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WINERY PROFILES

Maloy O'Neill Vineyards » Profile

 

Experience handcrafted quality. Maloy O'Neill Vineyards is a small family owned and operated vineyard and winery, specializing in premium handcrafted wines produced in limited quantities. Come visit our tasting room. Great people! Great wines! Great views! Open daily 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. Orders by phone, fax, e-mail or Web site. 5725 Union Road, Paso Robles, CA 93446. 805.238.6430 Fax: 805.226.8412. E-mail: winery@maloyoneill.com. www.maloyoneill.com

O'Neill Vineyards has been around since 1982 as a producer of high quality grapes for local wineries and wineries in Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino, and Lake County. O'Neill Vineyards was originally a 20-acre experiment, but is now a 150-acre enterprise with nine varieties planted. Cabernet Sauvignon is the flagship. Other premium varietals include Merlot, Syrah, Zinfandel, Petite Sirah, Sangiovese, Chardonnay, Muscat Canelli, and Malvasia Bianca. Maloy O'Neill Vineyards has approximately 30 acres planted to Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel, Syrah, Lagrein, Petite Verdot, Petite Sirah, Sangiovese and Pinot Noir and another 35 acres are slated for future development.

Maloy O'Neill Vineyards prides itself on being a family owned and operated business dedicated to quality. The winery is located at Maloy O'Neill Vineyards nestled between Tobin James Winery and Penman Springs Vineyards on Union Road in Paso Robles.

Winemaker/President Shannon O'Neill notes that the label specializes in producing limited quantities of hand-crafted, estate-bottled and site specific wines selected from local vineyards in the area. Shannon also notes that most of the grapes used for our wines are from O'Neill Vineyards and Maloy O'Neill Vineyards with a few vintages from select vineyards in the area.

Shannon O'Neill comes to this venture with extensive experience in all aspects of O'Neill Vineyards. He currently manages 180 acres of family-owned vineyards at two sites and has been actively developing other new vineyards in the area, and he has worked harvest and made wine from every vintage O'Neill Vineyards has produced since its first partial crop in 1984.

However, Shannon's experience doesn't just come from companies bearing his family's name. While receiving a degree from the University of California at Davis in Fermentation Science, he did internships in the chemistry labs of such companies as Atlantic Richfield Corporation and Chevron Chemical Company, and worked harvest and did cellar work for other local wineries. After college, Shannon worked for Chevron Chemical Co. for a few more years before going to work doing industrial fermentation research and development for a biotechnology company in the Silicon Valley.

After years of downstream processing and filtration experiments, Shannon has come full circle, and is now running the family business, the new winery, and various development projects. Since his first handcrafted vintage in 1984, he has done many experiments on many aspects of grape growing and winemaking from these vineyards and their grapes.
I'm always looking for ways to improve the vineyard and my resulting winemaking techniques, Shannon said. Only after many years do you start to figure out what works and what doesn't. It's this experience that allows Shannon to bring out the full potential in Maloy O'Neill Vineyards wines and to let them express the varietal flavors and nuances of their different site-specific vineyards.

The plantings of O'Neill Vineyards and Maloy O'Neill Vineyards consist of over 180 acres, with vines spread across several different soil types and microclimates. Although it has taken years of fine-tuning, many improvements have been made in the vineyard to maximize these different conditions. In 1997, the O'Neill Vineyards were switched to a vertical shoot position trellis system, and canopy management techniques such as leaf, shoot, and cluster thinning were employed to reduce yields and open up the canopy. Soil and water management has also become a top priority. Paso Robles area soils commonly need annual amendments and pH adjustments, in order to maintain proper nutrient uptake and overall vine health, said Shannon, and the results have been a dramatic increase in quality reflected in the wines made from these grapes. There is also a five-acre experimental vineyard on the O'Neill Vineyards property dedicated to varietal, rootstock and clonal experimentation. The grapes from these vines are used for small-scale winemaking experiments as well.

 

Learn more about our vineyards

Web site
www.maloyoneill.com

Address
5725 Union Road
Paso Robles, 93446

Phone
805.238.6430

  

Fax
805.226.8412

E-mail
winery@maloyoneill.com

Hours
Open Daily 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.

July 4th
Closed

July 5th
Open: 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Tasting Fee
$5/pp waived with wine purchase

Established
1982

Wines Produced
Cabernet Franc
Cabernet Sauvignon
Lagrein
Malbec
Merlot
Petite Sirah
Pinot Noir
Primitivo
Red Blend
Red Rhône Blend
Sangiovese
Syrah
Tempranillo
Zinfandel
Bordeaux Blend
Late Harvest Zinfandel
Chardonnay
Pinot Grigio
Pinot Gris
Sauvignon Blanc
Port
Red Tuscan Blends