What is a winery? Sounds like a simple question, right?

But, oh, what a headache it is to answer! You’d think it’s a place where wine is made, and to be sure that’s one definition.

Yet there are many other definitions, some of which have nothing to do with wine.

When the word “winery” is mentioned, most people think of a quaint stone chateau surrounded by acres of well-ordered vineyards atop an ancient cave filled with priceless bottles.

And that’s the case in many areas of the Old World, but today there are loads of “chateaus” with no buildings, “cellars” with no below-ground storage and “vineyards” with no vines.

In fact, one brand developed years ago is called Estate Cellars, and in fact there is no “estate” and there are no “cellars.”

The winery-in-name-only is one of the transparent developments that have fueled much of the growth in the California wine industry over the last decade. Literally hundreds of brands exist today that are made at a winery, sure, but the owner of the brand does not own the winery.

These are brands produced at what are called “custom crush” operations. Yes, the brand may have a dramatic, romantic tasting room, complete with all the trappings of such facilities — aprons, pot holders, placemats, jewelry and even ashtrays — and it may well be ringed with cottonwoods and wildflowers.

But the wine is made miles away at a most unromantic, concrete-paved commercial park. Or, more mundane, the wine is simply bought in bulk from a bulk-wine broker and then bottled at any place that has a power outlet, often by a portable bottling line brought in for the day.

No, it’s not very romantic, but it allows anyone to create a “winery” without walls or even vineyards.

As an example, you could call a grape grower and contract to buy chardonnay grapes. The grower arranges to have the grapes picked for you. You then contract with a “custom crush” winery to make the wine for you. The price depends on the aging of the wine and fees for storage.

On harvest day, a contracted trucking company picks up the harvested grapes and takes them to the contracted winery, where a consulting winemaker oversees the crushing and fermenting of the wine.

In the months when the wine is aging, you can contract with a wholesale company to market your wine, if a wholesale company is interested. You can also design and print your own labels, and on the day when you contract for the wine to be bottled, the labels can be affixed to the bottles.

All of this can be accomplished while sitting at your desk in Sarasota, Palo Alto or Honolulu.

Literally hundreds of wine brands are made this way, and the name of the wine can well be Jim’s Winery or even Jim’s Vineyards, even if Jim has no building or vines.

But that’s not all that defines a winery. In some areas, such as Napa Valley, a winery is defined by what it isn’t.

Beginning some 20 years ago, local regulators became concerned that wineries were increasing their traffic flow by the sale of gewgaws, artwork and foreign-made trinkets. Worse, some were hosting concerts, thereby increasing traffic dramatically on certain weekend days.

And then there were the wineries that opened cafes to serve food.

By the late 1980s, Napa County supervisors were deep into the question of: What exactly is a winery? Can it stage rock concerts? Serve food?

Eventually, a set of regulations was implemented to prohibit certain activities on the premises where making wine was the main business. A number of existing wineries were grandfathered in — so, for instance, the superb restaurant at Domaine Chandon remains.

But more prohibitions eventually were implemented, some of them a bit odd. One rule, for example, prohibits the sale of all food items, including espresso, even though the option of espresso would be logical since wineries often serve alcoholic beverages to people who are without designated drivers.

Such “what is a winery?” regulations eventually changed the plans of the Mondavi family in the early 1990s to put its Copia center for wine, food and the arts on a property adjacent to the winery.

It was moved to a spot in the town of Napa, where it wouldn’t run afoul of the regulations defining a winery.

Today, every state in the nation has at least one winery, but grapes are not grown in every state. So supporting your local winery may mean supporting grape growers who are somewhere else.

Wine Idea of the Week: Buy pink wine! Some of the best summer cool-off wines are dry roses. Some wine shops now carry 10, even 20, different pink wines, most of them from elsewhere. Spain, the south of France, and even a few from Italy are selling in the $8 to $16 price range, and are a sensational value. The 2006 Marques de Caceres (about $8) is an excellent value, but dozens of dry rose wines are now available. Experiment! I think you’ll be surprised at the appealing flavors.

Dan Berger resides in Sonoma County. Berger publishes a weekly newsletter on wine and can be reached at danberger@VintageExperiences.com.