But an 0ff-site tasting room in Carmel-by-the-Sea will remain open and wines from the Chalone estate vineyard will be made at other Foley Family Wines facilities.

Chalone is a case study in the virtue of remaining small. It had a sterling reputation – it was one of the American wines selected for the famous Judgment of Paris competition before it acquired than six other wineries from San Luis Obispo to Washington State. In 984 it was the first American wine company to do an initial public offering. It's diviend was basically a big wine party once a year for shareholders.

Ten years later it was sold to Diageo, which slashed Chalone's viticultural budget and slapped Chalone labels on a bulk-wine Chardonnay brand. Then Diageo decided to get out of the wine business altogether. In 2016, Foley bought Chalone and has attempted to restore Chalone's reputation..

Writing after Foley purchased Chalone, San Francisco Chronicle wine critic Esther Mobley wrote she "found it impossible not to wonder how great it might have remained had Chalone’s former owners had just kept their attention here, not tried to build an empire, not gone public, not ultimately sold it off. 

Foley hasn't given a reason for closing Chalone's winemaking operation.