Kosta Browne


Kosta Browne is a winery in Sebastopol, California, specializing in Pinot Noir. Kosta Browne was founded in 1997 and is currently owned by Duckhorn Wine Company.

History and production

In 1997, Dan Kosta and Michael Browne founded Kosta Browne Winery. The winery built a direct-to-consumer allocation model, selling only 15% of its wine through wholesale channels. Kosta Browne's 2009 Sonoma Coast Pinor Noir won Wine Spectator's Wine of the Year Award in 2011. The winery relied on purchased grapes until 2013, when Kosta Browne bought a 20-acre vineyard, followed by a 60-acre purchase in Anderson Valley 2016.
Kosta Browne is known for highly extracted wines made from very sugar-rich, ripe grapes, starting with the 2002 and 2003 vintages. Since 2015 the winery changed its style towards less extraction.
The winery has been sold twice to private-equity firms; the first time being in 2015, to J.W. Childs Associates; and more recently to the Duckhorn Wine Company, in 2018, which is owned by TSG Consumer Partners.