Special 48-hour LIOCO Offer, July 2026
Orders due: Monday July 27, noon
Pickup: Wines will arrive in mid-August
One of our favorite wineries, as many of your know
LIOCO began in 2005 with a question: Could California produce wines built around nuance, freshness and a genuine sense of place rather than sheer ripeness, oak and power? Wine director Kevin O’Connor and wine salesman Matt Licklider believed it could—and began searching California’s cooler coastal regions for distinctive vineyards capable of proving the point. Today, LIOCO is owned and operated by Matt and Sara Licklider, working with winemaker Drew Huffine and an unusually compelling collection of small, family-owned vineyards stretching from Mendocino through Sonoma and into the Santa Cruz Mountains.
LIOCO owns no vineyards. Instead, the team seeks out what it calls “special places”: mature vines, unusual soils, cool growing conditions and growers committed to sustainable, organic or biodynamic farming. Some sources are famous, such as Hirsch and Hanzell; others are wonderfully obscure, including old, dry-farmed plantings of Carignan and Valdiguié tucked into the backcountry of Mendocino County. That restless vineyard hunting is central to LIOCO’s identity—they are, in effect, helping to draw California’s still-unfinished map of truly exceptional sites.
In the cellar, the winemaking is deliberately restrained. Fermentations generally rely on native yeasts, new oak is used sparingly, and most wines are bottled without fining or filtration. The Chardonnays are especially distinctive: textural and savory, yet energetic, often fermented and matured without any new oak. Pinot Noir remains elegant and aromatic rather than dark and heavily extracted, while LIOCO’s “outlier” wines—made from grapes such as Carignan, Valdiguié and Syrah—show an earthier, wilder side of California.
What makes LIOCO unique is not simply that the wines are lighter or less oaky. It is that they offer a different interpretation of California—one in which acidity, texture, soil, coastal influence and vineyard history matter more than size or swagger. These are California wines with energy, personality and a strong sense of somewhere. They also happen to be enormously pleasurable at the table, which is ultimately where all that philosophy needs to prove itself.
A special offer on five incredible wines
These are rarities. They are not part of the normal stock at the local wholesaler’s warehouse. Rather, these gems are in California and LIOCO is making a special offer to our state.
We’re packaging them into a five-pack, one bottle of each, at a super discounted price.
2023 Estero Chardonnay
100% Russian River Valley. A composition of incredible vineyards: Burnside (next to Littorai), Piner, Tidal Break, and Casa Seca. Natural yeasts, long elevage, and extended time in the bottle. From the winery: aromas of lemon bar, loquat, and crushed chalk. Food pairings: brown butter scallops, lemon risotto, potato gratin.
2024 Compteche Pinot Noir
Compteche AVA is one of the newest AVAs in California. It’s located at low elevation (300-400 feet) and 14 miles from the ocean in the Mendocino coast. It’s a foggy and forested area that has diurnal temperature shifts of up to 40 degrees in a day. This is wilderness wine, coming from a micro-region alive with black bears, steelhead trout, and bald eagles. From the winery: aromas of Italian plum, potting soil, and coriander seed. Food pairings: meat pie, braised kale with chorizo, duck confit.
2024 Lejano Pinot Noir
Lejao is Spanish for “distant” and reflects the remote Sonoma Coast vineyards this wine comes from. These are sites incredibly close to the ocean, absorbing the influence that only the coast can bring. From the winery: aromas of crushed black cherry, red licorice, and slate. Food pairings: braised pork shoulder, lacquered short rib, charred eggplant.
2022 Fondo Cabernet Sauvignon
A wine inspired by the great Cabernets of Napa made in the 1960s and 1970s: lower alcohol, less wood, more details. The sources of the fruit are the legendary Monte Rosso vineyard as well as Bedrock. It’s access to these historic and legendary vineyards that led LIOCO to make its first-ever Cabernet. Aromas of wild blackberry, preserved cherry, and gravel. Food pairings: braised short ribs, Korean BBQ, and bistro burgers.
2023 Sativa Carignan
409 total cases produced from an ancient two-acre parcel of Carignan (possibly the oldest Carignan in California), in the Pine Mountain – Cloverdale AVA of Mendocino County. Whole cluster fermentation over 12 days, then racked to neutral oak where it sat still for 16 months. This is as pure as old-vine anything gets! Aromas of black plum, red licorice, and tarragon. Food pairings: birria tacos, Korean BBQ, and smash burgers.
This offer has closed. Thank you for your interest.