Significant professional accomplishment: Growing a national wine brand to industry growth accolades and acquisition.
Passion project: Launching a nonprofit wine brand to fund a cancer research foundation. I’ve had a working idea for a few years … The idea here is to develop a wine brand and project that is centered around an annual event or two which also coincides as a fundraiser for this organization. There would be an annual release of this wine that would be available at retailers and would include the ability to sign up for an annual subscription for quarterly wine club releases. It’s similar to the model that some breweries will use when they do a special beer for an event like Shipyard does for Tri for a Cure. It’s more difficult to achieve with wine because of the lead time required in production but the wine club/preorder model should allow for this to occur if there is an annual event surrounding it.
Audacious goal: Become the leading employee-owned national wine-and-spirits company in the U.S.
Favorite quote: “If you want something you never had, you have to do something you’ve never done.” — Thomas Jefferson
Favorite movies/TV shows/podcast: The “Back to the Future” trilogy is hard to beat while “Ozark” and “Billions” are in my current rotation. “How I Built This” podcast with Guy Raz
How do you recharge: Hiking or runnning with my wife Danielle, son Cooper and dog AJ.
