Napa Valley Vintners

At four o’clock on an October morning in 2017, neighbors urged Rex Stults and his wife to step outside. Standing in the driveway of their Browns Valley home, they looked toward the mountains that frame Napa Valley. Every ridgeline seemed to glow. The valley’s perimeter was on fire.

For Stults, who has asthma, the smoke that followed lingered for weeks. But what stayed with him even longer was the realization that this wasn’t an isolated disaster. Three years later, when wildfire struck twice again, that realization became impossible to ignore.

That morning changed how Stults thought about protecting Napa Valley.

As Vice President of Industry Relations for the Napa Valley Vintners, he has spent more than two decades representing nearly 550 wineries in government affairs and community partnerships. But after witnessing the valley burn, protecting Napa meant more than preserving a world-renowned wine region. It meant helping build a community resilient enough to withstand one of California’s greatest challenges.

Today, Napa Valley Vintners support of the Valley Stewards Initiative reflects a conviction shaped by both experience and collaboration: the future of Napa Valley depends on neighbors working together long before smoke appears on the horizon.

On a quiet morning overlooking rows of vineyards and mountain ridges draped in fog, Stults reflected on what makes Napa Valley special. The beauty is undeniable. So are the world-class wines, celebrated restaurants and remarkable landscape.

But that’s not what comes to mind first.

Stults learned that lesson shortly after arriving in Napa in 1992, fresh out of college. That winter, devastating floods swept through the valley, and he watched neighbors step in to help neighbors without hesitation.

“I saw firsthand that this place really steps up when the need arises.”

That spirit of collaboration has long defined Napa Valley’s wine industry, where competitors routinely share knowledge and work together to elevate the region. It’s a philosophy pioneered by leaders like Robert Mondavi, who famously urged wineries to see one another not as rivals, but as teammates competing together on the world stage.

The 2020 wildfires alone cost Napa’s wine industry an estimated $2 billion, before accounting for tourism, hospitality, restaurants, and the countless other businesses that depend on visitors coming to the valley. In response, the Napa Valley Vintners created a committee focused entirely on wildfire preparedness and mitigation.

“We’re not the experts,” Stults says. “There are going to be wildfires. The question is: How prepared are we? What are we doing to minimize the devastation?”

As the committee began its work, Stults admits he felt overwhelmed.

“I work for a nonprofit wine trade association. Wildfire wasn’t my specialty.”

Then he discovered Napa Firewise.

Despite being deeply connected throughout Napa Valley, he had been largely unaware of the growing network of Fire Safe Councils, the emerging Community Wildfire Protection Plan, and the coordinated work already underway across the county.

Finding Napa Firewise changed everything.

“I saw right away where we could help,” he says. “Our role was to support the experts—to help Napa Firewise get the Community Wildfire Protection Plan adopted and funded, and to support the Fire Safe Councils.”

That philosophy continues to guide the Napa Valley Vintners’ partnership with the Valley Stewards Initiative. Rather than trying to lead wildfire mitigation themselves, the organization focuses on providing resources, advocacy, and financial support to those with the expertise to make the greatest impact.

For Stults, collaboration remains the common thread.

“It’s people who own land in the hills stepping up. It’s people on the valley floor contributing because they know it affects them too. It’s organizations like the Napa Valley Vintners investing alongside everyone else.”

He believes the results are already visible. Compared with 2020, Napa County is better prepared, more coordinated, and increasingly capable of containing fires before they become catastrophes.

Ten years from now, he hopes that progress continues—that communities remain committed, investments continue, and the county becomes even more resilient.

Because wildfire doesn’t distinguish between wineries and neighborhoods, visitors and residents, ridge tops and valley floors.

Protecting Napa Valley, he believes, will always come down to the same thing that first inspired him more than 30 years ago: a community willing to stand together when it matters most.