To keeps prices low, this Napa winery sources grapes from neighboring regions

Louis M. Martini is one of the oldest wineries in Napa Valley, founded in 1933, and is located right on the historic Highway 29 in the picturesque town of St. Helena. The winery is best known for its lusciously rich cabernet sauvignon and draws thousands of Napa Valley visitors each year to taste them at the source.

Despite it being a high-profile Napa Valley winery, many of Martini’s top-selling wines are made with grapes grown in neighboring Sonoma County, including this one. Why? To make sure customers like you have access to something they can afford to drink! Napa Valley wines were once affordable but nowadays their reputation for exceptional quality has shot their prices into the stratosphere.

Wineries like Martini whose entry-level wines used to retail for $20 or $30 now struggle to make anything they can sell for less than $50 a bottle because Napa Valley cabernet sauvignon grapes can easily command pricing of $8,000 per ton or more. To offer a wine under $20, they must source fruit from neighboring regions and age at least a portion of the wine in more cost-effective stainless steel tanks rather than pricey oak barrels.

The result is a cabernet sauvignon that is lighter, brighter, and fresher-tasting than premium Napa Valley bottlings, featuring more red fruit flavors, like cherry and pomegranate, and less of the vanilla and coffee flavors imparted by French oak aging. What this value-oriented wine lacks in power is more than offset by what it gains in versatility, since these traits make for a red wine that is just as well suited to a simple plate of spaghetti as it is to a sumptuous steak.

$17.99; 13.9% alcohol

PLCB Item #9078

Sale price through May 30 — regularly $19.99

Also available at these N.J. shops: