By Brinkley Rash, Kaelea Pena, MaKayla Glenn, Erin Pellet, Faith Douglass, and Kamryn Mendoza
McPherson wine bottles inside McPherson dining room. Photo by Erin Pellet.
In March 2020, many travel destinations and attractions shut down as the world faced the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the McPherson Cellars Winery in Lubbock, Texas, found a way to pivot.
Many businesses that relied on tourism suffered as travel restrictions increased. For McPherson Cellars, the pandemic may have halted regular operation, but they were determined to continue to serve the wine industry.
Texas is known as one of the top wine-producing states in the country. It all started when two professors at Texas Tech University, Clinton ‘Doc’ McPherson and Robert Reed, began experimenting with vineyards.
According to a Forbes article, McPherson founded Lubbock’s first winery, Llano Estacado Winery. Kim McPherson, owner and winemaker of McPherson Cellars, son of Clinton McPherson, and a Texas Tech graduate, established the city’s most well-known winery, McPherson Cellars, according to the article.
McPherson Cellars is being recognized all over the world for their authentic wine. According to Forbes, McPherson has won over 450 awards with the wine and company he built.
According to the McPherson website, the business won four medals from this year’s Winemaker Challenge International Wine Competition.
The winery offers a wide selection from their wine club and holds wine tastings throughout the week. Turman said wine club members fill the winery every Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
Hospitality and Event Director of McPherson Cellars, Thomas Turman, said eight people work under him at the winery, but he took on multiple roles for a while.
“Originally what was like five different jobs, I collapsed into one and took over the whole front of the house,” Turman said.
The event center has a lofty interior and an outdoor patio available to accommodate about 150 people for various events. During the pandemic, Turman said they rescheduled 17 weddings.
Turman said he and his team adjusted during COVID-19 to keep the event center and tasting rooms up and running.
“During COVID-19 in order to keep our tasting room going, we offered a free delivery that was the same day, and within two hours,” Turman said.
Turman said to accommodate the social distancing guidelines, he used the space of La Diosa Cellars, which he now owns, to help with capacity and to keep their event center open.
The System Winemaker at McPherson’s, Spenser Igo, said he is in charge of ordering at the winery and has seen a change in supply and demand due to COVID-19.
The System Winemaker at McPherson’s, Spenser Igo, in the cellar’s wine creation room. Photo by Erin Pellet.
“We’re having trouble finding glass. We use many different types of variations of glass bottles, and some are in short supply,” Igo said. “The supply chain is all messed up.”
Turman agreed that the supply chain crisis has been unfavorable to McPherson Cellars. The shortage has led to certain wines not going into their correct bottles, and the packing tape to ship the wines has been almost out of reach.
“It is making it to where we are essentially having to source what we can,” Turman said.
Turman said the packaging might vary, but the product is generally the same. The only disappointment among customers was the temporary closing of the winery.
Due to COVID-19, 43% of supply management said their top concern is limited availability and shortage of raw materials, according to the Institute for Supply Management.
Igo said the winery’s sales went up during the pandemic because McPherson’s wine is sold at grocery stores like H-E-B, Market Street, United Supermarkets, and wine stores like Spec’s Wines, Spirits & Finer Foods and Total Wine & More.
“The restaurant sales went down, but the wholesale sales went up,” Igo said.
Turman said there are only four wineries in Texas that are distributed outside of the state, with McPherson Winery being responsible for two of those.
“Even though our front doors were closed, we were retaining all that income by the increase in people buying at the grocery store,” Turman said.
Turman said 92% of all grapes grown to produce Texas wines are grown within a 30-mile radius of McPherson Cellars. He said this brings in attraction from people outside of Lubbock.
“I would say out of a total of the frontend wine production retail side is a good 20% of people that are coming through or flying in,” Turman said. “We have a lot of flight attendants that will come here on their layovers.”
Turman said McPherson gets a lot of tourists who write articles about the winery and publish them in other countries.
According to Professor Rauf Arif’s former students’ work, California has been thought to be the largest viticultural area.
Texas is known for being the site of the first wine vineyard. According to a wine production graphic, the Texas High Plains is the second-largest American Viticulture area. The Texas High plains consist of about a million acres in West Texas. Fredericksburg, Texas High Plains and Texoma are just three of the eight viticulture areas in Texas.
The location where the McPherson wines are created. On this day, the air was filled with a sweet scent from sangria. Photo by Erin Pellet.
“We are at a level of quality that really has surprised everyone around the world, especially California,” said Bobby Cox, owner & winegrower of Pheasant Ridge Winery in Lubbock.
Turman said that many people were eager to return to normal life after the pandemic, especially in Lubbock. The retention rate of his regular customers has almost returned to normal after the pandemic.
“We’ve seen probably 100% retention of people getting back to their norms,” said Turman. “We have a big wine club, and so we have a lot of revolving routine customers that come in on their regular days.”
The winery usually operates with the event center, wine club, wine tasting rooms, and wholesale presence.
McPherson Cellars is located downtown in the old Coca-Cola bottling plant in Lubbock’s historic Depot District. The winery is open Tuesday through Saturday from 12 to 6 p.m., and happy hour is from 3 to 5 p.m. For more information about the winery, contact (806) 687-9463.
About JOUR 4370
