Brian Mast and Jennifer Waits established Waits-Mast Family Cellars in 2005. They were ardent wine drinkers before they began making wine. They took many weekend visits to California's wineries, and on a few exceptional excursions, they sampled wines from France, Switzerland, and New Zealand.
In 2000, they started going to the Anderson Valley Pinot Noir Festival and got their first taste of the wine industry by attending the technical conference. They developed a more profound passion for pinot noir as a result of the weekend's Pinot Noir immersion and Anderson Valley's kind and hospitable wine culture. In the year 2005, they created their first Pinot Noir barrel and by 2007, had established Waits-Mast Family Cellars as a small boutique winery.