By Elin McCoy / BloombergNapa Valley whiz winemaker Dave Phinney thinks big. So far, Phinney, 46, has made more than US$150 million from selling those ventures. Now he’s taken on spirits with his Savage & Cooke Distillery, which led to a partnership with billionaire Gaylon Lawrence to transform the San Francisco Bay Area’s Mare Island into a hip booze destination and a sustainable community for 75,000 people. Looking through old Navy files on Mare Island, two names popped out to him: “Savage” and “Cooke.”HISTORY OF GOOD TASTEPhinney certainly had the startup funds. But he first made his name with wine brand Orin Swift, which he founded in 1998 and sold to E & J Gallo in 2016 for a reported $100 million.
