My mantra (one my husband has heard so many times he’s sick of it): A server can make or break your meal, your happy hour or, yes, even your winetasting experience.

That’s why both of us were so impressed with a young man named Andrew Lincoln on a visit to Artesa Vineyards & Winery, a modern, hippish winery perched on about 350 acres atop Henry Road in Napa’s Los Carneros district. According to the website, “Spain’s oldest winemaking family,” Cordorníu Raventós, opened the winery in 1991 to make sparkling wine but transformed it into an artisan operation handcrafting chardonnay, pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon and other varietals. (In Catalan Spanish, “artesa” means handcrafted.)

What we like about Andrew is his charm and his knowledge of the wines he serves. One of Artesa’s “wine educators,” he tends the wine bar at the Visitor Center and tries to make his customers’ experience a memorable one.

“What I love about the industry is making people happy and turning them on to unique varietals, regions or the cultural history that leads to what’s in their glass,” he wrote in an email. “It’s fun and gratifying to sell wine, but at the end of the day my priority is to make guests walk away happy and excited about finding something they may not have tried before, like an albariño or a tempranillo.”

It’s easy to identify people who genuinely feel that way about their job and those that don’t. It’s a tradition I’ve followed for years: Treat me well and I’ll be your customer forever. I encourage them to tell their stories: how they got there and why, and where they want to go next.

Andrew is a perfect example in so many ways. Raised here and living near the winery, he may know more about wine than most of us. Yet, as he says, “wine is such a deep and complex subject that I can only say that my knowledge is growing.” He learned in part from previous experience as a food server. He took wine classes, attended tastings and did lots of reading. One of the biggest influences, without a doubt, has been his father.

Jim Lincoln, who manages vineyards, gave his son a global perspective on wine. Andrew says he doesn’t know why, but he and his father have similar palates. He wonders if it’s genetic “or if I love and respect his knowledge and opinion so much!” It’s probably both.

Working at Artesa has enhanced Andrew’s wine education. He fits right in with the winery’s approach: charming, knowledgeable and forward-¬thinking. Artesa considers itself a cross between the old world (founded by an historic Spanish winemaking family) and the new (bringing their roots to these rich, grape-loving soils).

Designed by a renowned Barcelona architect, the winery brings nature and wine together. It's built into a hillside, nestled beneath cool grasses and treating visitors to panoramic views of San Pablo Bay less than three miles away. The look is classically modern: clean, bright and airy—a vast difference from most wineries.

Besides what his father taught him, Andrew has garnered a treasure trove of experience from working at the winery. He’s considering becoming a certified sommelier and continues to study photography.

After reading so much of Andrew’s writing, I believe he should add that skill to his toolkit. His style is soft-spoken, articulate and sincere. From work and living in wine country, he tracks trends, takes notice of changes and keeps many historical tips that tie themselves to wine.

What he sees now is a younger generation finding interest in a new craft-style beer industry that launched “a cultural revolution of appreciating small production, and the top-tier wines have always had that M.O. It’s just that the concept of craft beer turned a lot of young people to the wine scene.”

“I think wine inherently contained qualities that were appealing to the mindset,” he said. “Great wine is a celebration of place, history and craftsmanship. It’s about quality, not quantity.”

Regarding other trends, he believes twist-off caps are here to stay. When some cork batches became contaminated in Portugal, he said, the Germans began using twist-offs. Technology has since discovered the right amount of oxygen needed to age the wines properly. “I know it’s not as romantic as popping a cork, but the moment you open that $300+ bottle of wine you were saving for a special occasion and it’s corked, you’ll wish you had a screw cap!”

On the horizon he expects there to be much more environmentally responsible agriculture and a gradual move away from the dominance of what was once “Napa’s golden child,” cabernet sauvignon.

“I think cabernet will continue to be popular for a long time in the Napa Valley, it’s just that the style is changing,” he says. “The big, uber-ripe, heavily oaked cabs that were championed by critics like Robert Parker and James Laube in the 1990s and 2000s are slowly giving way to more classic, restrained, more ageable expressions of the varietal.”

Yes, Andrew is the kind of guy you’d like to grab a beer and chat with. Come to think of it, make that a glass of wine.