Where were you at the bottom of your first bear market? I was making this. Things are good now And so is the wine 🍷🫡

Saying GFY to Big Wine one smile at a time.

A gift for the Peony Lane fan in your life 🍷👀

Wine sulfite removal drops are everywhere, They promise to eliminate headaches and hangovers with a few drops. But do they actually work? These products contain food-grade hydrogen peroxide that chemically converts sulfites into sulfates through oxidation. UC Davis research shows a quarter teaspoon of 3% hydrogen peroxide can neutralize free sulfites in a typical wine bottle. So yes, they do legitimately reduce sulfites by 30-50% through legitimate. Only about 1% of people have genuine sulfite sensitivity, mostly those with asthma. For everyone else, hangovers come from alcohol dehydration, acetaldehyde buildup, histamines, tannins, or one of the 72 other additives allowed in American wine. Outside of the Placebo Effect, the "hangover be gone" claim is misleading marketing for 99% of wine drinkers. I don't think you need to be paying premium prices for stabilized hydrogen peroxide to solve a problem you probably don't have. Better hangover prevention: drink water, eat food, moderate alcohol intake and drink Low Intervention Wine.

I agree that, technically, alcohol is poison and circadian rhythm is vital. However, I think that occasionally staying up until 2am drinking red wine with people you love is medicinal.

At 5,680 feet the sun hits harder. More UV gets through the thinner atmosphere and grapes respond by growing thicker skins to protect themselves. Thicker skins means more of everything that makes red wine interesting. More color. More tannin. More of the compounds that give wine depth and texture. You can't substitute for altitude.

I'm not saying that Peony Lane is going to fix the depopulation crisis... But Bitcoiners don't seem to be having a problem with it.

Is my career safe from AI? We're all thinking it. A winemaker's future isn't as simple as "a robot will take my job." I'll benefit from the first wave of automation through better software tools for marketing and production. When I zoom out, I see robots working my vineyard, trained more precisely than any human. A robot can't make good wine though, right? Most wine, especially in the USA, is ready for robotic production. Massive wine operations focus on reproducible, consistent, and formulaic results. This doesn't create interesting wine, but it's big business. Winemaking is a balance between art and science. A robot will definitely be able to complete the science based tasks, but the question remains: Can AI do art? There's this concept of "wu" from The Man in the High Castle - this soul-connection between maker and creation. You notice it when AI images lack that certain something that gives it soul or makes it feel real. AI will get better and better at replicating soul. The masses won't care, they already don't, and will appreciate cheaper wine. My career future rests on whether people care enough to spend the extra money for wine with soul produced by a human.

The difference between Pinot Noir vines and Thompson's seedless. Both planted in CO in 2004. Farming Pinot Noir at elevation isn't easy 🍇

What receiving Peony Lane feels like🍷

Treat your friends to a bottle of Peony Lane🍷

People tell me all the time, "Ben, we need to get your wine into this restaurant." Here's why I say no. When I started Peony Lane, I had no idea what direction I wanted to take things. I began at farmers markets because I needed first-hand sales experience. I wanted to see if my wine had enough traction to survive, and after investing much more than everything I had, I needed sales before I could think about the next stage. At the time, I thought that next stage would be a tasting room in my hometown. Community has always been huge for me. I figured I'd build it by creating the kind of space I wanted to spend time in. The "if you build it, they will come" idea. I'll meet the right people if I build the place they'll all want to gather in. On the road to getting there, I ended up finding the community I really needed online. We centered around one big idea, Bitcoin, and once I found that, I realized I couldn't find many of the connections I really wanted outside of it. So when I turn down restaurants or liquor stores that want to carry my wine, it's not because I don't want to grow Peony Lane. It's because I've learned what actually drives me. I don't get energy from just making and selling wine. I get it from producing value for my community. As soon as my wine becomes just another bottle on a shelf or menu, all the excitement disappears for me. Sure, it would be nice to make those sales, but fulfilling wholesale orders takes energy that pulls me away from what brings me joy. Focus is scarce, and I want mine aimed at what matters. If there's one thing I've learned about entrepreneurship, it's that consistency is everything when it comes to survival. New opportunities pop up all the time, but knowing when to say no is the difference between building something lasting and burning out. To make it anywhere in business, you need to be pumped about your goal, and I quickly realized that just making really good wine wasn't enough for me. What drives me is giving people the same experience I had when I realized wine doesn't have to make you feel bad afterward. Educating about wine in a way that isn't pretentious and getting back to basics: Does it taste good TO YOU? How do you feel the next day? It's deeply gratifying to show that you can make a great product, focus only on serving your community, and still win in a real way. Business has never really been about the money for me, which is ironic given that all our Bitcoin community cares about is fixing THE money.