Muni
Our first label, making wine since 2007. Familiar grapes, less familiar names. Open a bottle. Pass it around.
Municipal Winemakers · Dave Potter
Our story.
I like that it’s a name that sounds unfussy. Municipal Wine is like Government Cheese. Something that’s democratic and utilitarian, but still is in service of people. It’s a democratization of fine wine.
The idea of having a winery in town came from my time working in the South of France. the place I worked for was a little winery in a village, and the local folks would pop in to fill up their own jugs, I loved the idea of top quality, low-key wine that is popular and special with a group of neighbors.
I’m shy, so I didn’t want it to be David Potter Wine Estates
The beginning
The first shop.
My first wine job was working in the tasting room at Sunstone Winery during my last year at UCSB. The perk of the job was being able to take the open half bottles home at the end of the shift and drink them with my roommates in my shitty IV apartment. I had 5 roommates in a 3 bedroom place.
When we opened our first tiny shop in 2009, the Funk Zone was still mostly industrial spaces, artist studios, and a couple of wineries. We graduated from that back closet of a WWII barrack to the old Divers Den building in 2011. We raided every thrift store within an hour's drive to furnish the space, collected all of the UCSB discarded file cabinets, grabbed the old 'Cokes Fridge' out of my parent's garage, and confidently ignored the fact that we had absolutely no idea what we were doing. We just knew we wanted to make serious wine feel less precious and more like a good hang.
Fifteen years is a long time. Long enough to serve thousands of people their first glass of dry Riesling. Long enough to bear witness to first dates, proposals, weddings, birthdays, and a lot of bachelorette parties (whooo!!!!). We've had to cut people off and we've served celebrities (still waiting for the opportunity to cut off a celeb).
In the vineyard
Picking by flavor.
You know how one day a peach can be hard and green and taste like nothing, then a few days later it’s sweet and crunchy and then it turns very sweet and soft? For the wines we make, we’re trying to get to the grapes at that middle stage. Fruit that is simultaneously alive and intense with flavor. We measure the sugar content but my picking decisions are mostly based on flavor.
The name Potek is drawn from the story of the immigration of my great–grandfather from Romania to the United States. Our winemaking is rooted in traditional techniques with a reverence for site, and a search for balance.
Explore our labels.
Start with a label. Wander from there.
Explore Muni
Potek
Named for David Potter’s great-grandfather. Since 2012, Potek has focused on single-vineyard wines from Santa Barbara County.
Nowadays
Consult your higher self. See if they brought a corkscrew.
Our third label. Start with the Pet Nat.
Santa Barbara + Ventura
Come say hi.
Potek Winery has become our Santa Barbara hub.
Our tasting rooms are now at Potek Winery in Santa Barbara and Muni Wine on Ventura Avenue.
And then there's Ventura. If you haven't made it down to The Avenue yet, I hope you will. It reminds me so much of what I loved about the early Funk Zone—independent, unpretentious, full of possibility. It's where Muni feels like itself again. The vibe is immaculate.
I've been thinking a lot about what Muni has always been about. It was never really about the Funk Zone, or the dive shop. It was about sharing the good stuff in a space where people feel welcome. That doesn't change just because the address does.
