The Qupe label
The label displays a poppy design from the Arts and Crafts period of the early 1900's. The design came out of the Gustave Stickley craftsman school and was meant to be stitched on to pillow cases and bed spreads with the idea that the poppies would help you sleep. Ann Johnson, one of Qupé's original shareholders, found the design in a clip art book in the public domain. Ann sent a copy of the design to Bob along with about a hundred other poppy designs that she had researched. She had placed this design on the top of the stack as her favorite and the minute Bob saw it he knew it was the one. The stylized poppy also looks a little bit like a wine glass, and in fact Bob altered the design a bit to look more like a poppy.
About Bob Lindquist
Robert Neil "Bob" Lindquist was born in the Midwest and moved to Southern California with his family in 1964 when Bob was 11 years old. The sixties music scene quickly became a passion of Bob's as bands like the Beatles, Beach Boys, Kinks, Byrds and Rolling Stones were electrifying the airwaves…rock and roll music still resonates with Bob and in fact the Kinks later became a plot device in Bob's choice to pursue a career in winemaking.
Bob has also been a big baseball fan ever since he listened to the 1960 World Series on the radio while his family was living in Germany (when the Pirates upset the mighty Yankees). In 1965, Bob's first baseball season after moving to Southern California, the Los Angeles Dodgers won their 3rd World Series since moving west themselves and Bob became an instant and lifelong Dodger fan.
In the early '70's while Bob was in college at UC Irvine he got his first taste of good wine and he was instantly hooked. Bob started hanging out at Hi-Time Cellars, a great wine shop in Bob's hometown of Costa Mesa, asking a lot of questions and buying whatever wines he could afford…and in 1975 Bob moved from SoCal with his young family to the North Central Coast to pursue a career in the wine business.
Bob's first job was working the 1975 harvest at the Fortino Winery in the Hecker Pass area near Gilroy. When harvest ended he landed a job at the San Martin Winery tasting room in Gilroy where his enthusiasm and growing wine knowledge quickly got him promoted to assistant manager. San Martin was a dynamic and important player in the growing Central Coast wine business. When an opportunity to manage a new tasting room in Ventura County came along in 1976, Bob jumped on it. This lead to Bob's discovery of the potential for wine in neighboring Santa Barbara County, and from his first visits to Firestone Vineyards, Santa Ynez Valley Winery, Rancho Sisquoc and Sanford & Benedict this is where he was destined to be.
On January 1st, 1979, Bob moved to Santa Ynez to manage a retail wine shop in the little town of Los Olivos. This shop was way ahead of its time, and was owned by the son of the owner of Zaca Mesa Winery. Fate intervened ( the Kinks ) and in September 1979 Bob went to work at Zaca Mesa as their first tour guide just in time for the upcoming harvest. Zaca Mesa didn't get many tourists in those early days so most of Bob's time was spent working in the cellar learning to make wine under the tutelage of assistant winemaker Jim Clendenen, who would become Bob's winemaking mentor. Zaca Mesa was fertile ground for learning about winemaking in this up and coming region. Besides Jim Clendenen, the winemaker was Ken Brown and the enologist was Adam Tolmach, both have gone on to make their own marks as winemakers.
In 1982, while still working at Zaca Mesa, Bob started Qupé by buying barrels and grapes and traded his time to use Zaca Mesa's facility. In that first vintage he made 900 cases of chardonnay, syrah and a dry rosé of pinot noir. After the 1983 harvest Bob left Zaca Mesa and went off on his own, continuing to rent space in other wineries to make the Qupé wines. As the winery's production grew, Bob decided to focus on syrah and other varietals of the Rhone, while continuing to make chardonnay, which always helped pay the bills.
In 1989 Bob joined with his old friend Jim Clendenen (who had started his own winery, Au Bon Climat, in 1982) to build a winery facility of their own under a lease agreement with the Bien Nacido Vineyard. The wines continue to be produced in this same facility to this day. Over the last 20+ years Bob and Jim have mentored many other winemakers including Jim Adelman, Gary Burk, Frank Ostini and Grey Hartley, Paul Lato, Louisa Sawyer Lindquist, Morgan Clendenen and Gavin Chanin. Bob's two oldest sons, Ethan and Luke Lindquist, are also winemakers and spent plenty of time around the ABC/Qupé winery. Daughter Paige runs the Qupé tasting room and wine club.
Bob is also a partner in Verdad, a winery dedicated to Spanish varieties produced by his wife, Louisa.
In 2002 Bob and Louisa purchased an 80 acre ranch in the Edna Valley near San Luis Obispo, and the following year they moved to SLO with their then 2 year old son Theo. In 2005 they planted 40 acres at what is now called the Sawyer Lindquist Vineyard, where they are starting the next chapter of their life.
