Board Meeting – Oct. 13, 2021

Wine Road Board Meeting

October 13, 2021

9:00am – virtual or in-person

In attendance:

• Beth Costa
• Dan Christensen
• Devin Ruddick
• Aaron Krug
• Lillian Fechter
• Julia Lander
• Jack Seifrick
• Helen Sharrocks
• John Viszlay
• Lucas Meeker – dropped reception
• Brooke Ross
• Oded Shakked

Meeting started at 9:06am.

Treasurers Report:

Savings – $150,076.44

Checking- $53,512.42

Wine and Food

• We have not collected revenue yet – approx $125,000
• No expected expenses – maybe $500 at most.
• Exceeded 1,000 tickets, which was stretch goal.

Winter Wineland

• For WWL, have ads designed and things ready to go.
• Beth has already put on website that it will be same format as W&F Affair
• Will end ticket sales December 29^th, so wineries can provide catering numbers
• Not a big food event

General Meeting

• Board voted between Dec & Jan meeting – decided on afternoon in January.
• Reviewed Budget. If we go to Vintners – $5k+
• Suggested that a winery could winery host (John, Aaron, Helen and Jack all offered)
• Date: Beth is going to review with other organizations (RRV is in January). She will propose some dates

New ABC Requirements

• Everyone must go through in-depth trainings
• It will be tracked and will need to pass tests
• Beth is looking into further and will distribute information to all

Board of Supervisors

• Beth applied for grant for every event (WF, WWL, app, tasting pass, Barrel etc)
• Linda Hopkin’s office replied and said one grant is approved.
• We will know next Tuesday what will be received.

APP update

Minimal update –

• Discussed general info and including subscription level – People would pay for perks & privileges.
• Trying to decide what everyone will receive – for example wine events and winery discounts or 2 for 1 tasting. Additional perks – other businesses that would offer perks to our subscribers. For example, ziplining, hotels, that locals would use (Green Music Center)
• Discussed changing it quarterly or every other event etc.
• Beth has concerns regarding keeping content new. Wineries wouldn’t upload their own information, but Wine Road can’t constantly be on phone reaching out to get people to update.
• Roadrunner club – 1,000 people
• 10 years ago – VIP event pass. 200 people (with little effort)

Wine Club –

Beth has ‘little faith’ to start wine club. She has spoken to multiple people in the industry and who manage wine clubs, and it is challenging to see how there will be return in revenue. Members will want to choose their own wineries

She is going to speak with a compliance person in Napa, but she can’t see how it will work without quite a bit of expense.

Corporate Gifting

Nancy Woods is making calls from home

She purchased business listing from Bay Area. There were a few people who were interested. Beth is paying for 40 hours and she will see if there is any return.

Brand Ambassadors

Beth is moving forward with this program. Website is setup, on bottom of page. Fine tuned offering – combination of customers & influencers. Goal is 12 to start, then stop, and see what type of response we are getting. Goal is to keep Wine Road top of mind. Customers need minimum 2,000 followers. We will choose.

Influencer will apply via form online, we will review Social Media Page.

John noted the page has great mobile access

Aaron will forward to PR contact once Beth has finalized

Wine & Food Affair

Tickets end Sunday night.

Julia asked – How many people at each winery?   It depends on how many tables/availability each winery provided in advance. It’s different from winery to winery

What’s the feedback from guests?   Approx 20 were very frustrated, but overall reception has been positive. Some have been angry this week because we’re sold out.

Ticket is challenging to order, but overall it has been great.

John noted this is the first time, so it will only get easier each time.

Jack asked – do we already know what we would change for WWL?

Beth said – she wishes we could do WWL after WFA, so we had more space for feedback. Beth has given feedback to CellarPass for access. From the winery side, she thinks everyone will get information they need, but she doesn’t know at this time.  John noted it has been straight forward.

Lillian asked if there was a dropped shopping cart option, so we could see how many people stopped purchasing tickets mid-way through or may be frustrated, but could be a potential ticket holder. Beth said she thinks they all called.

Dinners/Receptions are doing well. John is sold out (12 seats each night). West Wines is a reception – sold out. Steven Walker is a reception – almost sold out. Breakfasts at $35 are not sold out. For WWL, it would be great to do Friday night events and Monday experiences.

John asked : any new business?

None

Subscription App

This seems to be the focus, but we need everyone’s feedback. Everyone wants everything on their phone and an app would show they are a subscriber.

Dan suggested we announce at General Meeting and receive ideas from others

Lets look at other apps we use. What do we like about them? They don’t always have to be perks/benefits. Could be last minute deals from hotels wineries .

Varietal of the Month

Nice benefit for members – nice writeup, link to shopping cart

Marcy uses “repour”. Beth is going to monitor clicks and potentially have repour sponsor

Feature on website –

Suggestion from winery member – Featured member of the week. Featuring different wineries each week. This week is 2 wineries & a lodging.   Caption with approximately 100 words. Not live right now but Beth is going to get back up & running. Everyone needs to write their own copy – caption of approx. 100 words.

Certified Publication

Charged us 25% as what they have in the past. Will go to 120 locations and picked up a pile of maps. Someone came this weekend and took all the maps. It’s great people are getting maps.

Meeting adjourned at 9:54p.