This past June, we celebrated our 5th Anniversary operating the Carolinian Winery
and Foley Farms. Hard to believe the time has gone by so fast, and yet, the hard
work, sweat and tears are a testament to the effort it takes to run the efficient,
successful business that the Carolinian Winery has become. It truly is a labour
of love and the living proof of what passion for what you are doing can accomplish.
This is a family effort with contribution from all, and the entire Foley clan can
lay claim to the modest success we’ve achieved to date. We’re very proud of what
we’ve accomplished in 5 years, and we thank all our friends and customers (and customers
who’ve become friends!) for being a part of our efforts.
However, as with all businesses,
sometimes you have to step back and reassess where you are at, and more importantly,
where you are headed. Our 5 year anniversary with the winery was just such an occasion.
We paused over a glass of wine (Anissa probably had the Jazzberry, Barry the Captain
Franc or perhaps Black Current), and surveyed the farm. There were the horses and
various other critters scattered about the place, there were the fields, the new
patio, the winery, the restaurant and all was pretty much as we’d hoped, based on
the aspirations of that early day in June, 2004 when we first touched the keys to
the winery.
Still, there was something that had happened in the 5 years we’d had
our noses to the grindstone, making the best organic fruit wines we could, learning
as we went. We had been so busy with our heads down working on our own little piece
of heaven, we hadn’t really taken the time and looked beyond our own front gate.
When we recently took the time to do just that, we saw that we weren’t alone. We
found that there were others just as committed, just as passionate about their own
efforts to bring organic, extensively farmed produce and meats to a hungry public.
And many were mere miles from where we stood!
We both believe that things happen
for a reason, and here we are, just started into our second half-decade at Foley
Farms/Carolinan Winery, and we feel like we are getting started all over again.
We have an amazing new patio setting, we are expanding our restaurant menu and seating,
we have an award-winning chef with national grilling and barbecue credentials on-board
and sharing in our enthusiasm for local, fresh, organic and wonderful flavours,
to which we are committing and building our full kitchen expansion around.
We feel
truly blessed to be where we are and feel we’ve created an environment at Carolinian
Winery where people feel truly ‘at home’. We hope you’ll join us as we expand and
explore the exciting new opportunities here at Foley Farms. It’s our goal to see
that, regardless of how much we expand and grow, you will always feel ‘at home’
at Carolinian Winery.
Barry & Anissa Foley July, 2009