09/09/2026
🍷📈 W**E WEDNESDAY NEWS: CREAM W**E IS BOOMING — AND IT’S DRIVING A $1.1 MILLION EXPANSION AT L’UVA BELLA.
At a time when the broader w**e industry has been fighting declining sales, one Northeast Ohio w**ery has found a growth category that has absolutely taken off.
And it isn’t Cabernet. Chardonnay. Or even its longtime best-selling sweet red.
It’s cream w**e.
According to a new report from George Nelson at The Business Journal in Youngstown, Luva Bella W**ery in Lowellville has begun work on an approximately $1.1 million, 7,000-square-foot warehouse expansion — with surging demand for its cream-based products helping drive the need for more space.
And some of the numbers behind that growth are pretty remarkable.
🥛 Cream w**e products now account for at least 60% of L’uva Bella’s sales, according to CEO Marisa Sergi-Schumann. If that name sounds familiar, she’s also the CRO of The Brew Kettle Brewery & Pubs.
🥚 The w**ery’s collaboration with Hartzler Dairy Farm began with Boozy Eggnog, launched exclusively through Heinen's in 2024. Heinen’s sold every unit within seven weeks.
📈 By the fourth quarter of 2025, Hartzler Boozy Eggnog had become the seventh-highest-grossing 750mL spirit in Ohio, according to the Business Journal report.
🔥 Shipments eventually reached Buc-ee’s stores in Texas, where locations receiving eight to 10 cases reportedly sold out within 48 hours.
And L’uva Bella isn’t stopping with eggnog.
The success led to a Hartzler Irish cream, and the w**ery has partnered with Pennsylvania’s Turner’s Dairy on another eggnog product with an Irish cream planned for 2027. The products are reaching major retailers, while L’uva Bella has also found an audience through QVC and is getting its first shot inside Sam’s Club, which is test-marketing Hartzler holiday packs in select Ohio stores and one Kentucky location.
That’s a pretty remarkable growth story in an otherwise difficult moment for w**e.
The Business Journal spoke with industry experts who said w**e and other alcoholic-beverage sales have been declining since 2022, with inflation, reduced discretionary spending and increased interest in wellness among the factors putting pressure on the category.
L’uva Bella, meanwhile, found a specialty product that took off so dramatically that cream w**e has surpassed its Purple sweet red as the w**ery’s largest revenue stream.
Now comes the expansion.
The new warehouse will sit near L’uva Bella’s existing manufacturing operation and replace some of the need for 10,000 square feet of leased warehouse space in downtown Youngstown. About $657,000 of the $1.1 million project is being funded through a state-administered USDA infrastructure grant.
For now, the addition is warehouse space.
But there’s a bigger possibility down the road.
By moving storage into the new building, L’uva Bella could eventually free up existing space for a larger, more efficient bottling line if cream-w**e demand continues on its current trajectory.
The w**ery isn’t committing to that investment yet.
But considering cream w**e has gone from an experiment to 60%+ of sales, it’s certainly on the radar.
🍷 That’s one heck of a pivot — and one heck of a Northeast Ohio beverage-business success story.
📰 This story was originally reported by George Nelson of The Business Journal in Youngstown. We’ve summarized the reporting here for our NEOCBN audience; check out their original story for the full report linked in the first comment.
