Seana & Justin Hunnicutt Stephens

I founded HUNNICUTT in 2002. I’d spent much of my youth in Napa Valley, where part time jobs included working in the vineyards and wineries of friends, scrubbing tanks and assisting with rackings and bottlings. After graduating from U.C. Berkeley I worked in commercial real estate, but quickly realized that wine was of much greater interest and importance to me. I moved to Napa Valley full time to learn the business from the ground up, and for the next several years I juggled night classes in viticulture, enology, and wine marketing with day jobs at wineries in production, sales and management roles. In 2002, as I continued to work and go to school, I made the leap to develop my own brand, HUNNICUTT, enlisting my good friend and noted winemaker Kirk Venge to make the wines.

Around the same time that I was creating HUNNICUTT, my father, Don Richards Stephens, founded the D. R. Stephens Estate brand that specializes in producing Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay under the guidance of winemaker, Michael Hirby. I took over the day-to-day operation of D. R. Stephens Estate in 2004 as General Manager. In 2007, my father and I created a partnership between the two brands and formed Stephens Family Wines.

I work directly with Kirk and Mike on the respective brands for all blending trials, vineyard selections, and barrel management.

In 2010, my wife Seana joined the winery in a marketing capacity, applying her prior experience in advertising with client brands such as Sprint, 24 Hour Fitness and The North Face to the development of the HUNNICUTT and D. R. Stephens Estate brands. Seana, who was introduced to wine years earlier by her father, brings a personal, high-touch approach to her work; she embodies the warm, fun-loving and gracious spirit we strive to create at our small wineries. In addition to our day jobs, we are also the busy parents of three young children, Parker, Preston and Beckett.

- Justin Hunnicut Stephens