An article in the Los Angeles Times reports that Gallo has confirmed that traces of TCA have been found in wines bottled at its processing facility in Sonoma. 90 different Gallo wines totaling nearly 2 million cases a year are bottled there under such labels as Rancho Zabaco, Frei Brothers, Gallo of Sonoma and Louis Martini. The chemical is not a health risk but can produce an unpleasant off-taste in the wine.
TCA is the abbreviation for trichloroanisole, a chemical byproduct of the interaction between mold and chlorine, which is used as a cleaning solution and to bleach corks and oak barrels. Contaminated corks are often a source of TCA in bottled wine. One of the mysteries of the Gallo contamination is that the winery stopped using chlorine as a cleaning agent years ago
The Times article also mentions that Gallo which produces about a third of California's wine, is the world's second largest wine producer.
I had thought that Gallo was the largest wine company . I was surprised to find out elsewhere that the world's largest wine company is Constellation Brands, a name totally unfamiliar to me although I did recognize its wine brands.