Westover Winery of the Castro Valley in California is closing its doors.
The winery has been cited by the California Department of Industrial Relations for using volunteer labor to help in the production and sale of the wines the vineyard produces.
A small-time vintner’s use of volunteer workers has put him out of business after the state squeezed him like a late-summer grape for $115,000 in fines — and sent a chill through the wine industry.
The volunteers, some of them learning to make wine while helping out, were illegally unpaid laborers, and Westover Winery should have been paying them and paying worker taxes, the state Department of Industrial Relations said.
As Westover Winery makes roughly $11,000 a year in profit, the fine is over a decade worth of profits. No business can take that much of a loss and survive.
Over half of the workers at the winery were volunteering their time, many of whom were taking wine making courses or wanting to learn more about wine making. Some wanted to learn about the business of running a vineyard. We would bet that some would have found the idea of helping to make the wine one would drink would have a charming and romantic element to it.
People volunteer their time and labor in a myriad of ways, even for “for-profit” businesses. Indeed, helping friends or family launch a business is a time-honored tradition. At this winery, it afforded people who wanted to learn a place for hands-on experience.
Peter Melton, a spokesman for the state of California said:
“These are not idle things. People should be paid for their labor. The workers’ compensation violations are very serious. What happens if someone has a catastrophic injury at the winery?” he asked.
What does Habitat for Humanity do if one of their volunteer contractors falls off a ladder or has a close encounter with a power tool?
Geez, I guess Peter Melton has never heard of insurance.
Via Walter Olson where, in the comments, Westover Winery’s William Smyth writes
I am the owner of the winery. I have cancer and have had five surgeries in five years. I left a corporate job to deal with my cancer in 2010. My life expectancy is probably another six years. The only reason I kept the winery going was for the fun and passion of those who wanted to volunteer and their friendship. I am closing the winery to spend time with both of my parents who are in the last years of their life and they are very ill at this point. I also want to deal with my cancer. The fines were probably more than what the entire winery was worth. The fines made my final decisions easy. We are talking about a business that is only open 10 hours per week total. We did not need any of the volunteers.
My wife and I could handle it alone. This was not about money, it was about passion. By the way, one of my volunteers made everything worth it, she later became my wife.
Meanwhile, government departments all over California have unpaid volunteers, from file clerks to attorneys.
Wonder why Peter is not worried about them?
I assume that this really has to do with (non-government) volunteers not joining the SEIU.
– Common Dar, you know the Napa large commercial breweries and unions are behind this. It’s one of the perks for corporations when you have a 1 party system. Killjoy.
– In other news….
– Bumblefuck and his clown car cabinet finally find Syria on a Chevron station map, and: More Progressive science, not so inclusive after all. To be or not to be, that is the scientific question.
The winery owners should just call their volunteers “interns” and have sex with them, too. Should be no problems then.
I just wonder which on of Mr. Meltons friends or relations is going to wind up with the winery. This is how things are done in Illinois.
I worked without pay for Ham Mowbray in the late summer into the fall of 1978, through the harvest, and on the spur of our mutual whim, through the crush and processing. Though Ham gave me room and board and all the wine I could consume over the course of those weeks was plenty pay enough. Great fun, great work, great learning times. And hell, Ham couldn’t afford to pay anyone, having in volunteers year after year for hand-picking harvests — and all of whom loved the old curmudgeon for it. I still recall his greatest hybrid varietal success was called Seyve-Villard 5276. Damn that was good stuff, and we drank it from breakfast til bedtime.
Peter Melton and the others of his ilk are the cancers.
Reminds me of nothing more than the EPA Guy from Ghostbusters.
I’m going back to my old habit of always putting “Nobel Peace Prize winner” in front of any mention of the current President.
My wife did some volunteer at a local winery a few months ago. Can we cash in?
California will henceforth be known as East Korea.
I want to get paid for the involuntary work I did for Solyndra and other subsidized green industries.
Or maybe North Venezuela.
West Cuba?
Baja Canada
Coastal Progtardia
– Such a beautiful place,
such a complete disgrace….
I’m still partial to the old Democratic People’s Republic of Kalifornia (DPRK)
– Clown disaster’s clown car cabinet never misses an opportunity to step on their own big shod clown feet.
I suspect Nobel Peace Prize winner Obama knows exactly what he’s doing there, and is trying to provoke a reaction.
You know, so as not to let it go to waste and all that…
I can’t see the “K” spelling without reading it as Kafkafornia.
Which…
That last one, McGehee, is bloody perfect – bravo.
Masks are dropped by Commieforniaists, recorded by Zombie.
**** Most countries we tend to think of as “communist” actually self-defined as “socialist” ****
Paraphrasing farmer Max Yasser, “Communist, Socialist, what the hell’s the difference once the head’s blowed off.”
I think commies twitch less. YMMV.
If only my dad had known how hip it would be to be 90, he would have been 90 today.
’round these here parts, the smart businesses call them interns.