Sinor-LaVallee Wine Company was founded in 1997 by the husband and wife team of Mike Sinor and Cheri LaVallee Sinor. Mike and Cheri met at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in 1993 where they had “Chemistry”. They were married on May 1,1996 in the French town of Beaune, in the heart of Burgundy. They then embarked on a series of wedding receptions, one each in their childhood hometowns of Sacramento and Visalia as well as their chosen hometown of San Luis Obispo. In the years following, Mike and Cheri both changed jobs, bought a house and had their first child Tomas in February 2000, with Esmee following in November 2001.

Mike’s introduction to the wine business came in 1991 when he went to work for Corbett Canyon Vineyards. Although it started out innocently enough as a fun job to pay for college, Mike was soon bitten by the “wine bug”. While working at Corbett Canyon, he also began working at six local Edna Valley area wineries doing anything and everything while gleaning every bit of information he could. For the 1993 vintage, Mike took the Fall quarter off from school to work and live full-time at Saucelito Canyon Winery. After finishing Cal Poly in 1994, Mike took a harvest position with Robert Mondavi owned Byron Vineyard and Winery in Santa Maria. The harvest position turned into a permanent cellar position, then Enologist, then Assistant Winemaker to Byron Ken Brown. During his stint at Byron, Mike had the good fortune to make two trips to France to study extensively the vineyards and wineries of Burgundy. Mike left Byron after the harvest of 2000 to become the winemaker for Domaine Alfred Winery in San Luis Obispo for the opportunity to be part of an exciting new brand as well as to be closer to his growing family in Arroyo Grande. In addition to his duties as winemaker, Mike supervised the vineyard operations and was in charge of the Biodyanamic aspects of farming the ranch. Mike is also one of the founding board members for the World of Pinot Noir event held each year in March and served as Board President for the 2005 event.

Cheri’s introduction to the wine industry also came from a need to pay for college. In the summer of 1992 she worked for a trucking company in Fresno that transported winegrapes from various vineyards to Gallo Winery. Although Cheri studied Agricultural Business at Cal Poly, she didn’t get bitten by the “wine bug” until she met Mike. His passion was contagious. After graduating from Cal Poly in 1994, Cheri worked as the Assistant Manager and Manager of the Corbett Canyon Vineyards Tasting room. She left Corbett Canyon to become the Executive Director for the Central Coast Wine Growers’ Association (CCWGA), a non-profit association of vineyards and wineries. Cheri continued to work with the CCWGA until February of 2001, then left to become a full-time mom and CEO of the growing Sinor-LaVallee household.

Sinor-LaVallee works mainly with two Pinot Noir vineyards, Talley-Rincon and Aubaine with acreage contracts on both. Sinor-LaVallee production is around 400 cases. Cheri is the President of the company.

Sinor-LaVallee is dedicated to growing and producing hand crafted authentic wines.