PerUs · Oakville bench
2020 PerUs 'Pont' Napa Valley, USA
A place on your wine list
Russell Bevan's Bordeaux blend for PerUs. Tench Cabernet next to Screaming Eagle, Sugarloaf Merlot and Franc. 300 cases. Built for a steak list.
Winery SRP $100 per bottle
Why this bottle belongs on the list
Two selling points.
Then the market.
Russell Bevan in the cellar.
Bevan wrote a syndicated Wine Spectator column, then stepped into the vineyard in 2004. Mentors: Greg La Follette and Philip Togni. He has more than thirty 100-point wines. Robert Parker gave 100 points to his 2011 Tin Box, the only wine from that vintage to earn the score. PerUs is his blend project with Anmol Bhandari, not a Bevan Cellars single-vineyard bottling.
Tench Vineyard, Oakville bench. Sugarloaf for the rest.
Forty percent Cabernet Sauvignon from Tench, on Oakville's east bench, iron-rich soils, neighbor to Screaming Eagle and Rudd. Thirty-five percent Merlot and 25 percent Cabernet Franc from Sugarloaf. PerUs is about putting those pieces together, not a single-site wine. First vintage 2013, 30 cases. This 2020 Pont is 300 cases.
The buyer's perspective
What the guest
hears first.
The house note: tobacco, bright cherry, a kiss of bittersweet chocolate, complexity and energy. 14.4 percent alcohol. Staff can sell it in one sentence: Bevan's Pont, Tench Cabernet plus Sugarloaf Merlot and Franc, 300 cases, pour it with ribeye.
Winemaker's corner
Bevan Cellars · 30-plus 100-point wines · Tench, Sugarloaf, PerUs
Russell
Bevan
Bevan is a fourth-generation Sonoman who spent years in the Midwest selling dental products and writing about wine. He has said that in 1994 he spent more on bottles than on rent. Greg La Follette told him lazy winemakers fail: taste every barrel. He still does. He tastes every ferment every day through harvest.
He and Victoria De Crescenzo founded Bevan Cellars in 2004. Mentors were La Follette and Philip Togni. Parker 100s followed, including the 2011 Tin Box. He consults. He does not want Bevan Cellars to get bigger. New vineyard contracts go to PerUs.
Anmol Bhandari, New Delhi-born, Goldman Sachs then Cians Analytics, founded PerUs after Dustin Wilson MS walked him through Napa and introduced Bevan. First commercial vintage 2013, 30 cases. Pont is the blend: Tench Cabernet, Sugarloaf Merlot and Franc. The 2020 is 300 cases.
The vineyards
Tench for Cabernet.
Sugarloaf for the rest.
Tench Vineyard sits on Oakville's east bench. Iron-rich soils, Cabernet Sauvignon planted among some of the most expensive neighbors in Napa. Screaming Eagle and Rudd are next door. Bevan also bottles Tench under Bevan Cellars. For Pont, Tench is 40 percent of the blend, the Cabernet spine.
Sugarloaf supplies the Merlot and Cabernet Franc. PerUs, unlike Bevan Cellars, is built as a blend across sites. Bevan has said it is about putting powerful pieces together so they work. Anmol Bhandari's brief was a world-class Napa Cabernet project that stays small.
First vintage 2013, 30 cases. The 2020 Pont is 300 cases. Typical retail sits around $100. Wine-Searcher average is $96. This is not a large-production Napa Cabernet.
2020 in the glass
Tobacco.
Bright cherry.
Bittersweet chocolate.
The house note on 2020 Pont: amazing linear power. Tobacco, bright cherry, and a kiss of bittersweet chocolate. Complexity and energy. 40 percent Tench Cabernet Sauvignon, 35 percent Sugarloaf Merlot, 25 percent Sugarloaf Cabernet Franc. 14.4 percent alcohol. Hedonism calls it ripe cherry and cassis with dark chocolate and sweet tobacco, poise and linearity. No named professional critic score is shown on this exact 2020. Drink it with air. A 30 to 60 minute decant helps the 2020 open.
Menu and service
Built for a serious table.
- Grilled ribeye or a thick butter-basted steak
- Slow-cooked roast lamb or beef
- Hard cheese and a savory mushroom plate
Serve around 60 to 65 F in a Cabernet stem. Taste on opening. Give it 30 to 60 minutes in a decanter if the bottle is tight.
Staff pairing clip
Joshua Weissman steak frites
The tableside introduction
“This is Russell Bevan's Pont for PerUs. Tench Cabernet from the Oakville bench, Sugarloaf Merlot and Franc. 300 cases. Tobacco, cherry, chocolate. Pour it with ribeye.”
Ready for your team
Put the story to work.
Shelf talker
A concise bottle story for guest-facing displays. No trade price.
Download PDFServer card
The pitch, menu matches, and service notes in a compact format.
Download PDFFull trade sheet
Russell Bevan, Tench and Sugarloaf, tasting, market context, and the case offer.
Download PDFOrder the case
Put Pont on the list.
Bevan, Tench, 300 cases. Trade $38 a bottle, $456 the twelve-bottle case, one-case minimum.
