Why it matters
The producer
JAK Meyer and Janice Stevens-Meyer run Meyer Family Vineyards with Chris Carson as winemaker and viticulturist. Meyer came from investment, while Stevens-Meyer brought accounting and food-and-beverage experience; their wine project is therefore tied to a working winery and vineyard rather than a tasting-room label. Carson returned to Canada in 2008 after eight years of work or study in New Zealand, California and Montrachet, bringing that experience to Chardonnay and Pinot Noir made in British Columbia.
Meyer Family Vineyards began making wine in 2006, before the Okanagan Falls tasting room opened in 2010. The estate joined founders whose experience lay outside vineyard work with a winemaker-viticulturist whose training moved through New Zealand, California and Montrachet. The result is a small Okanagan producer that treats site as a practical part of the label: McLean Creek Road for the home vineyard, Old Main Road for a Naramata Bench Chardonnay, and Lakehill Road for another source of fruit.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
The winery sits in Okanagan Falls, within the Okanagan Valley, but the range is not confined to one address. McLean Creek Road is the home vineyard, Old Main Road lies on the Naramata Bench, and Lakehill Road is in Kaleden. A vineyard name on a Meyer label identifies where the fruit was grown, so Old Main Road Chardonnay is read as a single-vineyard wine rather than simply as a regional Chardonnay.
McLean Creek Road was planted in 1994 on a steep, southerly aspect. Its gravelly sandy-loam soils come from alluvial and glacial deposits, giving the home site a physical foundation distinct from the Naramata Bench and Kaleden vineyards. That matters most in a producer built around vineyard names: the estate address is not only where bottles are poured, but a planted slope behind its Chardonnay and Pinot Noir project.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
The producer describes its work as minimal intervention, with Chris Carson responsible for both vineyard and cellar. That combined role keeps farming and winemaking close together: harvesting decisions begin in the named vineyard, then the cellar carries that fruit into wines identified by grape and site. The bottle-specific material for the 2022 releases records élevage for both B Fieldblend Pinot Noir and Old Main Road Chardonnay, while the Micro Cuvée Chardonnay receives its own documented ageing treatment.
Wines to know
The range in view
The range moves between estate and vineyard-designated wines rather than presenting every release as the same expression. Chardonnay and Pinot Noir provide the central grape frame, while the three vineyard addresses supply the geographical distinction. McLean Creek Road establishes the Okanagan Falls home site; Old Main Road places Chardonnay on the Naramata Bench; Lakehill Road extends the range to Kaleden.
B Fieldblend Pinot Noir 2022 is a Pinot Noir-based wine with documented composition and élevage. Old Main Road Chardonnay 2022 is a single-vineyard Chardonnay, and Old Main Road Vineyard Micro Cuvée Chardonnay 2022 takes the same named vineyard into a separate bottling with its own recorded texture, flavour and ageing assessment. These are different bottle roles, not a claimed ladder of quality.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with Old Main Road Chardonnay 2022. It is a single-vineyard Chardonnay from the Naramata Bench, so the label makes the producer’s site-led approach easy to follow: grape, vineyard name and bottle are all stated in one place. Its reported palate has body and acidity, ending on a saline finish. That combination makes it a useful first glass for seeing how Meyer Family Vineyards separates a named Chardonnay vineyard from its Okanagan Falls home address.