St. Clair Winery & Bistro will be soon be adopting the name D.H. Lescombes Winery & Bistro.
The change is a way to go back to the Lescombes family roots with not only its bistros but its wines.
“Instead of us being driven by one of the brands that we happen to produce, which at the time may be one of the most popular ones, (we’re) more identifying with the family who started us and kind of getting back to the vineyard itself,” said Brandon Young, CEO Lescombes Family Vineyards, of the change. “Get back to the dirt, right, and kind of go back to the beginning. That was really the driving factor behind us making this shift.”
Hervé Lescombes immigrated to the United States from France in 1981 with his wife, Danielle, and their three children. He produced wine in Deming for several years and later purchased St. Clair in Deming in the early 1990s when the original investors were unsuccessful and closed. Hervé added St. Clair to the family’s existing Blue Teal wine and later expanded his product line with the family label D.H. Lescombes in 1991, according to a Lescombes Family Vineyards news release. The product line also includes Soleil Mimosa and other brands that will now fall under the Lescombes Family Vineyards umbrella.
“It’s really just a rebranding of the complete identity, trying to get that clarity in the who we are, because I think that has been something in the past that has been, when you’re under so many different names and labels, and what happened with us that I think happens with a lot of businesses sometimes is we started becoming known as St. Clair because it was one of our more popular brands,” Young said. “It was one of more readily available brands as it became in more of the chains in the state and became more available to our consumers and our fans in all the retail markets and so you end up becoming known as that and you end up losing your identity of who you are, which is the Lescombes Family Vineyard, which is we’re trying to go back to the soil, go back to that identity to show who that is, so yes, all of those things will stay underneath that umbrella.”
Over the next four to eight weeks, customers will begin seeing changes including label changes as well as new signs at the bistros in Albuquerque, Las Cruces and Farmington. But fans of St. Clair and related product lines will still be able to find and purchase their beloved wines, including St. Clair Mimbres Red, a top seller in the state.
“St. Clair Mimbres Red has just become the No. 1 wine in New Mexico,” Young said. “For us, we’re not backing off of that. We’re super-proud of that line and what it’s doing, so our customers will see us continue to craft that brand and have it available in all the same public retailers that have it right now. … Actually, you’ll probably find us putting more support and marketing behind those brands, because we want to maintain that No. 1 position and fan base that we have, and we don’t want to lose anything on that brand. We’ll be crafting that brand for a long time to come.”
Lescombes Family Vineyards will be broadening its D.H. Lescombes wine line. It will continue to make its Limited Release and Heritage Edition wines and will add the new 6-3-1 Signature Series that will be available at company locations.
“As we’re trying to really get back to our roots and get back to the Lescombes family name, one of the things that will help with that is expand the D.H. Lescombes wine line and add a new few items in there,” Young said. “… We are going to be launching 6-3-1 Signature Series, which commemorates the legacy of the Lescombes history going back to six generations of winemaking, the three different continents that Hervé has crafted wine on, and then our one passion that we have, which remains constant in everything we do, which is creating the best quality of wine and food for enjoyment in the company of friends and family. That’s kind of been our motto that we’re going with. That wine line is going to help represent that Lescombes name and kind of who we are.”
