The Charles Shaw wine brand, sometimes known as “Two Buck Chuck,” was developed by Californian winemaker Fred Franzia. Franzia passed away at the age of 79.
Franzia passed away on Tuesday at his home in Denair, California, surrounded by family, according to messages on social media. Coming from a family of winemakers, Franzia was a maverick who “will be remembered as a larger-than-life character who widened the reach of California wine with affordable bottlings that offered consistent quality,” according to Wine Spectator.
Despite having a well-known name, Franzia did not participate in another effective tactic to attract wine drinkers on a budget: boxed wine. His grandparents Teresa and Giuseppe Franzia started Franzia in 1906, and in the 1970s, The Wine Group, which was formerly a branch of Coca-Cola Bottling of New York, purchased the business. In 1985, not long after that business was acquired by a private corporation, it developed the Franzia boxed wine brand.
Franzia was born on May 24, 1943, in Stanislaus County, close to the Bay Area of California, and was also Ernest Gallo’s married nephew. Ernest Gallo was one of the founders of E&J Gallo Winery, the largest wine firm in the world, according to the Turlock (Calif.) Journal.
