Twenty years ago, wine production in Washington state was at best a boutique industry, a handful of growers and vintners scattered across the state operating from renovated barns and seasonal shops. Ask about Washington wines and the industrial-size Chateau Ste. Michelle, with its Woodinville presence, was likely to be the one to come to mind.

But today, wine is a $3 billion industry in Washington state. We're second only to California in wine production in the United States, though it is a distant second place. California produced more than 3 million tons of grapes in 2007 compared with about 130,000 tons in Washington.

To see just how the industry has grown, look at Ste. Michelle. In 2000, the winery had an operating profit of $17.4 million and $175 million in revenue. Last year, Ste. Michelle reported nearly $60 million in profits and $354 million in revenue, according to Beverage World newsletter.

It took just over a decade for our state's wine industry to explode. In 1996, there were 90 licensed wineries; by 2007, that had grown to 534. About 17,000 acres were planted in grapes in 1996; just over a decade later, there were 30,000 acres planted with grapes.

In comparison, our state's wine industry "is about the size of the industry in the Napa Valley," says Robin Pollard, executive director of the Washington Wine Commission.

A study commissioned by the Wine Commission and the Washington Association of Wine Grape Growers showed just how important grape and wine production is to the statewide economy. It factored in the impact of employment in the vineyards and wineries, including suppliers, distribution and retail sale. Also included was the tourism industry in wine regions, the jobs it created and the money workers poured into the communities. The study looked at data through 2006, and found that more than 19,000 people were directly employed by the industry, earning pay of $579 million. Just seven years earlier, the industry employed 11,000 people with a payroll of $350 million.

The state and local communities have also reaped the benefits -- stuffing their coffers with $145.1 million in taxes.

"Just as important is the geographical expansion of the industry," says Pollard. "We like to say that wineries now exist in every corner of the state."

In fact, the recognized viticulture areas, the appellations that produce the grapes, while mainly concentrated around Walla Walla and throughout the Yakima Valley, also include the Puget Sound region. And wineries are located near Spokane, in the Palouse, on the Olympic Peninsula, in southwest Washington, and in the valleys of Skagit and Whatcom counties.

Wineries are also a lure to tourists, one that the industry goes to great lengths to encourage around the world as well as locally.

"We worked with state tourism officials last year at an event in Japan to promote both our wines and the tourism component," says Pollard.

The 1.7 million "wine tourists" accounted for about $238 million in revenue in 2006, spent at the wineries, the hotels and inns, and the restaurants and shops. Washington wines compete well on a world market already awash in wine. In the era in which Washington wine has grown from novelty to industry, Australia, South Africa and Chile have joined traditional wine powers Italy, France, Germany and California on the world store shelves. Washington exports wine throughout the world -- the largest markets are Japan, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Despite a worldwide glut of wine and declining per capita consumption in traditional wine-consuming regions such as Europe, the future for the local industry looks strong, even in the face of concerns over European producers flooding the U.S. market in the coming years to shed excess production. Pollard expects state wine production to continue to grow 5 percent to 6 percent a year over the next decade.