Southwest Michigan’s Next Generation of Winemakers Has a Bigger Vision for the Region
Observer ·
Younger winemakers are drawing on old vines, local training and a collaborative spirit to push southwest Michigan wine further.
Maxx Eichberg clambers over a row of barrels, Birkenstocks flapping on the weathered wood as he searches for the vintage he wants to sample. This thirty-something winemaker is the de facto superstar of southwest Michigan’s still-growing wine scene , though his label, Stranger Wine Company, has only been around since 2021. In five short years, Eichberg and his wife, Sidney Finan , have taken over a historic 15-acre vineyard, partnered with culinary destination Granor Farm to supply the bulk of the wine for their fine dining events, and opened a tasting room in the nearby town of Buchanan. In his free time, Eichberg moonlights as an adjunct professor teaching viticulture courses at nearby Lake Michigan College , and the couple also has two children under five. It’s enough to make anyone’s head spin, but Eichberg carries it all with an easy grin.
Today, in the fledgling winery’s production facility, he’s just another grape geek lost among the barriques. Finally locating the barrel he wants, Eichberg dips his wine thief and streams a ribbon of dark red pinot noir into my outstretched glass. At my hotel the night before, I drank several glasses of his 2024 Chablis-style chardonnay, made with grapes sourced from nearby Eden Hill Vineyards, but this vintage is made from his own estate fruit. Young as it is, it’s some of the best wine I’ve had all year. When I say as much, his grin is back and followed by a quick nod—not arrogance, but no false humility either.
“The idea was to make Michigan wine, but put it in a position where it could stand on the shoulders of giants,” he explains of Stranger’s ethos. “Minimal intervention, not dogmatic winemaking, but traditionalistic. We do skin contact at pressing, long pressing cycles, barrel fermentations, no racking and minimal sulfur. For me, the biggest thing was unfined and unfiltered wines—that’s how the best wines in the world work. They’re given time to settle.” Michigan has long been saddled with stereotypes about sweet wine and fruit wine, but Stranger and the next generation of emerging winemakers in the area are aiming to rid the state of that reputation for good.
I initially encountered Stranger Wine in 2023 during a farm-to-table dinner at Granor Farm , and made a mental note to follow up in a few years. I’m likely not the only guest won over by pairings at the seven-course meals on the farm, helmed by James Beard Award-nominated chef and Michigan native Abra Berens . “Granor is always looking to work with folks who are as dedicated to their craft as we are,” Berens says. “Stranger has the perfect balance of looking to the future without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. They want to continue to expand Michigan’s wine reputation as equally sophisticated to more established regions.”
Experience working in those established regions is part of what shaped Eichberg’s passion. Eichberg and Finan met while attending Roger Williams University, a small liberal arts school in Rhode Island. Finan was studying biology and environmental science, and Eichberg was studying math and chemistry, until an internship at a custom crush facility in Walla Walla inadvertently led him straight into the wine industry. “Originally, it was just a side quest to blow off some steam,” he says. “The advice I got out there, from Brian Rudin , was if you want to make wine, learn how to sell it first. So I went to work for Cream Wine Company , an importer and distributor in Chicago, who has an amazing portfolio.”
Cream reps big-time producers like Rosenthal Wine Merchant and Rare Wine Co., as well as smaller vintners like James Lester , an early pioneer in southwest Michigan’s wine scene. Lester’s wines, and those from another label, Left Foot Charley, farther north in Traverse City, showcased local vintages on par with what Eichberg had encountered while working in Walla Walla and later during stints in Willamette Valley and New Zealand. This was a bit of a revelation for him and Finan, who moved to Michigan as adults, but not a surprise to those who grew up in the region.
“A big piece of the southwest Michigan story is that it used to feed basically the entire country up until World War II,” Tim Godfrey, the program director of wine and viticulture at Lake Michigan College, tells Observer. “After that, a lot of things changed for farming, but we know farming works here, because of the past. And there’s an energy to bring that back—people like Maxx are really important for that.” Godfrey grew up in northern Michigan but moved to Sonoma after college, where he was a partner in the Golden State Cider Company. During the chaos of the pandemic, he opted to leave the company, move home to be closer to family, and take on his current role at the college.
“There’s a bit of the changing of the guard happening in southwest Michigan right now,” Godfrey says. “Most of these vineyards were planted in the ‘80s, ‘90s and early 2000s by people from a different generation. They’re nearing retirement now, and their children aren’t interested in taking over. Because of that, there’s a lot of change happening.”
This was exactly the situation that led to Eichberg and Finan’s purchase of Avonlea, their estate vineyard originally planted by James Lester. In late 2020, Lester offered the plot to the young couple, and working with the invaluable terroir, already planted with decades-old vines, was too compelling to pass up: “We dove into the shallow end headfirst,” laughs Eichberg. They agreed to purchase it in 2021, and Stranger was founded shortly after.
It was a passing of the torch. “At our tasting room opening, Lester gave us a magnum of his 2007 Avonlea chardonnay and wrote on the bottle, ‘from the old guard to the new, best of luck.’ That was a big thing for him to say. When he offered the vineyard to us, it was a sign of good faith. It was ushering in a new generation who could accomplish his goal, which was proving that Michigan could make world-class fine wine,” Eichberg recalls. Other young winemakers in the area are making similar moves to achieve that goal, most notably Amy Birk , who recently took over Domaine Berrien Cellars in Berrien Springs, Michigan.
Birk and her business partner, Jacob Nivison , were employees at Domaine Berrien before buying out the former owner, Wally Maurer , upon his retirement. After completing an undergraduate degree in chemistry, Birk was the first student to sign up for Lake Michigan College’s viticulture program when it launched in 2015. She worked at Domaine Berrien for seven years before acquiring the winery in 2022, and now runs the tasting room while splitting winemaking duties with Nivison, who handles viticulture. In a full circle move, she also returned to teach oenology at Lake Michigan College’s wine and viticulture program. Domaine Berrien offers a wide selection of estate wines, but after tasting her cabernet franc, I immediately requested a bottle to take home.
“Cabernet franc is probably one of the best-suited grapes for this region,” Birk explains. “We have earlier and earlier springs, but still potential for frost later on. Cabernet franc is later breaking, so if we do get a frost later in the season, it won’t be affected.” As peers in the industry, Birk and Eichberg have developed a healthy competitive mindset, constantly pushing each other to be better. “Actually, one of my favorite wines in the region is Max’s cabernet franc,” Birk says. “He sources the fruit from me, but I love seeing the juxtaposition in our winemaking styles between the two different wines.”
That sentiment is echoed by Alex McNeely of Poetson Wines , who released his first vintage in 2025. McNeely often sources fruit from Stranger and is working out of their production facility during his initial phase. “It’s great to be sharing a space and have a communal sharing of ideas,” McNeely says. “Maxx and I will often use similar—if not the same—fruit sourcing, but the wines come out completely differently. So many winemakers are working in relative isolation and not going through the process side by side.”
McNeely, who grew up in Michigan and returned home during the professional pause the pandemic provided, also benefited from attending Lake Michigan College’s wine program. “When I was growing up, I was aware grapes were being grown, and wine was being made here, but it wasn’t part of my life,” he says. “It wasn’t until I started learning about wine and the world’s great growing regions that I realized Michigan had incredible unmet potential.” McNeely worked as a wine director, then in wine importing and sales, but became interested in the viticulture side through an apprenticeship with Michael de Schaaf, a grower in the region with over 20 years of experience. His pinot blanc méthode ancestrale, or pet-nat, was a standout vintage during my visit to the region.
Slowly but surely, this new generation of winemakers in Michigan is vying for their place in the domestic wine conversation, and is eager for visitors to come to the region and experience the wine for themselves, instead of stereotyping it based on the past. “The goal is to get onto the national stage, similar to Willamette or upstate New York, or even Virginia,” Birk says. “To have people come to Michigan just to appreciate wine. The goal should be to keep pushing ourselves upwards.”
For Eichberg, the most important part of establishing his wine is leaning into the terroir. Stranger Wine is first and foremost “a Michigan wine company,” and he’s confident that, over time, the fruit that emerges from their estate’s regenerative, sustainable farming practices will speak for itself. “Michigan isn’t trying to be Burgundy,” he says. “And we can’t be a new leader in the American wine scene without differentiating our varietal character. I want my chardonnay to taste like it’s from my estate, but have enough varietal character to connect. I want to prove the concept of terroir here in Michigan.”
While wine regions all over the country are still vying to become the “new Napa,” southwest Michigan actually has a decent chance at growing into a hub for young American vintners—not a new iteration of California wine country, but its own, distinct entity. Proximity to major cities like Chicago, South Bend and Detroit brings in a steady flow of visitors, and the local winemaking program regularly churns out a new crop of talent. Unlike other domestic regions, available land suitable for planting vineyards is, in the grand scheme of things, relatively affordable, and weather changes from global warming mostly benefit growers.
Only patience and time will tell what the terroir actually yields, but if early vintages are any indication, Stranger Wine will undoubtedly be part of the region’s rise.