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In Bordeaux, in Burgundy, or in California, most fine producers use the same techniques as others in their region. Ridge is an exception, differing fundamentally from most California makers. These differences go back to Prohibition, which severed California's connection with its winemaking past. The post-Prohibition generation turned to the agricultural universities to learn how to make wine. Chemists re-invented winemaking technologically, independent of traditional techniques developed over centuries in Europe—and later pre-Prohibition California—which were based on empirically acquired knowledge.

Though born in the sixties to this new world of California winemaking, Ridge turned to the natural rather than the technological. The approach is straightforward: find the most intense and flavorful grapes, guide the natural process, draw all the fruit's richness into the wine. Ridge wines are fermented using wine yeasts naturally present in the vineyard.