🍇 Where Wine Takes You, Episode 175 Highlights 🍷

Legacy and Lift-Off: OGs & New Blood

In this episode of Where Wine Takes You, Adam brings two generations of Paso Robles wine together for a conversation about roots, risk, reinvention, and what it takes to keep building when the business gets complicated.

Paul Hoover, owner and winemaker at Still Waters Vineyards, brings the long view. Paul is a Cal Poly agriculture guy, farmer, former hospitality executive, longtime business leader, home-winemaker-turned-estate-winemaker, fisherman, and one of the most approachable voices in Paso wine. His stories stretch from a formative wine education fueled by an employer’s monthly bottle allowance to buying the vineyard that became Still Waters during an earlier downturn in the grape market.

Paul also breaks down the current wine-business correction with refreshing honesty. The COVID years created extraordinary direct-to-consumer demand, wineries increased production to meet it, and then the market shifted before all that slow-moving inventory reached the end of the line. Paul calls it an “I Love Lucy” moment. More wine keeps coming down the conveyor belt while the industry tries to figure out where to put it.

Across the table is Kyle Jury, founder and winemaker at Truss Wines, representing the next wave. Kyle arrived at Cal Poly thinking architecture might be his future, moved into agribusiness and winemaking, interned at JUSTIN, and spent nearly nine years at Booker Vineyard, where Eric Jensen became both a mentor and a major influence on his winemaking and entrepreneurial outlook.

Kyle launched Truss in 2022 with a tiny Chardonnay project, an old high-school drawing of a truss bridge, and a name that came to represent architecture, support, collaboration, and the structure of his growing family. Today, Truss is based at the former TH Estate property in the Willow Creek District, where Kyle is shifting the focus toward estate-grown Syrah, Grenache, and Mourvèdre while continuing to make smaller amounts of coastal Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. His goal is not to abandon Paso power, but to find balance, elegance, acidity, and, true to the brand, beauty in structure.

What makes this conversation special is the handoff happening in real time. Kyle listens to Paul’s stories not as a history lesson, but as fuel. Paul looks at the next generation not as competition, but as proof that the work continues. As Kyle puts it, Truss started on second base with a special Willow Creek property. Now the job is to take the torch and keep it going.

This episode was recorded at SLO CAL Studios in San Luis Obispo County, California, where life’s too beautiful to rush. Learn more and plan your next countywide adventure at SLOCAL.com.

Featured Guests

🌴 Travel Paso Spotlight: Concerts in the Park

Later in the episode, Adam shines the Travel Paso Spotlight on one of the city’s best summer traditions: Concerts in the Park.

Every Thursday evening from 6 to 8 p.m., Downtown Paso Robles City Park turns into one big community backyard, with blankets on the grass, kids dancing, friends sharing food, and live music under the trees. The 2026 season runs through August 20, with a lineup spanning classic rock, reggae, Latin music, R&B, and soul.

Lohr wine, Firestone Walker beer, water, and soda are available for purchase. Net beverage proceeds support the Paso Robles REC Foundation, while pass-the-hat donations help fund recreation scholarships and expand access to local programs. The foundation has supported Paso parks, playgrounds, public spaces, and recreation opportunities since 1999.

PASO WINE WIRE

Paso’s White Wines Take the Main Stage

The Third Annual Paso Robles White Wine Invitational lands at Rava Winery on Saturday, August 1, from 4 to 7 p.m. More than twenty wineries will pour over 100 wines in a walk-around tasting dedicated to the bright, textured, increasingly exciting white-wine side of Paso Robles. Live music and food vendors round out the evening, and advance tickets are required.

🔗 White Wine Invitational Information and Tickets

Marin’s Vineyard Puts Gold in the Bubbles

Marin’s Vineyard earned a Gold Medal at the 2026 OC Fair Commercial Wine Competition for its 2024 Sparkling Viognier. The wine was also voted Best Sparkling Wine in the 2026 Best of the Central Coast Awards.

Winemaker Marin Wolgamott produces the wine in the pét-nat style, finishing fermentation inside the bottle before every bottle is disgorged by hand. The winery celebrates two years in Downtown Atascadero on August 22 and plans to release the 2025 Sparkling Viognier that weekend.

🔗 Read the Paso Robles Daily News story

🔗 Marin’s Vineyard

Instagram: @marinsvineyard

Pink Drank Returns Poolside

Pink Drank Pool Social (Adam’s Rosé/Pink Event) returns Saturday, July 11, 2026, at the San Luis Obispo Elks Lodge. VIP entry begins at 2 p.m., general admission starts at 3, and the pink runs until 6.

More than 30 producers will pour wine, beer, cider, spirits, and cocktails alongside food, music, raffles, a wine pull, a silent auction, and actual pool time. Proceeds support Woods Humane Society and Elks charitable, scholarship, and youth programs. The event is 21 and over.

🔗 Pink Drank Tickets and Details

Instagram: @pinkdrank_poolsocial

🔗 Woods Humane Society

🎡 Summer in Paso

The California Mid-State Fair runs July 15 through July 26, 2026, at the Paso Robles Event Center, bringing twelve days of concerts, carnival rides, exhibits, livestock, food, and classic Paso fair energy.

🔗 California Mid-State Fair

And a friendly wine-country reminder: do not buy beautiful bottles and leave them cooking in the car. Bring a cooler, ask the winery to hold your purchase, or drop the wine at your hotel before the fair, dinner, or your next tasting stop.

🎯 Plan your next Paso Robles getaway at travelpaso.com

🎙️ RECORDED AT SLO CAL STUDIOS

Recorded at Adam’s SLO CAL Studios, San Luis Obispo County, California.

SLO CAL — where the wine is world-class, the people are real, and life is too beautiful to rush.

For turns well taken:
https://slocal.com

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🎙️ Credits
Executive Producer: Joel Peterson + Paso Wine
Associate Producer: Krista Smith
Recorded, edited, hosted by Adam Montiel
Follow Adam: @AdamOnTheAir
Explore all things Adam: AdamMontiel.com
Listen to Adam’s other shows: Up + Adam (daily) and The Pour (wine & more, travel, culture)
Learn more, connect, or say hey at AdamMontiel.com/connect

🎵 Original music by Moonshiner Collective
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🍷 Plan your trip at PasoWine.com and follow @PasoWine

🎯 Plan your next Paso Robles getaway at travelpaso.com

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Ep 175 Legacy and Lift-Off: OGs & New Blood – Featuring Stillwaters Vineyard | Truss Wines

Where Wine Takes You - A Paso Wine Podcast

Ep 175 Legacy and Lift-Off: OGs & New Blood – Featuring Stillwaters Vineyard | Truss Wines