Napa wine industry generates over $50bn

A new report has indicated that the Napa wine industry contributes over $50 billion a year to the US economy.

Photo credit: Jason Tinacci / Napa Valley Vintners

Compiled by Stonebridge Research, The Economic Impact of Napa County’s Wine and Grapes found that the region’s wine production has a $13.3 billion economic impact on Napa County, a $25.9bn impact on California as a whole and a $50.3bn impact across the US.

The report’s scope reached from the $3.7bn wholesale, $777.7 million direct sales and $84.1m export sales revenues achieved by Napa’s 789 licensed wineries to factors such as the $1.05bn generated by wine tourism expenditure.

Within Napa County itself, the wine industry was calculated as generating a $2.1bn wage contribution across 46,000 employees. This figure rose to $9.2bn across 303,000 employees when the impact of Napa’s wine industry was extended across the US.

In addition, the industry’s total tax contribution generated over $5bn, while a further $84m came from charitable contributions.

The report found that Napa accounted for 20% of California’s total wine production and “between 16% and 17.5%” of all the wine produced in the US. Meanwhile, sales of Napa wine accounted for 52% of the total retail value of all Californian wine sold in 2011 and 26.6% of the state’s retail volume sales.

Commenting on the report, Napa Valley Vintners’ executive director Linda Reiff said: “This is the most comprehensive examination of our wine industry’s economic impact to date, giving us a more detailed look from a multitude of resources, from one-on-one interviews with wine and wine-related businesses to local, state and federal reporting agencies.”

Based on the report’s findings, she remarked: “The Napa wine industry is healthy and thriving, fueling our local and national economies even in these uncertain times.”

A full copy of the report can be viewed here.