Lieu Dit Sauvignon Blanc 'Santa Ynez Valley'

The brand recorded for this bottle is Skurnik, which says it was founded in 1987 and now represents more than 800 producers of wine, spirits, sake and cider. The wine's name is Lieu Dit Sauvignon Blanc, Santa Ynez Valley, an origin now confirmed by the producer, Lieu Dit Winery of Santa Barbara, and by the importer's own portfolio listing for this exact bottling. The stores we checked in September 2026 had it between $27.99 and $31.49.

Sauvignon Blanc is the grape, a white known for clear aroma and refreshing acidity and usually made dry, though sweetness and oak use vary. We do not have a shopper rating for this wine, so if you are weighing it on the shelf, you are going on the grape and the name.

On taste, official regional guides note that cooler sites can keep Sauvignon Blanc green and citrusy while warmer, riper fruit can lean more tropical.

Lieu Dit is a small Santa Barbara producer founded in 2011 by winemaker Justin Willett, a Santa Barbara native who earned a degree at UCSB, worked as an assistant at Arcadian Winery, and had already founded Tyler Winery in 2005 for small-batch Chardonnay and Pinot Noir before starting this label. Lieu Dit is a French wine term for 'named place,' and the winery says its philosophy is to seek out vineyard sites with strong reputations and let the place carry the wine. This bottling draws from three named Santa Ynez Valley sites, McGinley, China Blue and Santa Ynez vineyards, in the Happy Canyon district, on soils the winery describes as sandy loam, river cobbles and serpentine. Production across the whole label runs about 2,500 cases a year, per the importer.

The producer's winemaking notes describe a gentle press, then fermentation and about six months of aging split between stainless steel tanks and aged oak barrels before the wine is fined and bottled. The producer's own tasting notes for the current 2024 vintage list lime leaf, Meyer lemon and wet stone; the vintage on this shelf may differ, which we have not confirmed.

Our call: this suits a shopper who buys on a named winemaker and named vineyard sites; Justin Willett built Lieu Dit around Santa Barbara vineyards he sources by name, and this bottling draws from three of them in the Happy Canyon district. Pass if you want the crowd's word first or a settled vintage; no shopper rating has reached our record, and we have not confirmed that the vintage on this shelf matches the producer's 2024 tasting notes above.

The Grocery Store Wine Desk · written Sep 16, 2026 from our research file for this wine. Numbers reflect our latest checks.