Company representatives trekked from Hawaii late last week to officially open Langtry's new wastewater treatment plant and break ground on its 18-hole golf course along Butts Canyon Road.
Malulani President Easton Manson said both of the projects are meant to bolster the winery's sales.
“We believe Lake County agricultural products are top of class,” Manson said.
The winery currently produces about 220,000 cases of wine annually between its own vintages and those it bottles for other wine producers, Manson told Lake County News. That makes it the largest wine producing operation in the county.
The wastewater treatment facility will allow the winery to eventually expand to up to 500,000 cases of wine annually, he said.
Across the way, the golf course and clubhouse won't be open to the public, said Manson, but instead will be an amenity to entertain visiting wine industry members, including buyers and distributors.
The Board of Supervisors gave the golf course final approval in March.
Supervisors Ed Robey and Jeff Smith attended the ceremonies, as did other local dignitaries, including Lake County Farm Bureau Executive Director Chuck March and Sierra Club Lake Group Chair Victoria Brandon, who took part in the golf course groundbreaking.
Robey lauded Manson and the Langtry team for their upgrades to the property.
“It's so important to Lake County,” Robey said, explaining that the business provides the area with an “enormous economic foundation.”
The golf course, Robey added, will be “a fantastic asset,” and he called Manson's approach to improving the winery “first class.”
Johnny Pott, Langtry Farms' director of golf operations, said golf balls will be in the air on July 4, 2009, when the course is slated to open.
In honor of the new venture, Kumu Hula Master Paul Neves – who teaches Hula in Lake County – led dancers in a traditional dance and blessing.
The Middletown area, said Neves, is similar to his home of Hawaii – “still quaking, moving, steaming” because of a volcanic history. As such, he and the dancers honored Pele, Hawaii's goddess of volcanoes and fire.
Company encounters lawsuit; discusses plans for the future
Manson, 36, was named the company's president in 2004 after he became the largest shareholder, which he did through buying out the shares held previously by Orville Magoon in 2003.
In June 2005, Malulani Investments raised $40 million in capital to invest in Langtry Estate and Vineyard, Manson said.
Between 2005 and 2007, the company used the capital for major upgrades to the property, including the still-to-be-completed renovation of early owner Lillie Langtry's house and the hunting lodge of her companion, Freddie Gebhard; irrigation and frost protection; new storage tanks and equipment; and a $1 million upgrade to the wine bottling line.
Manson said the percentage of agricultural usage on the property also has been increased, with 120 acres of new vineyard planted over the last three years. The vineyards include more than 400 acres of winegrapes.
“We do think ag is core to our business – it has been since 1964, when the company acquired the property,” he said.
The company refinanced its debt in 2007 to pay for the golf course and new infrastructure. Manson didn't divulge the golf course's cost.
In addition to property upgrades, Manson said the winery has had a 300-percent increase in its labor force. “We believe in the people who work here.”
Malulani's efforts to upgrade the winery could be hampered by a lawsuit filed in December 2006 by minority company shareholders that include Magoon Acquisition and Development, Nevada-based Reading Corp. and director James J. Cotter.
The plaintiffs in the case accuse Manson and other company members of depriving minority shareholders of important information and effective representation on the board, wasting corporate assets and attempting to force the plaintiffs out of their investments.
A March article in the Honolulu Advertiser reported that the lawsuit has cost the company millions of dollars and threatens to stop not only the winery's expansion but could lead to the liquidation of the property, which a 2005 appraisal valued at $110 million, according to court documents obtained by Lake County News.
The suit – which a judge called a “titanic struggle” between majority and minority shareholders – caused Malulani to lose the opportunity to increase its $40 million loan last year, the Honolulu Advertiser reported. Manson's attorneys have accused Cotter of being a corporate raider who is trying to liquidate the company's assets, including Langtry.
Manson told Lake County News that he couldn't discuss specifics of the case. However, he called the plaintiffs “sophisticated and litigious.”
“I don't believe their activity can be overly disruptive to what the company's goals are,” Manson said.
Over the next 20 years the company will seek to become more diversified, said Manson. In choosing a company he would like to emulate, he points to Maui Land and Pineapple Co., which owns 25,000 acres on Maui, owns subsidiary agriculture companies and the Kapalua Resort.
Malulani has no plans for a housing development on the property, as has been discussed in recent years, said Manson. Nor is it currently planning to build a resort.
“Being a destination would be a very longterm goal for us,” he said, pointing to the difficulty of raising capital for such a venture, and the need for collaboration from other big players such as Brassfield Estate and Ceago Vinegarden in drawing visitors here.
Manson – who compiled a book on the winery's history and its famed one-time owner, British actress Lillie Langtry – said plans to promote Langtry include an emphasis on both its colorful past and its promising future as a producer of fine wines.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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