Exec. Board – March 2020

Wine Road Executive Board

March 11, 2020

Wine Road Office 9:00am-10:00

Attending: John Viszlay, Carla Jeffries, Devin Ruddick, Joe Foppoli, Carri Holdredge, Beth Costa

Absent: Danny Christensen

9:00 Call to order

9:05 Review minutes from January. Minutes approved.

9:10 Treasurer’s Report

Checking: $206,566.06

Savings: $150,274.42

Plus pending Barrel Tasting revenue of $61,422; $50K of that revenue will be deposited into the Savings account.

9:15 PR/Marketing:

• Palm Springs: Rancho Mirage wine tasting (no Spirits or Beer). Beth hosted 3 journalists for a Friday luncheon; all are freelancers that write for multiple publications. Beth attended festival on Sat, handed out maps. While not a great use of her time, it may be worthwhile for wineries who are looking for exposure w/high-end clientele.
• Photo Contest Winners: Contest took place in Jan/Feb. One of the two winners is here for Barrel Tasting, the other coming out in May.
• BT videos: Beth went out during the first weekend of Barrel Tasting and shot videos in all three appellations highlighting the many aspects of Barrel Tasting including looking at a goat!   In RRV she saw Balletto, Jigger, Hook & Ladder; DCV was Mazzocco, Truett Hurst and Coffaro; then in AV it was Foley Sonoma, Mercury, and J. Rickards.

9:20 Website:

–Ambassador & Shopping Cart– The program is complete, but the pages are still not linking on the website. Beth has hired Amy Lieberfarb to fix this problem.

App: The WR App Punch card will include 20 different obscure varietals. Consumer visits each winery, takes a picture of the bottle, and then when completed, they will win a set of WR prizes (i.e., t-shirt, mug, etc.) App should be ready in two weeks.

9:30  Community Benchmark: John came back with a new proposal for $6K instead of $60K. It will include less data points, but will still be useful; the WR association will receive full data. Wineries can upgrade for more data at an individual cost. Beth is still waiting to get the proposal in writing. John is working with Sonoma Valley Vintners right now, then an Oregon group, and will be ready to focus on WR in May. WR will have an exclusive (no DCV or AV) until a mutually agreed upon time.

9:30  Retreat update: ½ day on April 9^th at Paradise Ridge (then ½ day in June). Sandra Hess will be our moderator and we’ll focus on WR’s three biggest challenges. Board as a group to determine the three challenges, then focus on direction/solutions during the meeting.

Today the Exec Board discussed the following three challenges:

• Travel/Tourism (including natural disasters)
• Membership (Dues/ AVAs/Member Participation) *Beth to pencil out changes in revenue if we modify the Dues structure (i.e., all dues at $900 vs. current varied rates.)
• Changing Marketplace

**Beth to send out an email to all Board Members asking them to be prepared for this discussion.

9:35  New hire – Member & Partner Relations: Emily Luna started today at 20/30 hours per week!

9:40  New Business: Lots of damage control in terms of emails re: Corona Virus.

9:45  Old Business: Discussion of modifying AVA to include a handful of hotels currently outside of our AVA (e.g., The Gables, Flamingo, Double Tree, Bodega Bay Lodge). Long-term, should WR consider Marin and SF lodgings? Should lodgings located outside of our traditional AVA pay a premium price?

Next Board Meeting – April 9^th, 9:00-2:00pm, Paradise Ridge Winery