WineTalent Classifieds: Estate Director for Luxury Santa Barbara Winery

 WineTalent is working with our Santa Barbara Winery Client to find an Estate Director.

About the company: WineTalent’s client is a luxury estate winery producing highly sought-after wines from a highly regarded AVA. The winery has a stellar team including an estate Vineyard Manager, Winemaker and a world-renowned consulting winemaker. Join the team in an important role that is integral to the success of the winery. 

About the opportunity: WineTalent is seeking an Estate Director to oversee the sales and marketing of the business to increase the brand awareness with consumers and trade professionals.

Responsibilities:

• Provide day-to-day and longer-term general management leadership to the business.
• Lead the sales and marketing activities to position the brand in the luxury product arena.
• Accountable for winery's revenue, expenses and profitability.
• Oversee marketing initiatives to ensure increased customer engagement including winery visits, wine club membership and wine purchases.
• Manage wholesale sales including strategic initiatives.
• Emphasize direct trade selling with all staff.
• Manage outsourced consultants in digital, social marketing and content development.
• Create routine and specific reporting to keep ownership engaged with business developments and performance.
• Ensure sales and marketing plans match production levels and budgeted revenue generation.
• Consistently deliver high touch consumer engagement across all channels.
• Management of human and financial resources.

What the Job Requires:

• Senior level management experience in a wine focused business.
• At least 3 years of winery experience in a management, hospitality, and marketing role.
• Bachelor's degree in Business, Finance, Communications, Marketing or related is strongly preferred. Work history in lieu of a degree will also be considered.
• Extensive wine business experience to create successful plans, budgets, forecasts and initiatives for the winery.
• Thorough understanding of DTC and wholesale sales channels.
• Strong communication skills.
• Proven personnel management to ensure collaborative team environment.
• Luxury product and/or lifestyle marketing experience.

About WineTalent: WineTalent is a wine industry focused recruitment company. We work closely with our clients and our job seekers to find the right fit of talents, experience and work environment.

WineTalent: The Right People for the Job

All inquiries will be kept strictly confidential

To apply please email your resume to amy@winetalent.net   

WineTalent Classifieds: Winery Office Manager in Napa Valley

WineTalent is working with our Napa Valley client to find a Winery Office Manager.

About the company:  WineTalent’s client is a luxury estate winery producing highly sought-after wines from organically grown grapes.  The winery has a rich history in the Napa Valley.  Join the team in an important role that is integral to the success of the winery. 

About the opportunity:  WineTalent is seeking an Office Manager to manage the administrative aspects of the winery.  This role will work directly with ownership and the General Manager in all aspects of business operations and administration to meet the demands of the company.  The Office Manager manages the company’s accounting, human resources, compliance, inventory management and service agreements.  This role will act as the primary point of contact for all service providers related to essential functions of the business. 

Responsibilities:

·     Establish SOP’s for purchase order and invoice receipt management.

·     Assist third-party accounting group with AR management, including deposits.

·     Direct and manage expense reporting, including SOP’s, systems, policy updates and company card management.

·     Liaise with and manage third party IT consultants to ensure IT service agreement and scope of accountability is effectively executed.

·     Manage all aspects of payroll, staying current on related state and federal labor laws. 

·     Develop and maintain a high level of knowledge about the company’s ERP system and its operating protocols. Default resource for ERP updates, troubleshooting and training.

·     Direct inventory management SOP’s and manage inventory movements, employee withdrawals and monthly reconciliation.

·     Manage relationships with, and troubleshooting of, the company’s utilities.

·    Collaborate with third party HR group and benefits brokers to assist in HR administration including: 

·      annual updates to the Company’s employee handbook

·      employee file management

·      employee on-boardings and separations

·      census reporting

·       benefits meeting coordination and benefits enrollment

·     Liaise with third-party compliance group to ensure state and federal permits and licenses are renewed on a timely basis. Set-up and manage COLA submissions in house through the TTB on-line web portal.

·     Manage office maintenance and janitorial services, office supplies and service contracts for copiers, scanners, printers and other communal administrative hardware.

·     Responsible for timely and accurate processing of wholesale orders with an emphasis on customer service

·     Provides support to the sales team.

·     Manages general administrative needs of entire company, including office, and internal and external communications in support position of the General Manager.

·     Administrative tasks as required.

What the Job Requires:

·       BA or BS or equivalent combination of education and experience

·       5 plus years of experience in similar position

·       Demonstrated business acumen and an innate understanding of wine production, hospitality, and customer service excellence

·       Ability to participate as a team leader to deliver financial and strategic results and exceptional customer service standards

·       Medium to advanced accounting skills

·       High level of proficiency with MS Office, specially Excel, and QuickBooks, as well as POS and database applications

·       Ability to establish priorities, work independently and proceed with objectives without supervision

·       Interpersonal awareness, relationship management and influencing skills

·       Must be proactive and have strong organizational skills including exceptional attention to detail and follow-through

·       High degree of integrity and strong work ethic

·       A valid CA driver’s license is required

About WineTalent: WineTalent is a wine industry focused recruitment company. We work closely with our clients and our job seekers to find the right fit of talents, experience and work environment.

WineTalent: The Right People for the Job

If you are interested in applying, email your resume to amy@winetalent.net

All inquiries will be kept strictly confidential

WineTalent Classifieds: Lab Manager - Enologist in the Napa Valley

WineTalent is working with our winery client to find a Lab Manager – Enologist to join the company. 

 

About the Company:  Our client is a well-respected, luxury wine producer in the heart of the Napa Valley.  The wines are produced from all estate grown fruit.  The winery has a proven commitment to producing wines of the highest quality. 

 

About the Position:  The Lab Manager will be responsible for Quality Assurance throughout the entire winemaking process, from grape sampling to bottling. The Lab Manager will carry out routine laboratory analysis on juice and wine samples and maintain accurate records of results.  This position will have frequent interaction with the Winemaker and cellar staff, be aware of all winery activities and monitor the evolution of the wine.  The Lab Manager will also be responsible for maintaining all inventories of lab chemicals and supplies, wine and dry goods, tracking cellar work orders and activities as they affect inventories and maintain all production records.  The Lab Manager will oversee the acquisition of dry goods and logistics during packaging, bottling and warehousing of wine.  This role supervises harvest interns and has daily interaction with the production team.  As needed, the Lab Manager will write and maintain SOPs for the laboratory and the cellar.   

 

Essential Duties and Responsibilities: 

Laboratory

•      Update standardization protocols and analytical procedures.

•      Maintain and update testing procedures

•      Maintain accurate record of test results

•      Maintain, calibrate and troubleshoot laboratory equipment and offer solutions as necessary

•      Ensure accurate analysis, compare results against previous data and re-run if results are not within specifications

•      Check lab analysis against external lab analysis to verify accuracy

•      Perform monthly volatile acidity and free SO2 analyses on all aging wine lots

•      Perform full analytical panel on all lots at racking (every three months)

•      Perform analysis panels as per Analysis Request Calendar (harvest and malolactic)

•      Sample tanks and barrels as necessary, and request samples from cellar team

•      Record results in vintage log

•      Conduct sensorial testing for wine defects

•      Maintain current inventory of lab chemicals and supplies and order as necessary

•      Alert Winemaker to potential issues with analysis or other observations

•      Investigate new lab protocols and methods

•      Ensure proper safety procedures are followed in the lab

 

Laboratory Analyses

•      Autotitrator

o   Total Acidity

o   Free SO2

•      Auto-analyzer (SMARTCHEM) or Spectrophotometer (enzymatic)

o   Volatile Acidity

o   Malic Acid

o   Residual Sugar

o   Nitrogen/Ammonia

•      Carbodoser

o   CO2

•      Alcolyzer

o   Alcohol

•      pH meter

o   pH

•      NTU meter

o   NTU

•      Spectrophotometer

o   Tannins – A280

o   Anthocyanins

•      Invisible Sentinel – PCR

o   Brettanomyces

•      Microscope

o   Microbiological observations of yeast and bacteria

•      Refractometer

o   Brix

•      Glories Method

o   Phenolic sampling during harvest

 

Winemaking Related Responsibilities

•      Participate in daily cellar crew meeting and interaction with cellar crew

•      Calculate and confirm wine additions

•      Write and maintain SOP’s for laboratory and cellar

•      Prepare egg-white fining and filtration trials and other benchtop trials as needed

•      Prepare trial blends and determine AVA and varietal breakdown

•      Understand winemaking and aging process to plan and organize analyses annually

•      Perform sensorial analysis and alert supervisor to any potential quality issues

•      Calculate and confirm additions

•      Proactively check analyses on lots according to stage or intervention

•      Prepare bulk wine samples

 

Inventories and Traceability

•      Enter work orders into cellar record keeping document

•      Maintain intermediate inventory

•      Prepare end of month bulk inventory

•      Participate in annual physical inventory

•      Ensure that traceability is completed (in coordination with cellar master)

 

Bottling

•      Realize pre-bottling analyses

•      Prepare bottling work order

•      Assist in pre-bottling organization (warehouse map, logistics, storage placement of bottles)

•      Ensure quality control during bottling

•      Realize inventory count

•      Enter bottling work order and create bottling summary

•      Supply cage labels

•      Realize end of bottling dry goods inventory

 

Packaging

•      Order dry goods (labels, foils, cases) and coordinate delivery and storage

•      Prepare warehouse maps and packaging logs

•      Realize pre-packaging analyses

•      Assist in pre-packaging meeting

•      Perform quality control checks on all dry goods (labels, filters, cases)

•      Ensure quality control during packaging

•      Realize end of day inventory count

•      Enter packaging work order and create packaging summary

•      Realize end of bottling dry goods inventory

 

Managing of Intern

•      Prepare intern introduction and training plan

•      Train and manage lab intern sampling methods, sample rows, grape analysis and data entry

•      Organize and evaluate intern’s work schedule

•      Coordinate sampling and grape ripening analysis

•      Layout and monitor activities during the workday (with Winemaker)

 

Cork Selection

•      Sample, prepare and perform cork quality control, including sensory analysis, for lot selection

•      Create cork sensory report summary

•      Maintain relationship with cork suppliers

•      Prepare cork purchase orders

•      Track “corked” bottles from tasting room

 

Sustainability

•      Update sustainability documents

•      Investigate potential areas of improvement

•      Organize audits

 

Qualifications:

•      BS in Fermentation Science or related science field

•      Experience with lab equipment and research methodology

•      At least 3 years of wine industry experience, including hands-on laboratory experience

•      Good Excel skills

•      Accuracy and attention to detail

•      Ability to manage multiple tasks and projects

•      Ability to function independently

 

Compensation and Benefits:  This is a full-time, hourly position.  During harvest and other times of peak activity there will be overtime hours.  Benefits include healthcare, dental, life insurance, 401K plan with company match and possible subsidized company housing.

 

About WineTalent:  WineTalent is a wine industry focused recruitment company. We work closely with our clients and our job seekers to find the right fit of talents, experience and work environment. All inquiries will be kept strictly confidential.

 

Please email resume and all inquiries to amy@winetalent.net  

 

WineTalent Classifieds: Staff Accountant in Saint Helena, CA

WineTalent is working with our client, Long Meadow Ranch, to find a Staff Accountant to join the finance team.

About the Company:  Long Meadow Ranch is a family­ owned and operated producer and purveyor of world­ class wine and food that is economically successful and socially responsible using diversified, sustainable, and organic farming methods.

The Long Meadow Ranch operations also include an acclaimed farm-to-table restaurant, a general store and wine tasting bar in the historic Logan-Ives House, an outdoor cafe, a farmer's market, a working garden and a variety of unique event spaces all located at Farmstead at Long Meadow Ranch.

About the Opportunity:  Long Meadow Ranch has a unique opportunity for a Staff Accountant to join our Finance team to provide quality service to our winery management team, farm production team, and other business partners. Reporting to the Controller, the Staff Accountant will provide general accounting support, maintain financial reports, records, and general ledger for multiple affiliated entities. This position requires ethical conduct and thoroughness, along with critical thinking, attention to detail and time management.

Responsibilities

• Facilitate and complete monthly close procedures
• Prepare journal entries and perform analysis and reconciliation of general ledger accounts and merchant accounts
• Support accounts payable where necessary, including invoice processing, coding and approvals
• Provide additional support for corporate credit card processing and facilitating employee expense reimbursement as needed
• Support Senior Staff Accountant with daily financial reporting
• Support other critical accounting areas as needed, such as fixed assets and accounts receivable
• Partner with sales team and order processing team to effectively manage accounts receivable
• Forecast of future cash receipts from accounts receivable
• Collaborate with Controller to ensure that the financial information is prepared in strict adherence with US GAAP, company policies and procedures and sound financial management practices

Education, Experience and Requirements

• Minimum of 3 years of experience in general ledger accounting practices
• Wine or consumer beverage product accounting experience preferred
• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, Business or a related discipline
• Experience with NetSuite preferred
• Proficient in MS Office with advanced MS Excel skills
• Sharp attention to detail with good oral and written communication skills
• Able to work in a team environment as well as operate independently
• Able to lift 40+ lbs

Compensation and Benefits

• This is a full-time, salaried position.
• Competitive compensation depending on experience plus benefits including medical/dental insurance, paid vacation and 401(k).

About WineTalent: WineTalent is a wine industry focused recruitment company. We work closely with our clients and our job seekers to find the right fit of talents, experience and work environment. All inquiries will be kept strictly confidential.

WineTalent: The Right People for the Job

Apply Online:  https://boards.greenhouse.io/lmr/jobs/1657578?gh_jid=1657578#app