Melanie Hexter and her husband/vintner Matthew Hexter did not plan to get into the winery business. But everything in their path drew them to where they are now with Evergood Adventure Wines in Palmer Lake, Colorado. The most interesting aspect though is their approach to making citrus wine…from lemons.
Melanie explains that “We use the term Blue Ocean if you’re familiar with a business book called Blue Ocean, It is the idea of where the market is competitive is where the sharks are and that creates a red ocean. So, if you’re entering a market that’s very crowded, you want to find an empty space, you want to find a niche. And certainly, wine made from lemons, not grapes, is that niche.”
The beautiful thing about that, Melanie says, is that they did not intend any of this. Their business is simply a byproduct of Matthew, the vintner, and founder, fermenting lemons, not grapes. Their wines are low sugar, gluten-free, and contain low sulfites because lemon is a natural preservative. “You don’t have to add the sulfites like the grape wines.” Their wines are vegan and have an extremely long shelf life because of the high acidity of citrus. “So, all those boxes get checked and as people care more and more about what they put in their bodies, they really are migrating very consciously to beverages that check some of those boxes.”
The creation of the product is also reflected in an amusing anecdote. When the wine was fermenting at the beginning in the company’s start in the family bathroom in Ohio, one of their kids joked that “Dad, it looks like pee!” This influenced the name “Skier Pee” when they eventually set up the business in Colorado, reflecting the outdoor sports and imagery with a sense of fun.
Their first big citrus wine product did end up being Skier Pee. “Saving a name like Skier Pee…we joke that you may not want to remember it, but you’ll never forget it. People say, ‘I drank Skier Pee? What?’ But they never forget it. So, it’s kind of been a perfect storm of “We want what’s in the bottle to be better than what’s on the label.”
She explains that they would have only been in business for a year if their wine was simply a gag gift just based on the name Skier Pee.” Melanie is proud to say they are starting their sixth year in business. They just opened in California markets last year and have online shipping available to 40 states. In addition, they just introduced their sixth flavor: Jolly Camper. “So, the growth has been fantastic. Last year was our best sales year ever. We survived COVID. All those points point to a good future.”
The Path from Home-Brewing to Citrus Winemaking at Evergood Adventure Wines
The path was a curvy one though. Melanie says the story starts 33 years ago (1989) when her husband (Matt) became a home coffee roaster in Ohio because there were coffee shops anywhere near them. Ten years later (they were still in Ohio), he got bored of that and said, ‘I want to start making beer.’” Melanie explains that he used a Mr. Beer kit which she finds funny “because it makes very bad beer.”
After homebrewing 7 or 8 times, Matthew gained the confidence to source his own ingredients. Matthew, she says, did not know any other home brewers in the mid-’90s in Ohio. “But gradually you make friends, and you meet other people that are interested in that.” Matt was involved in a local brew club and eventually through those connections, someone told him “I ferment lemonade.” Matt became intrigued.
Matt started to experiment with batches of lemons around that time. The couple has six kids, and, as Melanie explains, most home brewers put their batches in a bathroom to ferment for two reasons. One, the door can be closed to make that room warmer. A batch ferments faster with higher temperatures. “That’s just the chemistry of it.” The second reason is that a fermenter is likely to overflow its tank because a batch is actively fermenting, “It’s alive. It bubbles. It gurgles. You can see it. You can hear it. You can smell it. And when a batch overflows and spills, it’s really sticky to clean up, so most home brewers put their batches in a bathroom, because that’s the easiest place to just mop the floor.”
“There was never an intent to go to market.”
Melanie says there was never their intent all those years ago to go to market. She says Matt would make batches because he loved the process. It wasn’t that he was drinking the result. “I was even pregnant and nursing most of those years, so I wasn’t the one drinking it. He would give away 90% of what he .made, and people started saying, ‘This is really good. You ought to sell it.’ And we had to say, ‘No, that would be illegal. You can’t sell it unless you’re a licensed bonded winery.” So about eight years ago (2015), they moved here to Colorado to be closer to their family and realize that dream. “Colorado is the craft beverage mecca of the United States. [People here have] a fine palate, and they know what they’re talking about.” Their friends encourage them to go into business.
“So, we liquidated all of Matt’s teacher retirement. We cashed out 401Ks, sold things in storage, did a round of fundraising that was kind of jokingly called ‘Friends, Family & Fools’, and then in 2018, we got the 2000 square foot winery in Palmer Lake and finalized that.” She says it was about a year and a half, to a two-year process to get the paperwork to become a legally licensed bonded winery. They uncorked on June 29, 2018, with just two products.”
Melanie says they literally started cold calling around the state and working out of the back of a pickup truck. Their sales rep then got them into several hundred locations by the end of the first two years. She says they are now available at ski resorts. They are available at hot springs. They are sold retail in a lot of breweries which she says is undeniably interesting. For instance, she explains, Red Leg, Bell Brothers & Florence Brewing carry their wines. Their wines are served by the glass and give these breweries a gluten-free alternative that doesn’t cannibalize their own product. “I feel like a lot of times, people go into a brewery with a group of friends or family. And typically, somebody’s just not feeling a beer that day. And so, these breweries are finding they can offer a local craft wine. They also can use suggestive selling through their bartender or waiters and come away with a win-win. Because it doesn’t steal anything from their menu. It only adds.”
The wine angle has become the irony of the whole endeavor. “I would agree. Why is it wine? Because it’s fermented fruit juice? That’s the worldwide definition of wine. That’s like ciders and meads that are in a wine glass. We just happen to use citrus. But to us, the best descriptor is an adult lemonade. Which, as you said, is very approachable. It’s not red or white. It’s not about ‘Well what should I pair it with? What temperature should I drink it at?’”
The beauty, Melanie explains, is that their “wines” can be served in a red Solo cup over ice. “That’s literally how we drink it…over ice, for years, and years, and years. The fact that we now put it in a single-serve can, that increases the portability for outdoor activities. Because Coloradoans want to throw it in their backpack or their cooler.” They also ended up making most of their wines in pouches. That irony came about because they bought a canning line before COVID hit and because of supply chain issues that ensued (an aluminum can shortage among other things) meant the line sat unused. Even Coca-Cola couldn’t get cans. The solution of the pouches presented itself, hence another great portability solution.
The Discovery of the Next Flavor
Their newest flavor is the Jolly Camper. “The way the watermelon one came about is after the lockdown, we lost the ability to do Thursday, Friday, and Saturday liquor store tastings. We lost all our summer festivals. We lost all of the non-profit events because non-profits constantly called us saying, ‘Will you come pour at our events?’ We lost all of these sales opportunities that we called ‘Liquor to Lip’, where we introduced new customers to our new product. So, we had to get creative.”
Melanie points out they are a manufacturing winery, not a high-end California company that provides a fancy experience on-site. But, as the pandemic progressed, the couple thought they could bring people into the Palmer Lake facility and show them what they do, while also giving the customers a taste. They conceived of selling tickets on Groupon. They are now closing in on their two-hundred-and-fiftieth tour.
“We do up to about 15 to 20 people per session. That is the biggest we do, and they’re one-hour experiences.” What the Hexters found is not only did people like their wines, they loved their story. Many people asked, “How can we help?” So now Melanie says they have a list of almost 200 people that volunteer their time to come to the winery to help bottle, pouch, and label. “Now, of course, we pay in wine, so that’s a motivator. But it has created this community around this nutty and unique product.”
Now Matt and Melanie do quarterly parties at the winery that tend to be these volunteers whom they call their “Super Fans”. In 2022, as they always do when they launch a product, they did a little market research, where they have this “Super Fans” group taste the new product. “So last year, we had them taste this watermelon-citrus wine. We gave them three-by-five cards and three or four questions to answer.” On the back of the card, they would ask the fans to simply answer the question: “What did this remind you of?” Of 250 people that were at the party, over 50 of them wrote, “Jolly Rancher” on the back.
“So, by Monday morning, I was on the US trademark and patent office website to see if ‘Jolly Camper’ was trademarkable. And it is, and it was, and we now own it. And the fact that we put this watermelon-citrus wine in what we call ‘share-size pouches’, with a spigot on the front, makes it uber-appealing because they’re so easy to throw in the cooler. They’re not breakable. You don’t need a bottle opener.”
She sums up their appeal by saying that, in many instances, traditional wines aren’t fun. They can be very sophisticated. “It’s almost like they’re unapproachable if you are a novice. You have to be welcomed into the club almost. And we’ve kind of adopted a ‘wine can be fun’ mentality with our Evergood Adventure Wines. But you have to be careful. Our wines are almost 10% [alcohol] so they can sneak up on you.”
