Celebrity wine and spirits brands are a dime a dozen these days. What’s infinitely rarer are those that are worth their salt, delivering not just a recognizable name behind the label, but quality in the glass and savvy marketing as well. One such wine brand proving that a celebrity backing can indeed be a boon is Avaline, co-owned by actor Cameron Diaz and entrepreneur Katherine Power; for that reason, it’s been named the 2026 Market Watch Leaders Wine Brand of the Year.
Diaz and Power launched Avaline with a Spanish white wine and a Provençal rosé, both made from organic grapes, in July 2020. In the brand’s first three months on shelves, it sold 10,000 cases—a bellwether of the success to come—and by October 2020, it had added a Rhône red to the portfolio. Numerous additional wines have since joined its core stable, among them Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Noir, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, and a duo of sparkling wines (one white and one rosé), all of which are made with organic grapes. The entire portfolio falls within the $20–$28 a 750-ml. price range, putting it firmly in super-premium territory. In terms of bright spots within this lineup, the more recently added Prosecco has served as a particularly valuable extension for the brand—CEO Jennifer Purcell notes that in its first 30 days on market, in November 2025, it became the fastest-selling single-bottle release in Avaline’s DTC history. In the past few years, the brand has bucked trends in the greater wine space—where such conditions as increasingly health-conscious consumers and less consumption among younger drinkers have contributed to volume declines— and rapidly grown, skyrocketing from a base of 80,000 cases in 2022 to more than 300,000 cases in 2025, according to Impact Databank. Last year was an especially pivotal one for the brand, with depletions rising by nearly 50% year-over-year. At the heart of these soaring numbers is Avaline’s outside-the-box approach to brand development. “We built the brand more like a modern lifestyle company than a traditional wine label by prioritizing retail and DTC early, investing in design, and building cultural relevance beyond the wine aisle,” Purcell says.
Thus far, this has included engaging in strategic partnerships with brands including Moda Operandi, J. Crew, Anthropologie Weddings, Williams Sonoma, and Instacart, as well as releasing limited edition wines made in collaboration with various lifestyle brands (last year, for instance, saw the debut of limited-edition packaging by fashion designer Stella McCartney for Avaline’s rosé). “Limited releases have become an important part of how we introduce new consumers to the brand while keeping existing customers engaged,” Purcell notes, adding that additional limited editions were introduced over the summer.
Coming up for Avaline is a push in national retail chains. While DTC is a key contributor to the brand’s sales, it’s available in a slew of major stores as well, among them Kroger, Target, and Whole Foods. Now, it’ll arrive on shelves at more than 1,500 Kroger stores, 1,400 Target locations, and 350 Whole Foods outlets, according to senior vice president of sales Matthew Szura, setting the stage for more meteoric growth ahead.
Julia Higgins
