The Winery

2017-The year it all began...

The year it all began, when Rivka and Sam first met. Sam was still doing his service in the army, so the couple had to suffice with seeing each other once every two weeks and spending long weekends together. On Saturday nights they would have hours long dates at Corky wine bar in Jerusalem, and, as Rivka puts it, she fell in love with Sam and wine simultaneously. They began buying and trying wines and deepening their understanding of the industry, as wine became a shared passion and hobby.

2018-The year of the wedding and the eureka moment...

The year of the wedding and the eureka moment. After Rivka and Sam got married in the summer, Sam was still finishing up his army service and was even contemplating an army career. But fate had other plans. During an officers training course down in the south of Israel, Sam saw vineyards growing out of sand dunes, in a place he now knows is Nana winery. He made a silent vow to himself, there and then, that if he wasn’t going to protect the land for the rest of his life, he was going to cultivate it. He would grow vineyards, pairing his love for the land with his love for wine.

2019-The year the wine career began in earnest...

The year the wine career began in earnest. Sam came to the end of five and a half years in the army, and immediately started working at Castel winery. He started off in the wine production department, before moving over to the agricultural department. He worked his way up for a few years until he became head vintner at Castel.

2020-The year they took the plunge...

The year they took the plunge. Sam decided he needed more experience in winemaking as well as viticulture. He needed to experiment, to learn and make mistakes. He came home one day and proposed putting together all their savings into buying high quality French and Tuscan equipment from a boutique winery that was closing down. He insisted that it would all essentially be vinegar for a while, and their goal would be bringing out their first vintage in 13 years, by the time their soon-to-be-born baby boy would have his bar-mitzvah. Sam would continue learning about viticulture at work and educate himself about winemaking at home.
But Rivka had other ideas…

2021-The year of firsts...

The year of firsts. Their baby boy was born in March, and they named him Lavie Shabtai Marawi. Marawi is a grape variety indigenous to the land of Israel, from which the wine used in the Beit Hamikdash, the Holy Temple, was made. Fittingly, this would also be the year where Sam and Rivka added their first vintage to the long history of Israeli wine.

Rivka knew that Sam, being a perfectionist, would never feel ready to start selling their wine, but she also knew he had expertly crafted a wine worth selling. She hired a graphic designer, built up their branding image and presented it to Sam, making the case that they had to get their wine out there. Sam was convinced, and Rivka started recording the process on a private Instagram account. On the day they started bottling 2021’s vintage she told Sam they were going live. Rivka knew that they had to take their customers on this crazy journey along with them, showing them all the behind-the-scenes footage.

Their first vintage, only 200 bottles, pre-sold in 24 hours. They decided to drive across the country and deliver all the bottles by hand, to meet everyone who supported them from day one and thank them in person. That first year they even shipped internationally, reaching Hong Kong, the U.S. and the UK.

Sam looked at Rivka after the last bottle was delivered and said, “You realise that from now on, we’ll be doing this every year until the day we die.”

2022-The year of continued experimentation and expansion...

The year of continued experimentation and expansion. They produced their second vintage, now doubled to 400 bottles. It sold out in less than 24 hours. Again, they hand-delivered each bottle across the country. This was also the year they added their distinctive pink wax seal to each wine bottle, a symbol of their rose-coloured outlook and the love that is the ever-present undercurrent of their every endeavour.

2023-The year the war broke out...

The year the war broke out. Bruno Mars was coming to Israel in October. Rivka and Sam resolved to finish delivering bottles by then so that his concert would be Vintage 2022’s grand finale. They went on October 5th. The singer was supposed to have given a second concert on October 7th. The horrific Hamas attacks on that day changed everything.

When he was called up to the army on October 7th, Rivka promised Sam that she would take care of the wine that year. She knew how to do the fermentation process from having worked on it with Sam before, and with the help of Sam’s friends over at Castel, she would take samples from their mini home lab to Castel’s lab to ensure the balance was perfect.

With Sam only on leave for a maximum of 48 hours at a time, Rivka took on the bulk of the role herself, whilst still working long hours as a nurse. In her own words, “I had no idea if Sam was going to lose the people around him. I didn’t want him to come out of the army also having lost our business. That’s what kept me going.” Making their wine was Rivka’s coping mechanism, her way of communicating with Sam when she couldn’t see or speak to him.

All 600 bottles of 2023’s vintage were still produced. It is a dry, red wine, fruit forward with a kick of black pepper. A more intense, complex wine than the Baums have made before, this wine is liquid courage, imbued with Rivka’s fortitude and strength through turbulent times. It will be distributed in April 2025, needing more time to mature than their previous vintages.

Despite everything, the pink wax seal remains.

2024-The year we located the land for our own vineyard and moved to the Golan Heights...

The year we located the land for our own vineyard and moved to the Golan Heights. The Baums made the big move up to Moshav Sha’al in the Golan, to a beautiful landscape straight out of The Sound of Music. They will plant their first vineyard in 2025 on land carefully chosen for its Levantine terroir and distinctive flavour profile. Despite this big step, at their core they remain a family-run business, dedicated to organic growth. Sam will work in Dalton winery for a few years alongside growing his own grapes, working slowly up to the day where he can dedicate himself to his own winery full time.

Just as wine needs time for its flavours to deepen, Rivka and Sam know that their winery matures along with each passing season. They are humbled by the loyalty of their customers who have stuck with them from day one, and strive to continue improving each year. “Building a winery from the ground up is a little like being the parents of a young child. You all mature together over time.” Armed with faith, patience, tenacity and love, Family Baum Winery continues to grow.