Spending a weekend sipping superb wines while savoring the perfect food pairing sounds like heaven. Add in breathtaking scenery and the relaxing ambiance of Sonoma County’s Wine Country, and now you have paradise perfected! This magical wine and food weekend becomes reality on November 1st and 2nd as the Wine Road hosts the 27th annual Wine & Food Affair. A Sneak Peek at the Food Pairings With 50 wineries to select from, there are too many food pairings to list, so here are just a few highlights. If you love Italian-based comfort food, check out: Mushroom and Winter Squash Risotto at Pedroncelli Winery Lobster Ravioli with Vodka Sauce at Pech Merle Winery Tatiana’s Famous Lasagna at Colagrossi Wines If you’d rather pair Mexican, French or Cajun with delicious wines, here are some options: Roger’s Colorado Pork Green Chili at J. Cage Cellars Creamy Mushroom Chicken Facon Grand Mère at GC Lurton Vineyards Alison’s Jambalaya at Mat

We are pleased to announce the completion of the search for the Controller for our Client, Balletto Vineyards. Kevin DeMartini accepted the position from an outstanding pool of candidates that were highly qualified. Kevin has a strong background in financial roles within the wine industry including Controller role for Clos Du Val Winery, Director of Financial Planning & Analysis for TerrAscend and Vintage Wine Estates. Previously, Kevin held senior financial roles with Jackson Family Wines and Trinchero Family Estates. His unique combination of accounting knowledge and skills in winery operations are an outstanding match for Balletto Vineyards.  Kevin has a bachelor’s degree in economics with an Accounting Emphasis, from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an Executive MBA in Wine Business from Sonoma State University. His experience in winery financial roles make him well qualified to continue the success of Balletto Vineyards. Given our work on this project

The 3rd annual Healdsburg Wine and Food Experience was a weekend-long celebration that featured the best of Sonoma County and world-renowned food and wines. This year's festival showcased the region's makers – farmers, growers, winemakers and chefs – alongside globally recognized wines, highlighting the vibrant culinary diversity, deep connection to agriculture, and sustainable farming practices of Sonoma County. HWFE is deeply involved in the Sonoma County community, making substantial donations from this year’s ticket sales and sponsorships to local organizations that make a meaningful difference in the lives of farmers and their families, including the Sonoma County Fundación de la Voz de los Viñedos. These funds will help support the Leadership Academy and workforce development for vineyard employees and their families, fostering future leaders in both the industry and the community. As well as being co-founders of HWFE, Sonoma County Winegro

Ben Dollard President / Vintage Wine EstatesWine Industry Network (WIN) has announced Ben Dollard, President of Treasury Americas, as the distinguished keynote speaker for the upcoming Wine Sales Symposium, taking place on May 16th in Santa Rosa, CA. With an illustrious career spanning 20+ years, Ben Dollard brings unparalleled expertise and insight to this year’s event. Since having joined Treasury Wine Estates as President of the Americas division in January 2020, Ben has reshaped the Treasury Americas business with a relentless focus on consumers, innovation and unlocking the potential of the premium and luxury business. In addition to this years’ esteemed keynote, the event will host an impressive line-up of industry experts and winery professionals sharing their insights, predictions, and strategies for succeeding in the competitive landscape. Featured Speakers Presenting at the Symposium: Session panels will cover topics that include the current state of the wine i

Across six generations, the Hill-Smith Family has evolved from pioneering grape growers and winemakers to a global wine company integrated through vine cultivation, wine growing, wine making, and international distribution, with a diverse portfolio of world-renowned wine brands and vineyard sites across esteemed wine regions, including Barossa, Limestone Coast, Riverland, Tasmania, and Marlborough. In an intentional shift, they've upscaled their production strategy by implementing InnoVint as their winery operating system. This transition was part of a pivotal change to embrace purpose-built, modern technology to advance operations across their wine business from dirt to shelf. The Challenge Legacy Systems and the Need for Modernization Facing the reality of their legacy wine production software nearing end of life, Hill-Smith Family Estates (HSFE) recognized they needed technology to meet their current and future needs. Brent Jones, COO and Executive Director of Operations at HSFE

The Australian ‘Black Summer’ of 2019/20, which saw bushfires destroy swathes of vineyard land across the country was a dramatic reminder of the growing challenges facing winemakers around the world. We spoke to leading Australian winemakers and lab technicians to find out how agile decision-making is helping to deal with the consequences of global warming. Offering alarming proof of the escalating effects of climate change, in November 2019 bushfires blazed through New South Wales, scorching more than five million hectares of land following Australia’s hottest and driest year on record. In December 2019, the fires swept through the Adelaide Hills, destroying 650 ha of vines in the region, and wiping out entire vineyards. Making matters worse, the smoke from the fires was far-reaching, rendering vineyard plots from Canberra to the Hunter Valley useless. Ravaging an estimated 24.3 million hectares of land in total and destroying over 3,000 buildings, the September 2019

Afternoon Brief, November 6th

Wine the Winner in Ohio Court Case: Advocates for interstate wine shipping can mark one down in the win column after an Ohio lawsuit took another twist...

Much better than some might think! Wineries selling in the premium and direct to consumer sector have experienced positive outcomes. Looking back over the past three years:  2020 was the toughest year for direct sales in the last ten years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The closure of tasting rooms and restaurants made it difficult to sell premium wine. I'm glad we're past that whole mess!  2021 was a huge rebound year for wineries selling direct. The rollout of vaccinations, reopening, and the early stages of travel normalization improved the market opportunity. Hospitality as a whole had a very good 2021 as you probably noticed with hotel prices soaring during the year. Compared to the best year of the decade, 2022 may not have been as good, but for those who sell DTC, business was still quite successful. By the end of 2022, the Peer Group Financial Database of Silicon Valley Bank reported that the premium segment had a sales growth of 13.8%, and three-quarters of w

Seismic shifts are rocking wineries’ traditional methods of producing and selling wine. The industry has recognized the vital need to capture the interest of younger consumers to compensate for reduced spending by its older buyer base. Agriculture’s growing acceptance of climate change ― painfully reinforced by increasingly frequent wildfires and droughts ― has led to more sustainable vineyard and winery practices, requiring investments that have sometimes dug deep into budgets. According to Jarod Hernandez, Product Manager for Wine, Spirits, and Beverages at global label materials supplier UPM Raflatac, these shifts also impact wine packaging. “The biggest trends I’m seeing are an increasing commitment to sustainability and the market impact of Millennials and Gen Z,” Hernandez notes, “and these are converging since these consumers may not want to open a 750 ml bottle of wine and leave it open, instead preferring single-use cans or bottles.” A