A brown and tan colored tabby cat is fast asleep on a rocking chair outside Alto Vineyards, 4210 N. Duncan Road. Despite the increasingly chilly weather, it looks perfectly comfortable, tail drooping over the edge of the seat as the chair gently rocks in the wind. Going inside, there is a fleeting sensation that one has stepped into an old general store selling camping equipment, farmer’s vegetables and preserves. A closer look, though, reveals the refrigerators stocked with personal-sized cheese wheels, shelves of crystal decanters and of course, the wine. The wine is everywhere.

For 20 years, Alto Vineyards has been producing multiple varieties of Illinois wine. For several more years, the vineyards have produced mountains of grapes. Jim Dubnicek, general manager of the Champaign branch of Alto Vineyards and member of the family that owns the company, said that his family never intended to actually get into the wine business when it first planted its vines.

“When my father retired from Southern Illinois University, he decided he wanted to have a vineyard,” Dubnicek said. “Four or five years down the line we had so many grapes we didn’t know what to do with them all. We couldn’t sell them all, so we learned to make wine. Most of the small vineyards in the state of Illinois are just like us, self-taught.”

Dubnicek, who has been the general manager of the Champaign branch since 2001, went on to say when he and his family started to first produce wine, six years after first planting their grapes, they weren’t sure if what they were doing was a good idea.

“We had no idea if we could be successful,” Dubnicek said. “In those days, not many people in this area, and in the U.S. in general, really drank much wine. We’re lucky, because today, wine is extremely popular.”

As for not being successful, Dubnicek may have been exaggerating. Today, Alto Vineyards produces in excess of 36,000 gallons of wine annually, which is nearly 700,000 bottles. The company produces 18 different styles of white, red, blush and port wines, and intends to continue introducing new styles as they are perfected.

Still, Dubnicek considers Alto Vineyards to be a small producer.

“The big wineries can produce into the millions of gallons of wine a year, they’re more like wine factories,” Dubnicek said. “Small wineries like us can give more individual attention to quality-control on each batch of wine, and usually are more personable establishments.”

The human touch is not lost on visitors like Sandra and Rita Ohler, a mother-daughter tandem that was having a luncheon at Alto Vineyards with other members of a group called the Red Hat Society. The society is a social organization for women of 50 or more years to meet and have fun together. Sandra Ohler, of Mount Pulaski, Ill., wore a red cap, and Rita, her daughter, not yet being 50 herself, wore pink.

“The manager gave us all lessons on how to taste wine properly,” said Rita Ohler, who lives in Indiana and had never been to a winery before. “He taught us how to tell the difference between a dry, semi-sweet, and sweet wine.”

Rita’s mother, Sandra, liked the wine so much she decided to buy several bottles for friends from the country of Chile.

“My son in law is originally from Chile, and whenever I go there I like to bring home Chilean wines,” Sandra said. “So when I go to Chile, I want to be able to bring them something from my own home. It can be hard to find good Illinois wines made right here in our state, and so I am glad to find these Alto Vineyards wines.”

Rita Ohler pointed out the difficulty of sending impressive souvenirs from Illinois.

“You can’t really send an ear of sweet corn in the mail,” she said.

The Champaign branch of Alto Vineyards also offers events during the summer and into the fall for fans of wine and people interested in the vineyard. In addition to informal tours of the dozen species of hand-picked grapes that make up the 160 vines of Alto’s Champaign vineyard, the branch plans musical events and private wine-tasting parties. In the summer, blues and jazz musicians play in the gardens once a week while wine and food are sold. Dubnicek said that weekly attendance for the musical events can approach 300 people. The vineyards even play host to the occasional outdoor wedding in warmer months.

Dubnicek said that University students play a larger and larger role in the vineyard’s success.

“These days we see a lot of young people, students at the university with very developed tastes in wine,” Dubnicek said. “The target market really isn’t middle-aged people anymore. I’d encourage anybody who likes good wine to come on out and give us a try.”