Home winemaking can be fun and challenging, and it may even turn into a lifelong hobby. Your expectations for the quality of the final product need to be realistic and based on how much time and, yes, money you put into the enterprise.

Before you start designing your wine labels, here are some extremely important issues to consider before you begin.

• Make sure you have enough space. If you plan to buy grapes and crush them yourself, you will need much more work space than if you buy grape concentrate from a brewing supply store. If you plan on the former, your garage is most logical base of operations. Depending on the size of your garage, you may have to park your car outside as you make your wine. Also, your work area must be somewhat cool and as clean as possible.

• Decide how much money you want to spend. Wineries spend millions of dollars on new equipment and on maintaining their existing equipment. This is not an option for most of us. If you are serious about establishing a home operation, you will have to spend several hundred dollars to acquire the most basic equipment. Again, if you plan to forego buying and crushing grapes, your costs will be considerably lower. It is also possible to rent home winemaking equipment.

There are as many as 750,000 home winemakers in the United States. In Sonoma County, California, home winemakers stage a grand tasting once a year and award medals to the best wines.

• Don't be afraid to fail. Experience will be your most valuable teacher. If your first foray into home winemaking does not result in the most palatable wine, your next attempt will undoubtedly be more successful. Keep a journal as you make your wine, noting every step in the process, from the amounts of sulfur dioxide you add along the way to the type of yeast you use. Some techniques you will use again; others, you will discard.

• Purchase a more detailed home winemaking guide. The information in this chapter will allow you to produce a passable wine, but if questions or concerns spring up along the way, here are two excellent supplementary texts, both available from Amazon.com: Jon Iverson, Home Winemaking Step by Step and Daniel Pambianchi, Techniques in Home Winemaking.