Matt Kettmann has been with the Santa Barbara Independent since 1999, where he covers food and drink and writes the Full Belly Files newsletter. After years of freelance work with publications including TIME, Wine Spectator, Smithsonian, and The New York Times, he joined Wine Enthusiast in 2014 to cover California’s Central Coast, reviewing 200 wines per month.
In 2025, he expanded his coverage to France’s Languedoc-Roussillon, traveling there regularly. He has reviewed more than 25,000 wines to date.
A UC Santa Barbara graduate, Kettmann is the author of Vines & Vision: The Winemakers of Santa Barbara County and has contributed to major reference works including The Oxford Companion to the Wines of North America and The World Atlas of Wine.
He co-founded the New Noise Santa Barbara music festival (2009–2016) and advises several nonprofits, including the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden, White Buffalo Land Trust, and the Regenerative Viticulture Foundation. A fifth-generation Californian, he lives in Santa Barbara with his wife, two children, and a dog.
How did you come to wine, and to wine writing? Why write about Wine?
I started my journalism career in 1999 as an intern at the Santa Barbara Independent during my UC-Santa Barbara college days, and was hired as a proofreader after graduation, working for $7 an hour. But I also got paid 10 cents per word for articles, so I started writing about everything I could. I became a news reporter soon after, and wrote my first wine articles in 2000, largely because going to drink wine in tasting rooms for free on the weekends was what we did as recent college grads. I became the paper’s main wine writer in 2007 (among many other roles, like building the website Independent.com), and remain at the paper today, mostly writing about food & drink.
Meanwhile, I was exploring the freelance market – living in Santa Barbara has never been cheap – and sold a story about a trip I took to Nagorno-Karabakh to Wine Spectator in 2004. They paid well, and wanted more, so I wrote a handful of stories for them every year while also freelancing for Time Magazine, the NY Times, Smithsonian, and many other newspapers and magazines. I was still also full-time at my newspaper, writing about everything under the sun.
In 2014, Wine Enthusiast called me out of the blue and took me to dinner. I didn’t know what they wanted, but I said that I was a journalist and wasn’t really interested in being a critic. Two weeks later, they asked if I would review the whole Central Coast and Southern California. I recognized it as a chance to meet even more people and visit even more places in a region where I’d lived and traveled my entire life, so I said yes. I’ve been reviewing about 200 or so wines a month ever since.
My largest accomplishment so far, aside from raising two cool kids, was publishing Vines & Vision: The Winemakers of Santa Barbara County with the photographer Macduff Everton in 2020. We sold out quickly and made decent money doing so – despite what the publishing world told us about wine books – and it’s considered kind of like the bible of Santa Barbara wine. Though it probably deserves an update someday soon.
What are your primary story interests?
Being a news reporter for many years gave me a strong sense of what qualifies as actually newsworthy and compelling for readers. So, I generally chase those angles, especially when selling stories to publications. But personally, I am interested in California history, unique geographies, fascinating biographies, new technologies, forgotten tales, and authentic sustainability stories.
What are your primary palate preferences?
I have a very broad palate, which is helpful in reviewing so many different types of wine. But I tend to drink lighter, fresher reds and mineral-driven whites when I have an option.
Are you a staff columnist or freelance? What are the advantages of both?
I am both a salaried staff member of the SB Independent and a contracted freelancer for Wine Enthusiast. I also occasionally freelance for other publications and speak at various events, often for a fee. It’s nice to be left to your own devices as a freelancer, but it’s also grounding to have a staff position that provides a bit more stability, not to mention a 401K that I started in 2000 and health insurance.
Is it possible to make a living as a wine writer today? If so, how have you succeeded?
I am proud to say that I make a very good living as a journalist and critic who writes almost solely about food & drink, at least by industry standards. But I do work two jobs, both of which can be nearly full-time depending on the week, so it’s not easy or very relaxing or as luxurious as everyone assumes. How I got here was a mixture of hard work and good luck. But I would say that I walked through every professional door when it opened, but also stayed loyal to places that supported me. And I have always been nice and helpful to everyone I meet – that goes a long way, and it’s also much easier than the alternative.
What would people be surprised to know about you?
That I’d much prefer to sit on my couch watching TV with my kids than attend most of the fancy events that I get invited to.
Have you spent most of your life (professional/personal) in Santa Barbara? Pros & Cons?
I grew up in San Jose, where my family settled in the 1850s, but I’ve lived in Santa Barbara since coming here for college in 1995. I’ve traveled all over the world, and still think that Santa Barbara offers the best mix of smalltown community spirit and bigger city cosmopolitan vibes.
Plus, we have beaches and mountain trails that are usually pretty empty, and our little urban area is sandwiched between the amazing Channel Islands and Los Padres National Forest.
The con, professionally, is that I might have a much bigger profile – and possibly make considerably more money – if I lived in Los Angeles, San Francisco, or New York City. But I chose lifestyle over that sort of success many years ago, and remain pretty confident that was the right move.
You have varied interests outside of wine. What haven’t you done, that you’d like to do?
I love traveling and cooking, so living in some small European or Mexican village surrounded by farms, ranches, and the sea with only the need to cook or eat out every day for an extended period of time would be great.
Can you describe your approach to wine writing and/or doing wine reviews?
I’ve been a journalist since I was 21, and I approach wine writing the same as I have always treated any topic: report thoroughly (within reason given time and budget) and write engagingly with your audience in mind. Reviewing is much more formulaic, but it involves the same strategies of paying attention, ensuring fairness, and then being as creative as the format allows.
How do you develop and collaborate with sources for story ideas?
I’ve never had a shortage of story ideas, more a shortage of time to do them. I get dozens of press releases a day and am friendly with dozens of marketing pros, but most of my successful story ideas come from traveling to wine regions and hanging out with the vintners.
Do you work on an editorial schedule and/or develop story ideas as they come up?
There are seasonal things at my newspaper and some special issues at the magazine, but I am mostly just keeping a list of ideas as they come all year long.
Do you consider yourself an Influencer? What’s the difference between a writer and influencer?
Some of the social media work I do would definitely qualify as influencer-ish, and I have nearly 6,000 Instagram followers who appear to be real people, which qualifies as something. But I much prefer writing stories that have the weight and intrigue to stand the test of time.
What are your recommendations to wineries when interacting with journalists?
Get to know them personally and then reach out when you have something truly unique to pitch. Then also appreciate how busy they are and that they are not usually the ones to approve or deny stories, as that falls on an editor’s shoulders.
What advantages are there in working directly with winery publicists?
Good publicists get to know writers on a personal level, and then come to them with stories that align to their interests. They are also aware of the limitations that any writer faces when it comes to writing stories for certain publications.
What is your most memorable wine or wine tasting experience?
Sipping on wine in the ancient land of Artsakh in winery-barns that were riddled with bullet holes and surrounded by land mines was pretty unique, but so was climbing the tree-like ancient vines in the Cinti Valley of Bolivia.
Do you have a favorite wine and food pairing? Favorite recipe/pairing?
Any decent red wine and a cheeseburger.
Carl Giavanti has been a Winery Publicist for over 15 years, and in business marketing and public relations for over 30 years. His background in tech, marketing and project management informs his role as a publicist and wine journalist. Clients are or have been in Willamette Valley, Napa Valley, and Columbia Valley https://carlgiavanticonsulting.com/ Today, Carl is actively writing about his wine travel experiences for several publications. Check out his author pages here: https://linktr.ee/carlgiavanti
