Owning a vineyard is no longer an essential part of making wine.Romantic notions of wine usually conjure up visions of vignerons tending their grapes before making them into wine at their estate. In reality, many producers don't have their own wineries, and in the world of the virtual winery, they don't even own any vineyards either. Kim Crawford was one of our first local labels set up on this model, a decision entirely based on capital in its early days, according to its founders Kim and Erica Crawford. For new enterprises, investing in vineyards, let alone their own winery, is an enormous outlay.