. During the 2010 vintage, Ross learned all he could about Pinot Noir production from the bottom up, but reluctantly returned to Texas in early 2011 to “tie up the loose ends of the divorce from him.”
As the summer of 2011 approached, Ross made a commitment to move to Sonoma and find full-time employment in an environment filled with part-time and seasonal jobs. To make his transition more difficult, Ross was competing against younger applicants with winemaking degrees from UC Davis and others. “I’m always learning,” Ross said of her hands-on education in winemaking. “My nose is always in a book or a glass of wine. I watch as I drive through vineyards to learn how they train their vines. Where else do you see a truck with two containers of grapes heading to some garagist’s house to make wine? I find it all so energizing.” With a U-Haul packed to the brim, Ross returned to Sonoma and landed another harvest intern position at Pratz and Hall. But as is the nature of inside harvest jobs, Ross found himself unemployed once the harvest season concluded.
Determined not to return to Austin with “his tail between his legs”, Ross began looking for a job. With his experience selling wine, a job in the tasting room would have been easy enough to find. However, at most wineries, entry-level positions are in either sales or production (winemaking), rarely both. Although he thought he had enough savings to make the move, Ross discovered that the surprise of living in California wine country quickly depleted his bank account. Furthermore, the credibility that Ross assumed he had earned by being named The Winemaker carried little weight within the viticulture establishment. He discovered that The Winemakers was not followed very well by insiders in the wine industry. However, with the emotional and financial support of family, Ross was able to survive a few months of unemployment. He now says, “I’m back with the people I know and love, Adam and Dianna Lee of Siduri in a hybrid position,” Ross said of the friendly and outgoing Texas winemakers. During slow production seasons, Ross uses his sales skills in the tasting room and will return to winemaking once the first grapes arrive from the vineyards.
The future that Ross Outon now sees is bright but not without its challenges. “If it was easy, it wouldn’t be worth it,” Ross quips, “and as hard as it’s been, if it wasn’t for the show, I wouldn’t be here (Sonoma) doing what I love.” As he continues to hone his winemaking skills with the help of Adam and Dianna Lee and other mentors, Ross hopes to start making small batch Pinot Noirs in the next few years. Ross will continue to pay his fair share, but says, “When I was cast on the show, I felt like I stopped walking on water and started swimming in a positive direction. It’s been tough, but I’m relentlessly certain of the idea that I’m going in the right direction”.