If you ask Andrew Sides, Texas wine is the future.
The owner of Lost Draw Wines in Johnson City sat on the porch of the winery’s barrel room to discuss the ups and downs of the wine industry at large and his business specifically.
Sides, who wore a collared shirt with small bluebonnets on it, hails from the Texas High Plains. Like the Hill Country, the High Plains evolved into a wine region at the turn of the century.
“I grew up there in a farming community, mostly centered around growing cotton and peanuts, all row crop stuff,” Sides said.
His family’s farm, andbmany in the area, pivoted to grapes.
“In the early 2000s, farmers were just looking for something to grow to make money and put food on their families’ table.” Sides said grapes were an easy choice, as the state legislature had just passed a law allowing individuals and businesses to sell wine straight to consumers.
The Johnson City winery gets its name from the original Lost Draw Vineyard still owned by his uncle, Andy Timmons, in the panhandle.
Winemaking is Side’s way of introducing people to Texas agriculture. It all starts with the grapes.
“Wine’s pretty interesting because there’s no exact way to make wine. Everyone’s got a philosophy,” Sides said. “I think the most important thing for us is trying to develop wines that showcase the farming efforts. We always make that a part of our story.”
The land decides how the wine will taste. Sides points out large stacks of rocks piled throughout the property, signifying the land where the grapes are grown.
“It’s literally the main ingredient. That’s the beauty, wine truly captures a time and a place in a bottle and you can never reproduce that same bottle of wine.”
Sides is an evangelist for Texas wines, believing those marketed as Texan should be made with Texas grapes.
“I would really encourage people, if they are going to the Hill Country to taste wine and to support the Texas wine industry just to do some research,” he said. “If you truly want to support Texas, find the places that are growing Texas grapes and making Texas wine.”
His interest in grape-growing and the burgeoning wine industry took root during summers Sides worked on the family farm and followed him to Texas Tech University.
Wine in Texas was still a nascent industry at the time and Tech didn’t have any formal viticulture or enology programs yet. So, Sides settled for a degree in civil engineering. Post-college, he found himself using his degree at a firm in San Antonio.
“I had a pretty bad week at work and I was tired of sitting behind a desk and fighting with contractors. I just thought that there was something better for me out there,” he said.
Sides produced the first Lost Draw vintage in 2012 with help from Timmons and opened the company’s Tasting Room in downtown Fredericksburg two years later with his father-in-law, Troy Ottmers.
While he enjoyed the tasting room in Fredericksburg, the goal was to eventually own acreage, where the grapes can grow, be processed, bottled and sold, all on site.
The COVID-19 pandemic threw a wrench in everyone’s plans. Sides and other winery owners couldn’t tell how the pandemic would change the industry or wine consumers’ buying habits.
In 2020, Lost Draw partnered with William Chris Vineyards to streamline. The companies had separate facilities and products, but partnered on operational and logistical parts of their buisnesses.
“Chris [Brundrett, co-owner of William Chris] and I had become collaborators on a lot of things in the industry,” Sides said. “We wanted Texas to be viewed as a winemaking region on the same level or category as all the famous wine regions around the world.”
Two years ago, with both companies on solid footing, Sides and the Lost Draw team started thinking more concretely about the dream of its own land.
“Being able to sense and see and feel what you do when your in the vineyard, it really connects you to what you’re tasting in a glass,” Sides said.
They moved the entire operation to a 32-acre spread just across the Blanco County line. The company’s first Hill Country vines can be seen from the roadside. Eighty percent of Lost Draw grapes still come the vineyard in the High Plains.
“We kind of had to redesign the experience. The experience of Lost Draw at Johnson City is very different than how you experienced the Lost Draw in Fredericksburg.
Sides said there was a shift in visitors when they moved to Blanco.
“I think that Lost Draw is more accessible here,” he said.
The facility sits at 1686 U.S. 290 near Johnson City’s limits, making it one of the first wineries drivers hit when coming from Austin or turning off U.S. 281 from San Antonio.
“We got into it at a good time for the industry and we’ve made it work for 13 years now. It hasn’t always been easy, but we’ve seen enough ebb and flow in the market and visitorship,” Sides said. “We’ve seen growth and we’ve seen now the stall of visitorship,” he said. “Through it all we’ve learned a lot and our business has always been very adaptive to circumstance.”
Growing up in the agriculture world taught Sides to be creative and flexible in an ever-changing industry.
“My uncle spent a ton of time with different farmers and regions that had similar climates to ours. That’s why we have frost fans and hail netting and some of the innovations we’ve added in Texas were things that have been going on for 50, 100 years in other places.”
Sides and his team members sat together on the property’s barrel room porch enjoying the weather. He motioned to the poles saying he hopes to screen in the area soon.
The company is at a perfect size right now, said Sides. Lost Draw has 26 employees making 25-30 types of wines each year, marketing them, planning events around them.
“The mission and goals for the entire company can really be felt and expressed. Our team makes 90% of our business decisions together,” he said.
Being independent again brings its challenges. The cost of enclosing the porch, and other projects, are bigger expenses now that they aren’t under the William Chris umbrella. Sides also hopes to reach more visitors at the facility by expanding its services in the years to come.
Currently, the winery offers tastings, memberships, live music and a custom blending experience where customers can taste and bottle their own wine with a custom label.
“We do all kinds of events, and I think some of the best release parties for our members of anywhere.”
The biggest draw, according to Sides, is an experience “unlike any other.”
“We don’t have the flashiest facilities or gimmicks, but our wine is always really good. Its consistent and the experience that you get with our team is always really intentional,” he said.
In Johnson City, Sides sees a bright future for Lost Draw and Texas wine.
LOST DRAW CELLARS
1686 US-290, Johnson City, TX 78636
830.992.3251 • lostdraw.com