This UVA Darden Alum is Literally Crushing It in the Wine Industry

These days, a wine enthusiast flying over the rolling hills of Virginia’s Piedmont or the nearby Shenandoah Valley would find cause for optimism in the orderly rows of grapevines.  

Though less well-known than its West Coast or European relatives, Virginia’s wine industry has been humming for years.

In 2022, the Old Dominion boasted over 4,000 acres of grapevines yielding approximately 10,000 tons of grapes, and 274 wine producers. In total, the state’s industry was responsible for more than 25,000 jobs and an economic impact of over $6 billion, according to a study by the National Association of American Wineries.

With growth often comes growing pains, however, and not all grape producers want or can afford to build full-scale production facilities to process, bottle and label their creations. And the industry’s financial and technical knowledge requirements leave many would-be new winemakers dreaming of possibilities but unsure how to bring them to fruition.

Right at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains on the outskirts of Waynesboro, a new operation co-founded by a University of Virginia Darden School of Business graduate offers a solution.

“It’s really been incredible to see the growth,” said Patt Eagan, co-founder of Common WealthCrush Co., a business Eagan and his co-founders describe as “winery custom crush meets business incubator meets think tank cooperative.”

Since graduating from Darden in 2021, Eagan has helped build Common Wealth Crush into a first-of-its-kind facility for the Shenandoah Valley, one that serves as a regional resource for Virginia’s expanding wine industry. The team consults with new growers and provides production capacity for emerging and established winemakers alike to usher their wines from grape to bottle. As its name implies, the team hopes to generate common wealth for all the makers in the ecosystem.

“Patt had a vision for himself,” said Marc Lipson, Darden’s Robert F. Vandell Professor of Business Administration, who Eagan describes as a friend and mentor.

Growing a Business

Common Wealth Crush is located in the historic Virginia Metalcrafters building in Waynesboro, a massive early 20th-century complex once home to the renowned, eponymous manufacturing operation, and a 2015 addition to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. Though the original business closed in 2015, the building has reawakened with new tenants, including Basic City Beer Co, The Foundry music venue, and Happ coffee roasters.

From the outside, the Common Wealth Crush building is industrial and unassuming, with an entrance around back near the former Metalcrafters loading dock. But inside, the facility is sleek and modern, with gleaming stainless tanks, wood barrels, and newly installed water and electric lines running neatly from floor to ceiling.  

In addition to vineyard and winemaking services, Common Wealth Crush is a support mechanism and sales channel for regional grape-growers. Some clients seek to supplement their own vineyard crop, while others rely solely on purchases each year to produce their wines.

Common Wealth Crush’s own house–label wines are produced entirely from purchased Virginia-grown grapes. In each of its first two years, the team bought approximately 20 tons, yielding roughly 15,000 bottles. Due to early demand, they plan to nearly double this with the 2024 harvest. Stylistically, the team embraces a less traditional approach with the house label, often exploring unique blends and lesser-known grape varieties, as well as non-classical naming and label design, such as “The Artist Formerly Known as Sparkling,” a crisp white blend created by Eagan.

For clients new to the wine world, the company acts as a consultant from the earliest stages. In some cases this takes the form of full cycle service, with Common Wealth Crush guiding decision making from vineyard block to bottle. For others who are already established, Common Wealth Crush simply processes grapes and assists as needed to exact customer specifications.

On a recent summer afternoon, Common Wealth Crush’s new Assistant Winemaker, Elia Chaves, was training on her first day, watching as a forklift glided across the concrete floor, moving barrels.

“I am learning and observing today,” she said. “We’re about to rack some wine.”

Nearby, a raised tank for red wines sat near a slightly lowered one for whites. Depending on the type of grape and desired wine style, Common Wealth Crush processes the fresh-picked fruitaccordingly, then vinifies, barrels, bottles and labels the resulting wine, giving clients back a ready-to-sell product.

Despite the Virginia wine industry’s growth in recent years, Eagan and his co-founders – Shenandoah Valley–born winemaking brothers, Ben and Tim Jordan – recognized that there was a need in their region for a multi-producer facility. Historically, emerging Virginia producers often needed to either own expensive processing facilities or rely on relationships with established wineries. In the early 2000s, Michael Shaps Virginia Wineworks began operations in the Charlottesville area, addressing a similar market need for custom winemaking services.

“While custom crush winemaking service is not a new concept in Virginia, we recognized that there wasn’t really a communal facility designed from the start with independent winemakers in mind,” Eagan said.

He and the Jordan brothers opened the doors to Common Wealth Crush in 2022. The process was complicated by the notoriously slow pandemic supply chains and the unpredictable renovation of a very old building. For a while, they were borrowing electricity from their neighbors at Basic City.

But they were right about the demand. They hoped to process 6,700 cases of wine in their first year of operation, Eagan said. Instead, they did almost 11,000. In their second year, they hoped for 12,000 cases and produced almost 18,000.

“We built the capacity, and it’s been really gratifying to see the customers come in,” he said. This harvest, nearly 20 different brands will be produced within the facility, some helmed by Virginia winemaking veterans, and others dreamed up by newcomers to the industry.

Planting Seeds

Years ago, as an 18-year-old undergraduate at the University of Richmond, Eagan thought he would major in music.

“I’ve played and written music my whole life, and I assumed music would be my professional path, in some way, post-graduation” he recalled.

But he was curious about the business classes at Richmond, and ended up a business major, though he still made sure to take all the music and philosophy classes he could.

In his third year, Eagan studied abroad and had the chance to catch up with French cousins, who operate a winery in the Champagne region.

“I felt a magnetic pull toward it. In retrospect, I think it was because it was a natural combination of all the things that I liked from business school, but it also engaged the art and philosophy side of my brain.”

In a nice stroke of luck, on his first day of classes back at Richmond, a professor announced that the Virginia Wine Marketing Office was offering an internship. Eagan applied and was selected, beginning that June.

Inspired by his intern immersion into Virginia winemaking, after graduation Eagan accepted a job with the newly opened Early Mountain Vineyards, north of Charlottesville. It gave Eagan an opportunity to work across multiple areas, and while there, he met Ben Jordan, one of his future partners in Common Wealth Crush. After seven years, Eagan knew he wanted to further his business education and ultimately launch a wine venture of his own, and he applied to Darden.  

A New Node on the Darden Network

Coming into Darden with a clear idea of the industry he wanted to work in gave Eagan a particular type of focus, Lipson said.

“He saw Darden as a vibrant community with much to offer a fertile and engaged mind,” Lipson recalled. “Darden does not impose its vision of success; it empowers everyone to be the best version of themselves possible. This certainly requires breadth of coverage in our curriculum and depth available as needed. But more important is that it requires us to push students to recognize challenges they may not foresee and confront their limitations and build plans to adapt.”

Looking back, Eagan said the case method and Darden’s real-world approach to learning was great preparation for the controlled chaos of launching a start-up.

“I would say that Darden is as close an analogue to the real world as any academic experience I’ve ever had,” he said. “For someone who is looking at all the great MBA programs that are out there, yes, many of them will teach you similar frameworks and tactics, but the case delivery method you experience at Darden and the intuition development and problem-solving ability that results has been a game–changer in starting Common Wealth Crush.”

Eagan said the broader Darden network also played a critical role. In fact, it was Darden entrepreneurship professor Damon DeVito (MBA ’94) who first urged Eagan and his partners to consider the Virginia Metalcrafters location as a possible fit for the operation. 

Eagan also recounted fondly sitting down with Lipson on North Grounds a year after graduation to review the company’s final financial model together. Eagan said he always felt comfortable reaching out to Darden community members for advice. It’s a strength of the school, Lipson said.

“The Darden community, both during and after the program, offers passionate but honest feedback matched with a bias to act rather than just talk,” Lipson said. “The only complaint I recall from a CFO alum at a major corporation was that he felt students did not reach out to him enough!”

Lipson also pointed out that Eagan himself is already paying forward the experience he gained at Darden.

“Patt and his wife Anika – both alums I had the pleasure of teaching – brought grace and intelligence to all their Darden activities,” he said. “They did not need a spotlight or a podium upon which to be admired. They offered sage guidance and emotional support to all who they saw in need, regardless of their own recognition.”

What’s Next

With two full years of operations under its belt, Common Wealth Crush is looking to settle into a period of steady growth.

“There were such radical changes in the first years: getting used to a new space, a new company, new processes, and scaling production faster than anticipated,” Eagan said. “The coming year will be the first time where we can think: OK, we’ve been here before.”

In addition to the rapid scaling of their winemaking services, in the past year the team also opened their public tasting room in the Metalcrafters building, launched a direct-to-consumer wine club and online e-commerce store, and expanded their national distribution footprint to nine states and counting. Common Wealth Crush also started a new winemaker incubator program aimed at bringing fresh perspectives into the industry and launching the next generation of Virginia winemakers, particularly those from historically underrepresented groups.

At maturity, the team hopes to reach 30,000 cases of production per year. While the majority of this is envisioned to remain client production, a portion will stay dedicated to Common WealthCrush’s own house label wines, which currently make up 10-15% of its annual total.

The team has also grown, now numbering nearly a dozen between full– and part-time members.Celebrated NYC-based sommelier Lee Campbell (CLAS ’94) joined Common Wealth Crush as a partner upon launch and oversaw the development and opening of the tasting room.

Back on North Grounds, Common Wealth Crush also recently entered the Darden curriculum as the focus of six new cases authored by MBA ‘24 graduates, Alex Hickey, Fehin Ibiloye, and Alyssa Tulabut, in collaboration with Darden faculty members. The cases explore the topics of finance, ethics, accounting, marketing, operations, and negotiations, all through lived examples from Eagan and his co-founders. In fact, the cases made their public debut this past spring, taught by faculty to prospective new students during Darden Days.

As to his advice for Darden students who want to pursue an entrepreneurial career, Eagan urges them to embrace the resources UVA offers, in addition to the school’s deep network for guidance and mentorship.

For more information about Common Wealth Crush’s winemaking services, wine club, bottle availability and more, visit www.commonwealthcrush.com