Santa Rosa World Championship Grape Stomp

California Grape Stomps Celebrate the Crush, It's a Rush

No info since 2019

Sonoma County Harvest Fair
1350 Bennett Valley Rd.
Santa Rosa, CA 95402
$, harvestfair.org

The World Championship Grape Stomp is part of the Sonoma County Harvest Fair. Preliminary stomps take place all day Saturday and part of Sunday. Late Sunday all the winners meet in the finals.  Stomp teams come in all sizes and ages. There is one stomp reserved for teams ages 13 & under.

Grape Stomp Teams of two (one stomper & one swabby) compete for the world's greatest grape stomp team. The Stomper stands in a barrel full of grapes, and squishes out the juice using only feet. The Swabby stands below the barrel and keeps the juice flowing into the jug, pulling grape skins away from the screen, and pushing juice toward the pipe.

Team T-shirts and costumes are encouraged; a special award for creative costuming is given in each stomp. Winners from stomps around the country (and the world) travel to the Sonoma County Harvest Fair to compete for the World Championship title. If you are sending a team from your stomp, let the organizers know so they can provide special recognition.

Sonoma County Harvest Fair Event includes 50+ wineries, wine sales, chef demonstrations, microbrew tasting (Saturday only), farm and harvest agricultural activities for children and adults, the World Championship Grape Stomp, continuous live jazz, an art show, crafters pavilion, farm animals to meet, and much more. 

Several of the grape stomp events have categories for children so they get to feel the soft grapes squish between their feet and get to stomp on the precious grapes to see what it's like to make grape juice or wine. Of course nobody drinks the products made from these events. It is strictly done for enjoyment and entertainment, but you get to understand how wine once was made before mechanization and how the time honored tradition became so important to those who sought this desirable beverage.  In California, wine-making spans the entire state and has become an important industry, along with table grapes, to the California economy both for sales, exports and tourism.