Vice Versa’s wine philosophy is to produce good old wines from the best vineyards in the Napa Valley – using some of Andy Beckstoffer’s six heritage vineyards – and to create wines that are balanced and polished, but with great depth. Although Samantha no longer practices her profession as a pharmacist, she now focuses on managing Vice Versa with Patrice, overseeing their distributor and organizing visits to Wheeler Farms where they currently produce their wines. They married and eventually settled in Napa Valley in 2013. In 2011, Patrice met Samantha, a pharmacist in Montreal. They made some changes to the winemaking process, including the introduction of longer fermentation times, longer maceration times and not using pressed juice. When Pawel was busier with his own clients and international projects, Filip Melka and his team, including winemaker Maajan Koszczycki, were invited to work on the wines. The first commercial release of Vice Versa took place in 2003. Patrice learned everything he could by working directly with Hobbs.
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Paul created several yearbooks with Patrice in the early 2000s, but they were never published. The two men became wine friends, helped by the fact that during a meeting in Paul’s office, Patrice saw an empty 1992 bottle of Château d’Yquem, which Paul had used with his father when he was young. He contacted winemaker Paul Hobbs in 2001 (without recommendation or introduction) and Paul agreed to meet with him it was Patrice’s first time in California. He began to consider buying vineyards, first in Bordeaux (which was facilitated by the fact that he spoke fluent French), and then in Napa Valley. His passion for wine became serious – eventually he amassed what is perhaps the largest vertical collection of Chateau d’Yquem in the world. He began collecting wines from Bordeaux, Burgundy and Napa Valley. Before he left the company in 2001, it had grown rapidly and employed more than 400 people. In his twenties, in 1996, he co-founded one of Canada’s first internet companies, Mediagrif Interactive Technologies (still operating and now a publicly traded company known as mdf commerce). Without much of a budget, he started buying books on wine to educate himself. And at 19 (the legal drinking age in Ottawa is 18), he couldn’t afford much wine, but he did get a chance to try a special star, a 1983 Château Guiraud. Founder Patrice Breton was born in Ottawa – in his youth he was interested in art, books and later wine.