Stats for your winemaker and other employees will improve each season. I hired my winemaker with a total stat of about 500. Fifteen seasons later his total stat is now 661. So don't constantly fire and re-hire. In reality, a 40yr old winemaker with a stat of 450 is better than a 55yr old with a stat of 500. Remember, winemaking is a long-term adventure.
Employees do seem to retire at age 65. I had a vineyard hand disappear this way once.
Wines will continue aging and improving in a barrel for about 5 seasons.
Do not harvest all the grapes of a variety on the same day. They get better as the harvest month progresses. This is my Cabernet Franc for season 59. Note that the youngest one actually has the best stats. This is true for each variety. All of these came from the same plot. I typically save the last 60 or so litres for the final day (Sunday). Those will end up as my show wines.
When you harvest it is tempting to fill your 1000L tank completely - but don't. Just put 900L in it. During the de-marcing process you will lose 1/3 of the content. So 1000L becomes 667L, while 900L becomes 600L. When you eventually put it in barrels, the max barrel size is 600L. So if you started with a full 1000L tank, you will end up having to use 2 barrels instead of 1. That gets expensive (and uses up valuable cellar space).
Save work for a rainy day!! Example - the first task each season is Installing Training Wires. This is done by hand and can be done any time over 6 months (Jan 1 - Jun 7). Don't feel like you have to do it first because it's the first thing on the list. Other tasks (cane shredding, grass mowing, vine treatments, hoeing, etc) use power equipment ... and you can't use power equipment in your plots on rainy days. When it's raining, your farm hands can install the training wires - otherwise you are paying them for the day to do nothing. So do power equipment tasks on sunny days and do manual labor on rainy days in order to keep your vineyard hands busy all the time.
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~Prizz~