About Us

WELCOME TO CAMAS PRAIRIE WINERY

Located in the small town of Moscow, Idaho Camas Prairie Winery is North Idaho’s oldest production winery. We offer a great selection of wines ranging from sparkling to table wines and honey meads. Try 5 wines for just $1 at our tasting room open from 12 - 6:30PM Monday through Saturday.

LOCAL WINES & IMPORT BEERS

Award Winning Wines

Using locally grown grapes, fruits and honey - we produce 22 different types of wine.

Import Beer Cooler

From blonde to black beers and everything in between, we have the largest selection of import beers in Northern Idaho with over 90 types!

FRESH NEWS

ABOUT US HISTORY

Established by Stuart and Susan Scott, Camas Prairie Winery is the oldest independently owned and operated winery in the State of Idaho. Stu began making wine in the basement of his Moscow home in 1983. Soon, his hobby became a business in 1989 in a former butcher shop in Historic downtown Moscow. After 22 year of business, Stu and Sue sold Camas Prairie Winery to their new successors Jeremy and Heidi Ritter in January 2011.

MOVING FORWARD BUSINESS AS USUAL

Jeremy and Heidi Ritter will continue the Camas Prairie Winery legacy by producing the same quality and value sparkling, table wines and fruit meads as taught by previous owner Stu Scott. Similar to Stu, Jeremy also began making wine in his home in Deary, Idaho in 2007 using fruits like raspberries, apples, cherries, watermelons, plums, peaches and elderberries.

TASTING ROOM WINE AND BEER

Along with a wide variety of award winning wines ranging in sweetness from dry red and white wines to sweet dessert meads, Camas Prairie Winery is the only winery in Idaho that hand-makes sparkling wines. You can try any 5 wines for just $1 at our tasting room. We also serve wine-by-the-glass and wine flights! Custom labels are also available on our wines for special occasions or gifts.

More than just wine, we also offer the largest selection of imported beers in the Northwest with over 90 different beers from all over the world. We also NOW carry a selection of premium Micro brews! Camas Prairie Winery is an IDEQ-approved pollution preventer business as we were Idaho’s first winery to use rural development funds for solar energy and was also named the 2007 Winery of the Year by Wine Press Northwest.

Stop by our tasting room in Downtown Moscow to try our wines and enjoy the ambiance of our mezzanine loft with beautiful stained glass panels and genuine copper ceiling.

POLLUTION PREVENTION CHAMPION CLEAN GREEN

Camas Prairie Winery is an approved IDEQ Pollution Preventer business. Our Clean Green sticker placed on every Camas labeled bottle is proof of our sustainability efforts. The $85,000 solar panel system was installed on the roof of the building in 2009. The four categories that designated our winery as the Pollution Prevention Champion are: Renewable Energy, Solvent and Hazardous Waste Reduction, Packaging Design and Energy Efficiency.

RENEWABLE ENERGY

In 2008, Camas Prairie Winery was awarded a USDA Rural Energy Assistance Program (REAP) grant for a 5,000 watt solar power setup. Using solar systems reduces the demand for coal-fired power, a source of greenhouse gas and mercury emissions. Camas Prairie was the first successful REAP grant for solar power in Idaho. The solar panels produce approximately 945 kilowatt hours of solar power a month and reduces energy bills by $125 per month or $1,500 a year. Avista Utilities also offers a one time abatement rebate of $0.20 for every kilowatt hour of power produced with a solar energy system during its first year of operation.

SOLVENT AND HAZARDOUS WASTE REUDCTION

We use hot steam to sterilize equipment instead of chemical cleaning agents. By using this sterilization system, the use of 75 gallons of chlorine and 32,000 gallons of water a year were eliminated, which generated enough savings to pay for the steam system itself.

PRODUCT DESIGN

Camas Prairie uses lightweight wine bottles with a flat bottom and no dimple. Typically this change can reduce the cost of buying bottles due to a decreased production cost of the glass, an average of 12% drop in water use per container, a 20% reduction in energy and a savings of 20,000 tons of glass packaging per year. As a winery, the lighter bottles reduce how rapidly the price of wine bottles increase and it also reduces the bottle weight by three pounds which allows for reduced shipping costs. Through this change, Camas Prairie Winery conserves thousands of gallons of diesel fuel each year consumed by UPS trucks and the glass distributors.

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

The natural gas tankless hot water system provides hot water on demand in contrast to standard tank-type water heaters, which consume energy around the clock to keep water in the tank hot. Using the natural gas tankless system, we have reduced our natural gas consumption by 50% and electricity consumption by 25% which accounts for a savings of $125 per month or $1,500 a year.