Southern Roots Wine. Wine is about bringing people together and building relationships and is often centered around food. And it is what cemented a long friendship resulting in the creation of Southern Roots Wines. Take Alabama native Frank O’Neill and Georgia born Rob Francis for example; both men met while working at Birmingham based ProAssurance, a company that sells professional liability insurance to doctors. Frank and his wife Janet and Rob and his wife Fran are partners in the brand; both families have known each other for more than 40 years.
During college, Frank met a friend whose father was a serious collector and consumer. Inspired by his knowledge, Frank began learning about wine and tasting a diversity of wines to increase his palate perspective. And he realized that his dates were often more interested in someone who knew about wine. After college he worked at a wine shop part time to further increase his knowledge. As he mentioned, “I want to learn something new about wine each day”. And after retiring, he is again working at a wine shop part time. He takes his greatest pleasure in selling wine to customers from when they later return excited about his recommendation and or how well the wine paired with their meal.
In 2004 Rob moved to Napa Valley and became CEO of the Doctor’s Company, lasting nearly 13 years. The company is headquartered in Napa and is the nation’s largest physician-owned medical malpractice insurer. In 2008 he planted one acre of Cabernet Sauvignon at his home in Coombsville and then subsequently planted another 1/2 acre. Once Francis Vineyard matured he sold the grapes to other area producers, some of which earned high accolades for wines from the Francis Vineyard.
Frank would occasionally visit Rob in Napa Valley each year; during one visit both men began discussing the idea of keeping Rob’s grapes to make their own wine. This was the impetus for the creation of the brand. The first vintage of Southern Roots was in 2015; since that inaugural vintage, the wine has been made by winemaker Rudy Zuidema at Shadybrook Winery in Coombsville.
In 2020 Rob sold Francis Vineyard and moved back to Birmingham and re-joined ProAssurance where he is now President of their Healthcare Professional Liability. And in 2025 it was announced that The Doctor’s Company purchased ProAssurance.
The label was creatively designed by the partners with the help of Rob and Fran’s talented son. And reflecting both their California and Alabama roots, an outline of the state of Alabama is depicted on the right side of the label and of California on the left. Its not something that stands out immediatley, but when you are told about it, you won’t ever forget. And the number of spurs coming out from each of the vine cordons is also significant; the right side features four spurs representing Frank & Janet and their two children while the left side has 6 spurs in homage to Rob & Fran and their four children. Editor’s note: with grandchildren, the image may eventually have to change to a quadrilateral cordon.
Winemaker, Rudy Zuidema
Rudy was born in Sacramento but grew up in nearby Davis, a town known for its university. Conveniently Rudy was accepted to UC Davis where he spent three years studying photography and design with the intent to eventually create logos and designs for sports equipment. However, he eventually discovered this was not a career field he was passionate about. He became intrigued with the world of wine while taking an introductory course to viticulture – which inspired him to switch majors to Plant Science and Viticulture. Graduating in 1991 he moved to Napa; his first job in the valley was working in retail at the Oakville Grocery back when Joseph Phelps owned this iconic purveyor.
He would often taste up to 300 wines per month – one of these wines was from St. Clement which he was happy to sell and promote at Oakville Grocery. But after being told to replace those wines with some of the Phelps offerings he quit and decided to pursue winemaking. He showed up at St. Clement unannounced and spoke to their winemaker at the time, Dennis Johns. Rudy quickly reminded him that he was the guy helping to sell all that St. Clement wine at the Oakville Grocery and then asked Dennis if he needed any winemaking help. Dennis soon hired him; this was Rudy’s first winemaking job in Napa Valley.
Over the years Rudy has made wine at a number of well-regarded Napa Valley based wineries including Allora, Cuvaison, Honig, Ehlers Estate and the former White Cottage Ranch. It was at Ehlers that he was introduced to Biodynamic farming – through their General Manager at the time who learned about it when he was at Quintessa (at the time, Quintessa had just begun farming biodynamically). And while at Ehlers, Rudy began his own consulting business; today he crafts wine for a number of premium boutique Napa Valley based producers.
The focus of Southern Roots wines is primarily from vineyard sources in the southern part of Napa Valley. These are clearly California grown wines but reflect restraint and are expressions of both variety and location.
Select Wines
Rosé/Whites
The 2023 Southern Roots Rosé Wine, Napa Valley is medium to deep salmon in color; this wine is a blend of 90% Cabernet Sauvignon and 10% Merlot. It was aged in neutral oak barrels prior to its bottling. The distinctive bouquet offers a bouncy and bright character with aromas of ripe strawberries, raspberry jolly rancher candy, freshly husked pomegranate, bright cherries, guava, ruby grapefruit, Buddha’s hand and some floral layering including citrus blossom, violets and rose petals. Smells ripe yet also simultaneously elegant. On the palate there are flavors of raspberry, blood orange, red cherry, cranberry and pomegranate. Texturally, this is not a light rosé; supporting the palate is a fleshy and creamy mouth feel accompanied by a spirited and mouth-watering acidity. Finishes bright and refreshing. Our immediate thought in terms of pairing would be a grilled salmon. And thinking of salmon made us recall a fishing trip to Waterfall Resort in Alaska years ago which resulted in shipping back enough salmon and halibut in our freezer to last for several months.
The 2021 Southern Roots Chardonnay, Carneros Napa Valley is medium to deep gold; the immediately engaging and diversely layered bouquet offers a honeyed note including of honeycomb, vanilla, golden apples/baked apples, creme Brule, butterscotch, melting butter, ripe papaya, pineapple, lightly mottled banana and scents of ripe stone fruits including nectarines and peaches. And toasted coconut and caramel. Brighter than the bouquet would lead one to believe, the palate is supported by a balanced acidity. It is very much stone fruited including flavors of apricot, peach and nectarine with additional layers of pineapple, papaya and some citrus characteristics including lemon drop candy and an orange peel zest. The mouth feel offers a creamy and silken texture. The extended finish is highly flavorful and lingers with a sweet note of dill and toasted almond. Both the bouquet and the palate express a full varietal ripeness. This wine was fermented in 60% stainless steel vessels and 40% oak barrels. It was barrel aged sur lie in both new and used French oak barrels for 30 months with the lees stirred every two weeks.
Reds
The 2021 Southern Roots The Secret, Napa Valley Red Wine is deep ruby in color; this wine is a blend of 42% Cabernet Sauvignon, 33% Sangiovese, and 25% Merlot. The Cabernet Sauvignon and the Merlot are from Coombsville and the Sangiovese is from Pope Valley. It was aged in 65% new French oak barrels and 35% used. Despite the name, there is nothing secretive about the bouquet. Ripe and generous, it offers aromas of blackberry jam, blackberry pie, boysenberry preserves, dark plum, dark cherry at the end of the season and plenty of contributions from its barrel aging. These secondary scents include dark chocolate, mocha, expresso, coffee grinds, Graham cracker, clove, nutmeg, old cedar and vanilla. Expecting more secondary characteristics on the palate, we were pleasantly surprised by a noticeable thread of acidity running from the entry through the finish keeping this wine fresh and higher-toned. Its fruit expression offers both red and dark flavors. These include Santa Rosa plum, cherry, boysenberry, Persian mulberry and currant. The finish lingers with a tobacco spice, smoked cedar, and dried sage. Juicy. Mouthwatering. The tannins are rounded, resolved and lightly tumbled, resulting in a gentle textural grip, persisting with a light dusty character. We would pair this with a pork tenderloin, bone-in covered in an assortment of spices and dried herbs.
The Secret is appropriately named. When getting close to bottling this wine, Rudy sends samples of the proposed blending components to Rob and Frank. They taste through these and send Rudy their thoughts on the wines. The resulting secret is the varietal percentage when Rudy creates the final blend.
The 2019 Southern Roots Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley is 100% varietal from Coombsville; this wine was barrel aged in 65% new French oak barrels and 35% used barrels for 30 months prior to bottling. This wine is deep ruby and nearly opaque; dark fruited and savory, initially the nose opens to saddle leather, sage, dark cherry, blackberry, boysenberry and Pakistani mulberry. As the wine evolves, the bouquet expresses more of its secondary characteristics including of chocolate, mocha, old cedar box, toasted oak and pipe tobacco. A pretty wine, the palate is red fruit driven with flavors of cherry, plum, currant and raspberries. Medium bodied, the wine lingers savory and spice filled with flavors of smoked sage, pepper and smoked cedar. By savory we mean a combination of bright acidity, herbs and dark spices. The tannins sport a lightly grainy texture which is well integrated on the finish. For reference, we needled and nosed this bottling 6 years post vintage; it still has loads of life ahead of it. If we were ever to grab a quintessential Napa Cab for the BBQ, this wine would be it. Perhaps pair with a well-marbled cut of Wagyu beef.
We have often wondered what wine would be in our Josephinenhütte Number 3 glass when it broke; we have had that glass since almost when Josephinenhütte first launched their stemware and have tasted hundreds and hundreds of Napa Valley wines in it. We were tasting this wine when a distracted misplacement on our desk resulted in the glass toppling over and breaking.
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Total production is generally only a few barrels per each wine or as Frank calls it, “right below boutique”. But they have room to grow production. And they don’t bottle every year – waiting to sell through previous vintages before bottling again. The wines are primarily sold direct to consumer but also have very limited distribution in Alabama including at several premium restaurants in Birmingham. For more information, to purchase wines or to join one of their wine clubs (Best Buds or Deep Roots), visit: www.southernrootswines.com
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