A Fond Farewell to a Grape Grower Advocate

Nat DiBuduo, Allied Grape Growers

Nat DiBuduo is stepping down as President and CEO of Allied Grape Growers, where for the past 18 years he hasn’t been shy about sticking up for his 450 grower-members. (Photo: Betty Miranda)

Nat DiBuduo is always talking about quality when he’s talking about winegrapes — which is a lot of the time — and that makes sense, but it’s more complicated than it first appears. It’s not about quality as an absolute, says DiBuduo, who is stepping down as President and CEO of Allied Grape Growers (AGG), the largest such cooperative in the country, which is based in Fresno, CA, where he was born and raised.

“Quality has always been and will be relative to the winery buyer and price they are willing to pay,” he says. “The ‘quality/price dynamic’ will dictate production levels, cultural operations, and therefore costs per acre. The ‘quality/price’ will give you a gross income per acre, which hopefully drives the growers’ net income per acre.”

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The beauty of DiBuduo’s approach is it applies to all 450 AGG grower/members, from the guy growing ‘Ruby Cabernet’ in the simmering San Joaquin Valley for a $3 wine, to the gal growing ‘Cabernet Sauvignon’ in a nuanced Napa hillside microclimate for an $83 wine.

“This is what I’ve strived to leave with my staff and growers in negotiating with wineries,” he says, “whether it’s $8,000 a ton or $400 a ton.”

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This approach makes perfect sense, but it’s not always easy, especially when you have to tell that guy in the San Joaquin Valley that $400 a ton might not be achievable next year. Back in 2015, in his “State of the Industry” address at the annual Unified Wine & Grape Symposium, DiBuduo advised growers to take out 15,000 acres in the central and southern San Joaquin Valley.

It was a stunning moment, because you almost never hear anyone in any official capacity essentially tell growers to stop planting. Was that a tough announcement to make?

“Real tough,” he says. “In fact, we told growers they had to pull out as many as 36,000 acres. A president of one of the wineries got angry, but I didn’t want to keep seeing my growers losing money; the prices were unsustainable year after year.”

DiBuduo paused, recalling the moment. “I was accused of interfering,” he says, seemingly taken aback, “because he was saying I was trying to hold up prices.”

But weren’t you? “Damn right,” DiBuduo thunders, chuckling at the memory.

Hang ‘Em High
While winegrape prices are obviously the overriding consideration of someone leading AGG, there have been a host of issues during DiBuduo’s tenure. Some are incredibly persistent, such as “Hang Time.” That’s been around for the entire 18 years he’s been at AGG. And while it quieted down for a while, it’s flared up again recently.

The crux of the issue is some wineries mandate the growers hang the grapes for longer than the growers think is necessary. The wineries say they just want higher Brix, but growers say the grapes are being dehydrated unnecessarily, and the proof is that the wineries add so much water to produce the wine, a practice that’s perfectly legal.

DiBuduo says some wineries have been willing to build into their contracts a Brix bonus if they harvest the crop at Brix levels that cause weight loss. But some wineries continue to ignore the issue and want to harvest when they determine it based on winemaker determination and winery capacities.

That is when the growers get upset and claim the contract says minimum Brix, while the winery response is “grapes are to be of condition suitable as determined by winery for their purpose,” so they have final say when to harvest. In most cases, the wineries and their grower relations’ staff are working cooperatively to get the best quality grape delivered and maximize the growers’ returns, says DiBuduo.

“Everyone wants a win/win relationship, but sometimes it just doesn’t happen,” he says. “I know of winegrapes being harvested at 37 to 41 Brix — the grower losing significant weight due to dehydration — then the winery had to legally add water to facilitate processing.”

The Survey Says
While “Hang Time” is a persistently thorny issue, AGG has spent a lot of time and effort on a host of other issues, especially pests and diseases, such as the glassy-winged sharpshooter and the incurable malady it causes, Pierce’s disease. “We fought it well,” says DiBuduo, “and now we’re getting resistant vines out of the University [of California] that will be released to growers.”

His biggest regret doesn’t have to do with a single issue, but AGG’s inability to expand operations to the state’s Central Coast. In fact, he still hopes to see an office there sometime in the future.
DiBuduo says AGG’s biggest achievement in the past decade has been the establishment of a nursery survey. Until it was started, knowing what was planted where was definitely an inexact science in a state the size of California, where there are hundreds of thousands of acres.

“The nurseries were willing to share because they weren’t sure the state acreage report was as accurate as it should be, and they wanted their grower-customers to have better information overall to make better decisions,” he says. “It’s beneficial to the entire industry to know what’s been planted and where, and I want to thank the nurseries because this has been very beneficial to marketers as well as the growers.”

Infusion of Youth
It’s simply time for new blood, says the 67-year-old DiBuduo. He’s certainly not retiring, though he plans on spending more time with his wife, Marilyn, three children, and five grandchildren. “I’ll be practicing agricultural real estate,” he says.

During his tenure at AGG, he says he’s been blessed to have been mentored by great professionals —starting with his father — and this has given him the obligation to be a mentor to young men and women as they develop their various skills, farming and otherwise. Among them are the new AGG President, Jeff Bitter.

“With the team I’ve had and the team I’ve been able to develop, the team I’m going to leave here in place for Jeff Bitter is a dynamic, energized team that I believe will continue to help the membership prosper and grow for the next 20 years,” he says. “It’s a young team.”

DiBuduo says there have been a lot of ups and downs. When AGG hired him in May 2000, the association was on solid ground. But later that decade, the economy took a nosedive, which always takes its biggest toll on the higher-priced wines and grapes. Coupled with that, the lower-priced San Joaquin Valley winegrape and concentrate market hit historic low prices.

“I have survived many down cycles in my 18 years at the helm at AGG and promised myself I would not leave AGG nor my predecessor in a negative term for Allied or its growers,” he says. “I see good opportunities in both demand and improved pricing for quality winegrapes going forward.”

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