April 26, 2024
She Walked Into My Office And Made A Difference. Meet Julie Hernandez.
Julie started as a representative for a major wine player in America. I thought she would never make it. Oops. She became an executive in the trade. Incredible conversation. 1.) Julie Hernandez had a "light bulb" moment about the power of wearing a...
Julie started as a representative for a major wine player in America. I thought she would never make it. Oops. She became an executive in the trade. Incredible conversation.
1.) Julie Hernandez had a "light bulb" moment about the power of wearing a suit in a male-dominated business setting, which positively impacted her career trajectory.
2. Despite being experienced and holding a high-level position, Julie was frequently underestimated by male colleagues, sometimes mistaken for being in a lower role.
3. Paul K shared a personal experience from the 1980s, reflecting on encountering sexism in corporate America.
4. Julie discussed the importance of competitive spirit sourced from being an athlete and an actor, mentioning the Chubbuck acting methodology which emphasizes winning.
More thoughts:
In this enlightening episode of "Wine Talks," host Paul K delves deep into conversation with Julie Hernandez, touching on various topics from her illustrious career in the wine and spirits industry to the personal challenges she faced balancing work and family life. Julie shared her early days in the field and how she navigated a male-dominated industry with strategic decisions like wearing high heels to ensure she was at eye level with her male counterparts. She emphasized the importance of building strong relationships based on trust and mutual respect to succeed in sales, and discussed the transition from chain work to on-premise sales at restaurants.
Both Paul and Julie reflected on the evolution of corporate America, discussing gender equity and how personal experiences in the 1980s compare to today's more discreet challenges. Julie was also open about the sacrifices she made, feeling married to her job while rising through ranks from a sales representative to a director of sales. Ultimately, she chose her personal well-being and family over her demanding role, underlining themes of work-life balance and the importance of being present for one’s family.
Through their conversation, Julie and Paul encapsulated the spirit of perseverance, adaptability, and the sheer importance of ethics and commitment in both personal and professional walks of life. They closed with thoughts on the ongoing changes in the industry, especially due to COVID-19, underscoring the need for continuous adaptability and relationship-building in the business world.
Transcript
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Carson Leno
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Fallon. Now it's
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wine talks with Paul K.
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Hey, welcome to wine talks with Paul K. And we are in the studio today
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about to have a conversation with Julie. And I always say.
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Delaquila. That too. If you say it in italian
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with the italian accent, it's different introductions.
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Hernandez. Hernandez. That's right. Oh, that would've been easier.
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Hey, listen. Have a listen to
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Chris Phelps. I just re released his episode. I completely
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forgotten about this winemaker in Napa Valley. If you're going
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up the highway 29, you make a hard left right inside
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St. Helena. Make a hard right after that, and you end up in this very
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understated tasting room where Chris Phelps and his son Josh
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make wines. And he had worked in the greatest
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places in the world to make wine and now makes wine in Napa. It's called
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ad Vivim. Incredible conversation and very philosophical
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about winemaking. Also in the studio last week was Matthew
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Borde from Chateau Lagrange Saint
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Julien, a classified growth Bordeaux. And here
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how he works in what is a very exclusive
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industry in Bordeaux, France, but for corporate
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Japan, actually for Suntory corporation. So you'll hear something very
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interesting from Matthew, but not why we're here. We're here to catch up with an
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old friend, an old, you know, I think almost
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a mentor to me. Right. Really? And,
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yes, and because of you, and I tell this story
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all the time. It's what business is
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about. And you've always said, this is
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like, I'm going to help you, and you
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never asked for help back, but we
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always wanted to help each other. We always wanted to grow each other. And I
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have to tell you, when you first came in here about 20 years ago.
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Sorry, I'm turning it off. 20. Was it 20
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years ago that you walked into actually, almost exactly where you're sitting right now?
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Yeah, probably like about maybe like 17 years ago, because
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I started in the chains and stuff like that. But, yeah, it's.
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It's been a long time. You realize, literally the studio where
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you're sitting is steps away from the day you walked in here
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with Bo and he introduced you. Yeah. You know what my
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thought was? What? You don't know? My thought was what?
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Oh, yeah. I tell you this already. I kind of heard it. But you, I
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think you were just like, oh, my gosh, who would
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emotion in here?
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I'm like, seriously? You know, wine warehouse.
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When they first came out to see me, a young girl came
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and I called the manager and said, look, you know, please don't send me somebody
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who's never done this before because I've been doing it too long, and I need,
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like, I don't want to educate anybody. That's not what I thought about
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you. But Beau had done a really good job before you
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came in, and so I was a little nervous. And what does that mean, a
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good job? You supported us. Well, it
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goes back to this. Business is all about relationships. You
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can't do anything without starting with a
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relationship. And then as you grow
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you, and, like, in that situation and
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you're bringing in somebody, you have to have that foundation and that
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platform where you've built that trust to where he could have
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brought me in through your relationship to be like, hey,
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give her a chance. Let her just come in and bring some
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wines. And. And I think our
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relationship has just been that. Like, I'm sure
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that was the impression of me, but I think
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probably our first meeting, I brought in wines, and I was just like, okay, what
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do you need? What price? Like, how many cases? Like,
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I just was straight with you, too, that I didn't know anything.
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Like, I was new and I'm just learning and, you know, so you
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teach me. Just tell me, like, what you're looking for. The price, the
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profile, all those things that as a
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salesperson, you can narrow down, you know, your
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suggestions and make it work. Not everybody's like that. I mean,
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sales is about matching what you have in your
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quiver to the customer's needs and, or creating the need in
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the customer's mind that what you have is important. So that's not
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natural for one. Salespeople have to learn that took me
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40 years to figure it out. And you were in a very,
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very large organization. And for the listeners, the
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wine and liquor business is rather
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strict or rather rigid in its format. There's not
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a lot of flexibility to run with. And then you add the layers of bureaucracy
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in corporate America, and it's even less flexible.
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And so when did you get. I don't remember having
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this conversation with you. But when did you get into working
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in this industry? Was it always corporate America? No. So
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this, like, whole industry fell out of the sky. It was.
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So what happened was, I'm in college. I actually wanted
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to act and model and do that. I went to Cal State
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Northridge. While I was there, I worked for, you know,
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quest diagnostics, the laboratory. I worked in the managed
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care department with all women, by the way. And then I also
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worked at a tanning salon. And at night I would go and I would do
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promo modeling, because at the time, you could put that on your resume that you
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were doing promo modeling. So, anyways,
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this managed care department, this department of women would literally
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just be like, hey, you go do what you need to do. Check in and
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out. So that's how I was able to get through school and get
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everything accomplished. But I knew that I needed to work my
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butt off to get whatever it was that I needed to get or
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to get where I was going. So, anyways, I would do these jobs
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at night, and this woman walks in, and she's wearing a
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black suit, and I'm probably wearing, like, my little black
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skirt, my little, like, black, you know, tequila t shirt,
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whatever brand it was, and high heels and walking
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around socializing with people, and she walks in a suit. You
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socializing with people? Shocking. So she walks
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in and she starts telling me what to do, and I'm like, so confused.
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Cause I'm like, oh, I don't know. My agency sent me here, and she's like,
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no, I'm the sales representative at this bar
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restaurant, and I booked the promotion so that you could
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help sell the brand. And I'm like, okay. I mean, it's just
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crazy how I had no idea. And, like, going
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through this business talking to people, they have no idea either, like,
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how anything gets behind the bar or why it's listed
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by the glass or by the bottle or what they're pouring you in their. Well,
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if you say, I want, like, a vodka soda, like, you don't know
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how that got there. So you were
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representing the tequila brand. That's why you're wearing the t shirt, and
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you showed up to do this bit. I'm working for the marketing company
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that the supplier. You just walk in the door like, okay, I'm here.
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So what happens is I'm like, I have this light bulb
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moment in my life. It's very clear where I'm like, why is she wearing
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that suit? And I'm wearing this outfit? It was all about the suit, really,
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that just empowered me to be like, okay, I need to go to the
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next level. So that weekend, I
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had a trade show, and I went past a
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gentleman that had, like, four six foot tables, and just, like,
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brand after brand lined up, and I went up to him, like,
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do you represent all these brands? Like, again, I have no clue. I
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have no clue just how anything is
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placed at this point. So he says yes. So I
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take down his info. Turns out it's one of the biggest distributors
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in California. And while looking
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at it, I find the other bigger competitor,
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and turns out I have an interview with both of them on
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the same day. Because you walked in and went to the booth?
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Well, no, because while researching it, I found the top
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two. So I applied it both, coincidentally, which
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I'm saying is more like a miracle. I have an interview with both
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companies. So the first interview, this kind of paints
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the picture for the future and stays with me throughout my
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entire career. It's my competitor. I go in there
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first, and it's like, in some general sales meeting room with tables
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all lined up, and it's three men in suits across
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from me, and I'm sitting by myself in a chair in front of them. Remember,
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I'm like some 22 year old girl. Like, I still have no clue, you know?
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I just know I want to get that job. Like, I want to be in
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that suit, making that money, right? So
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I just recall them, like, laughing and talking to each other
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while I was in the interview. And I just felt, like, so weird. Like, I
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don't even think they're listening to me. So I get my car, and I go
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to the next one. This is in an HR, like,
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office with a gentleman, and he sits me down. He's like, so what is it
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you want to do? And I'm like, oh, there was this girl in the bar,
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and she's wearing the suit. Like, literally went down like that. And he goes, he
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goes, you're talking about the on premise, like, restaurants, bars,
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hotels, clubs. I'm like, yeah, that was it. That sounds good. And he goes, yeah,
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you can't do that. And I'm like, oh, well, how do I get to do
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that? And he goes, you need to be in the chains for at least six
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months. I'm like, okay, well, what's that? And he's like, you gotta get up
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at. So you knew nothing? Two in the morning. You literally knew nothing. I know.
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You gotta get up at two in the morning, and you gotta stock the shelves
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and dust them. I'm like, okay, that's okay. I'll do
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that. And so he goes, hold on a second. He goes
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out, another gentleman comes in, he starts asking me questions.
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They go out again. They come back in, and they say, we like to hire
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you. So that company hired me on the spot. How did that
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feel? Like, right away? Did you expect that? And you were. I
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felt like. I feel like I've always kind of just known my
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purpose. Like, if I'm in the right moment, I just kind
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of. It's just like, right now, we're talking, like you're asking me
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questions, and we're just having a conversation.
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And I'm sure it was just like that with them, too, versus
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the other environment where it was just like, almost
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like, yeah, right. It was all makes sense. Yeah. You said that suit thing
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I want to go back to just for a second. And I worked for corporate
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America. I worked for Xerox. It was the greatest sales organization in the world at
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the time, or one of them, anyway. And one of our. My
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teammates, her husband owned a sporting goods store or worked at
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a sporting goods store, and he used to come to these events that Xerox hosted,
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and we'd all be wearing suits. And one day he pulled me aside, he
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goes, one day I'm gonna wear a suit, too. And I thought,
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you know, I didn't know any different. I just applied for the job. I got
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a job. I wore a suit. That's what you're supposed to do, I thought. But
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there was some kind of ambiance about that. There was some kind of
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aristocracy about seeing somebody in a suit for this gentleman
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that he aspired to do. That sounds like what was happening with you.
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Well, I think it goes back to a generation, too, like
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your parents, your dad being here, and
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it's a form of respect. And I,
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coming from a family that's very, you know, that's. It's important.
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So if that's the attire, that's what I'm gonna wear. You
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know, I don't. That. So that kind of
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goes into. I was immediately put in a male
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dominated business. Yeah, well, it is. There were not any females.
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I mean, it was very few females.
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Saleswomen. And then as far as leadership, there was none at that time.
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What year was that? Do you remember? So that was
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2004. Wow. It's well
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past. And I was in the corporate America in the eighties, and
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I had to apologize to every woman in my branch, all the salespeople. I
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had to apologize for. What would you do? Because I demonstrated a
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copier, and I alluded to the fact that any secretary
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could do this. And then later, I used her as the pronoun for
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secretaries, and the shit hit the fan. And I was told to
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write, and I had to stuff an apology letter in every key, every
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mail slot at the company saying, I did not mean to
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insinuate that secretaries are women and women are stupid. Yeah.
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So you're talking about 2004, and still there's nobody,
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nobody in corporate America. So maybe it's the liquor business,
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wine. Business, but the thing is, you see something right there where it's
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like every generation has the opportunity
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to make the change, and if you think about, like,
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I think about my managers. The best
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ones were the ones that had women around them,
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and the worst were the
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ones that if I raised my
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voice, I was screaming. If I made a certain face, I'm in a bad
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mood. You know what I mean? Like, never.
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I see. Yes. Yeah. So
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I feel like with what you're saying, too, like, it's important. It
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changes with each of us. And
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so did you feel like then, because of
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that role, because you saw that there was. I mean, you've been here how many
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years? I'm almost entirely staffed by women here. I
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always just work better with them. But did you feel
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like you had a task then to. I always had to prove
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myself. Cause it was always. It was always
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different, especially when you're younger. Like, I grew
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up in this business in my twenties and in my thirties,
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I didn't have my kids till I was
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36, and so
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I gave a lot to this business. And the thing is, is
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you have to give up a lot if you want to keep moving forward.
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And I remember feeling like, in my twenties,
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I was married to the job. Like, it was literally my husband. Like,
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it was just night and day and pretty much
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all the way through. COVID. Pretty much, yeah. I mean, that's why you acted
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here. So. So the chain work is probably the toughest work,
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and the chains for the listeners, I mean, you're. For the listeners. I don't understand
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that when it's what made Gallo famous is how they
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handled merchandising in these big stores. And so you were
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boots in the field. Yeah, you're in the field. You're in the field. You're fronting
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merchandise. You're basically getting up super early,
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and you're meeting all the trucks and all the pallets
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come out into the aisles, and you're just throwing
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loads. And so let's talk about that for a second.
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That was something. Again, as a female. Yeah, I'd be in
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heels because I didn't. You know, a lot of times, I would wear high heels
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to make sure I was at the same eye level as some man that
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I worked with. It was, like, a strategic thing. Like, those
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are things I think about. And so. But then you had
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to. But then I would never give an excuse, like, if I'm in heels or,
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like, someone say, like, can I help you? It's actually something that I deal
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with, like, where I don't like asking for help, because I never
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wanted to give anybody that reason to be able
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to say, like, oh, well, she this or you know, like,
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I just wanted to always be able to do it myself. Yeah. And show them
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that it could be done in three inch heels and with
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nails and. But, yeah, you were throwing cases.
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Cases. Actually, two things that I never liked.
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The hardest part of the business, carrying cases and dealing with
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people's credit. But, yeah, I mean, the cases, like, some of them are
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super heavy, depending on the glass. But you did it. You just did it. Because
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that's what they were having to. Do for the listeners. A case of wine, typical
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bottle of wine is 36 pounds, and if they decide to put it in heavy
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glass, they call it. It's around 50 pounds. So. And I remember
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carrying two cases at a time, my dad's store, but I was 16 and 18
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years old. But let's just focus really fast. Cause this is
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really interesting. But chain work, meaning
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Ralph's, whatever large, big box store there is,
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is more than just sort of handling the account and make sure the wine gets
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there, make sure the booze gets there. It's. You're sort of fighting for shelf space.
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The most famous, I think I mentioned earlier, is the Gallo brothers
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themselves would go into, like, thrifty, the
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pharmacy, and front their own stuff. Yes. And then, can
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I ask you, is that shelf space random? No,
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it's definitely not random. So we have
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surveys. They still go on today, but
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basically, the suppliers are working with Ralph's
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or whoever the chain is. The supplier being the person
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that brings the stuff to you as a distributor? Yes.
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And so that supplier is pretty much sponsoring or
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buying space on the end caps. So you have your aisles, and at
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the end, you'll have featured products. And that's all planned
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out throughout the calendar year for an x amount
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of dollars. So that's how those get
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actually placed in the grocery
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stores. So I did a show with Mike
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Houlihan and Bonnie, and they established the
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brand barefoot cellars. And they're the ones that told me the
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stories about running into Ernest Gallo, fronting merchandise, and they decided to
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copy him. But when he first came to me, and this is
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anecdotal, in 1989, he came to my office, and he
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says, we have a barefoot cellars wine. It's the
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chateau Lafitte feet of the California wine business.
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And the guy left, and I called my dad. I go, this is the dumbest
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thing I've ever heard in my life. I can't believe he's trying to do this,
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and he ends up being the biggest brand in America. So that's what I know.
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So you go through this chain part and are you dying to get out of
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it to do the next level? Yeah. I mean, it's tough because you have all
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those big wigs coming in and wanting to make sure that
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everything that they paid for is in its space,
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but that's, you know, how you grow brands. So then
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you had. I had to be in there for six months, and the
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first month I started, you know,
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applying for positions. You try to find an
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area, a territory, you know, where you're gonna have
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anywhere from 40 to, like, 120
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accounts. You usually want it to be somewhat in your
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backyard. So that took about a month, and one came
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up. And that's actually when I first met our good
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friend Melissa. Wow. Bo had a
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cherry, picked her right out of Buca de Beppo. And
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so I show up, and it's just. It's actually a funny thing
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because she wouldn't even look at me like she knew who I was. But again,
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I'm walking in like, hello, you know? That's funny.
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And so she got the job, and.
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But it was crazy. Again, another miracle,
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another position open the next month, and then Beau hired
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me that month. I didn't realize that Melissa has such
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pedigree working at Bucca de Beppo.
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Hey, she is literally, she's a hustler. She's the best
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in. She's the best in Cali, for sure.
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So Beau hires you. So you were. So
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when you came here, you were working for Beau, or you
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were. So basically, I started in the chains, and then I got
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hired on with Bo as a sales rep in the
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union for the on premise. So I had, like, burbank lunch
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restaurants where they pour stuff. Yeah. So
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it was a lot of fun because Pasadena at the time, like, it. It
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was a great time. Again, we were, Melissa and I were, like, in our twenties
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and twenties and thirties, and we just went out
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and goes back to relationships. We would
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go there, support our accounts, come through with
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whatever anybody needed the next week, and just grew the
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business. And that was a new learning curve for you. Yeah. And you're
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still, what, 10 hours a day, 12 hours a day? Oh, yeah. I mean, it's
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crazy. You're starting early in the morning because you have to plan
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out your day. What does it need to sell? Your goals, all that kind of
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stuff. Quotas. And then you're taking care of any
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unfinished business, and you're just hitting the field and just seeing as
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many people as you can, you know, throughout the day. So let's
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delineate for the listeners that understand, you know, because I think
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by design. And really no reason for the consumer to understand that. But when you
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walk into a restaurant and you're handed that wine list, that's
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not by accident. And if you order vodka on the
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rocks, like you said earlier, or something that's coming from the well, which is the.
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What they call the main pour of that store.
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But if you call a drink, you ask for something
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in particular, like Belvedere or something, then that's a different level.
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Tito's. Tito's still pumping. Tito's.
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So for the listeners,
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all that is organized by people like
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you coming in. And saying, look, and our relationship.
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Yes. So just like if
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a consumer had a relationship with an owner and they like to drink something
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specific, the owner brings it in. Right? So
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for the sales person, it's the relationship. I
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mean, that's it. I mean, that's basically the
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recipe to anyone's success in this business. But how do you build that
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relationship? Is just. Is me showing up saying,
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Paul, you're way more versed in wine
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and spirits than I am at the time that I met you. And even
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still now, and just being honest
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about who you really are and what you're capable of doing. I know
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that I might not be able to talk about it, but if you tell me
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something specific, I'll go. I'll make sure it's the right thing. I'll
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research it so I can come back and talk about features and
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benefits and then get you the price point you need. And
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then that just builds trust, you know, showing up again and again.
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You don't have to be a genius in any field as long
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as you have the passion to want to go out and
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figure it out and win and be successful and do what you. Say you're gonna
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do. Exactly. I have to say, the 35 years I did this,
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the cycle of sales reps, all the various
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suppliers, let's just take the big guys.
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It ebbed and flows. There was one time where I was doing a lot of
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business with one of your competitors, and that gentleman moved on,
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and it plummeted. It literally plummeted from, like seven,
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$800,000 a year to like, nothing. And what's sad is,
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well, and it's sad that they had the opportunity.
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They never didn't have the opportunity. It's
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just taking advantage of it, seeing how far
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we can go with something. And when you build that trust,
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that's when it gets super fun in the business, because
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that's when both parties can be super
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creative and come up with all kinds of
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ways to innovate. And to change, like, okay, well, this isn't
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selling anymore. How can we make it work and then sell
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it? So I just. That's the best part about building the
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relationship for me, was just, like, being able
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to collaborate and just get super creative and make
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fun, because we all have to move boxes. No, you're right.
394
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We both have to move boxes. So if you can't move that box for that
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reason, we need to figure out why and fix it. There was
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the success that you had here, and I want to get into
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the gender specific problems that you encountered, but
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it always seemed to me, and I, of course, don't know the
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emaciations of corporate wine and
400
00:24:32,490 --> 00:24:36,298
distilled spirits, America, but it was always obvious,
401
00:24:36,386 --> 00:24:39,626
particularly with the volume that we were buying, which was quite a bit at our
402
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peak. I mean, we were buying 8700 cases of wine at a time
403
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that it was your fearlessness
404
00:24:47,498 --> 00:24:50,926
inside the company. Yes. Like, how much work you're going to put into doing this
405
00:24:50,950 --> 00:24:54,694
for Paul and then trying to do it. And you were successful.
406
00:24:54,734 --> 00:24:58,046
I'd say 90% of the time, when I needed something from you, you'd pull it
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off. Yeah. And not knowing how high up the ranks you had to go to
408
00:25:01,638 --> 00:25:05,366
do that, it, um. That's one of the
409
00:25:05,390 --> 00:25:08,982
crazy things that I think gets you towards the end is, like,
410
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you move mountains for people because you really care.
411
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And it just. I think that's what kind of, like, it gets to
412
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be a lot, but that's what you're doing. You're literally. You have to start
413
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selling to your own company. I got to sell to the credit department
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that the order's going to release and he's going to cut a check. I have
415
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to tell the inventory person, yes. I have to line up
416
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everything, that here's a contract that he's going to take the 700
417
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cases I'm having to sell to everybody
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to get it done. And at the end of the day, it goes back to
419
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just being true to yourself and
420
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just everyone just being like, you know, you're gonna need to
421
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sell it for that price point at some point. Like, do it now. I
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00:25:54,438 --> 00:25:57,766
can't tell how many people, and they would. Wouldn't do it in previous
423
00:25:57,830 --> 00:26:01,662
deals, and then would come back a year later, nine months later, and
424
00:26:01,678 --> 00:26:04,702
say, we still have it then the wines, not the wine, wasn't any good at
425
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that point, and so they had their shot. So inside
426
00:26:08,600 --> 00:26:12,272
selling corporate America, we've got hierarchies, we've got to go up the
427
00:26:12,288 --> 00:26:15,680
ladder, we have to go to the supplier sometimes, like, paul's going to buy this
428
00:26:15,712 --> 00:26:19,232
wine, like the hess. You remember the Hess shirt tail cabernet? I mean, that was
429
00:26:19,248 --> 00:26:22,444
like incredible price, right? Because
430
00:26:23,024 --> 00:26:26,776
I'll just tell the listeners that that deal came down to
431
00:26:26,920 --> 00:26:30,688
such a substantial discount, but it was less money than the
432
00:26:30,736 --> 00:26:34,192
penalty imposed by the supplier or the winery or the group supplying the
433
00:26:34,208 --> 00:26:37,616
wine was going to fine at the end of the year because the inventory was
434
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still here. So this is like stuff that people. Well, that's one where I had
435
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:44,184
to get creative. That's one where the creative side came out.
436
00:26:44,224 --> 00:26:47,768
Cause that's a well known brand, but the brand
437
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that you had access to, not everybody else
438
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had access to because, you know, it was a
439
00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:58,744
restaurant, right? So true. That was a
440
00:26:58,784 --> 00:27:02,344
selling point for me to be able to go to them, to be like,
441
00:27:02,464 --> 00:27:05,874
how cool is this that we're gonna get this wine
442
00:27:05,954 --> 00:27:09,770
in, you know, 200 homes and they're gonna
443
00:27:09,802 --> 00:27:13,586
see the brand name and those impressions. And
444
00:27:13,610 --> 00:27:15,054
so that's what I'm selling too.
445
00:27:18,234 --> 00:27:21,954
So this is not an easy task. I mean, for a male,
446
00:27:22,034 --> 00:27:25,730
not an easy task. Like I said, I worked at corporate America. I totally
447
00:27:25,762 --> 00:27:29,466
understand the hierarchies and the outlooks. The 30 day, 60 day, 90 day
448
00:27:29,490 --> 00:27:32,802
outlooks, the brand. What are you doing with this account? I know all those conversations.
449
00:27:32,938 --> 00:27:36,754
I know them well. But you're
450
00:27:36,874 --> 00:27:40,570
one of a few women that are in the street fighting
451
00:27:40,602 --> 00:27:44,026
for this position. And you talked about earlier how it was
452
00:27:44,170 --> 00:27:47,546
married to the job. I mean, that sounds like it
453
00:27:47,570 --> 00:27:50,934
anyway. But tell me about headwinds.
454
00:27:51,234 --> 00:27:53,614
Not to say disrespect, and I don't mean,
455
00:27:54,514 --> 00:27:57,694
but that extra effort it took because you're a woman.
456
00:27:58,734 --> 00:28:02,390
Um, I definitely, it
457
00:28:02,542 --> 00:28:05,354
first starts with appearance, so
458
00:28:06,174 --> 00:28:09,726
I can't tell you how many women. It's funny,
459
00:28:09,790 --> 00:28:13,354
I, I don't, I feel like, in a way,
460
00:28:14,614 --> 00:28:18,342
as much as I want to empower women
461
00:28:18,518 --> 00:28:22,126
at the same time, I'm like, but you gotta play the
462
00:28:22,150 --> 00:28:25,806
game, okay? And especially when you're in sales.
463
00:28:25,910 --> 00:28:29,694
So for sure, when you show up and it's four men, don't
464
00:28:29,774 --> 00:28:33,478
give them limp hand shake. Like, give them a hard
465
00:28:33,526 --> 00:28:36,686
handshake, look at them in the eye and let them know you're ready to rock
466
00:28:36,710 --> 00:28:40,142
and roll. Like, that's against the grain. Do you
467
00:28:40,158 --> 00:28:43,734
think for most women, I. Don'T think
468
00:28:43,814 --> 00:28:47,558
that they think like that. Yeah. And you? I think
469
00:28:47,606 --> 00:28:50,594
it comes from being an athlete
470
00:28:51,674 --> 00:28:55,330
and being very competitive. I'm very competitive
471
00:28:55,402 --> 00:28:59,106
wanting to win, and you have to have that in
472
00:28:59,130 --> 00:29:02,378
you. No one can teach you to do that. I mean, at the end of
473
00:29:02,386 --> 00:29:05,962
the day, you're gonna either grab someone's hand and give them a
474
00:29:05,978 --> 00:29:09,754
firm handshake, or you're not males. I know men that don't do that.
475
00:29:09,834 --> 00:29:13,450
Yeah. And it's first impression for me. Side note, real
476
00:29:13,482 --> 00:29:17,106
fast, we're talking about acting. Yeah. And there's this one methodology
477
00:29:17,210 --> 00:29:20,438
called Chubbuck. And she. I've been reading her book, and it's
478
00:29:20,606 --> 00:29:24,262
exactly that. It's like you have to
479
00:29:24,318 --> 00:29:28,030
embrace that you want to win. Whatever, whatever role you're playing
480
00:29:28,142 --> 00:29:31,726
and whatever emotions you're pulling back or pulling from,
481
00:29:31,870 --> 00:29:35,678
it's basically about winning. Your objective as the actor,
482
00:29:35,726 --> 00:29:39,342
whatever your role is in this job and this overall thing, I thought when you
483
00:29:39,358 --> 00:29:42,382
said that, I go, wow, that's really what it is. It's like you. If you're
484
00:29:42,398 --> 00:29:46,050
not motivated to, it's not win. Like, you don't mean
485
00:29:46,082 --> 00:29:49,642
winning by cheating somebody else. You mean winning by
486
00:29:49,778 --> 00:29:53,434
accomplishing your goal. Well, you have to stay ahead. That's the other
487
00:29:53,474 --> 00:29:57,154
thing, too. So in a way, you have to win, especially
488
00:29:57,274 --> 00:30:01,034
if you're just getting started. You have to prove yourself, and you're going
489
00:30:01,034 --> 00:30:04,754
to have to prove yourself again and again. You're going to have to reinvent
490
00:30:04,834 --> 00:30:08,570
yourself by accepting change and growing with the
491
00:30:08,602 --> 00:30:12,270
changing times. I mean, when I first started, we were using those, like,
492
00:30:12,342 --> 00:30:16,126
brick tells on units where you, like, used the payphone that was
493
00:30:16,190 --> 00:30:19,942
all sticky and the facts, like, you'd hold it up
494
00:30:19,958 --> 00:30:23,594
to the phone, to pagers and, you know what I mean?
495
00:30:24,094 --> 00:30:27,910
Now everyone's just got their head in the computer, not building
496
00:30:27,982 --> 00:30:31,794
that relationship with the customer. So
497
00:30:32,094 --> 00:30:35,694
it has to do with you just accepting change
498
00:30:35,774 --> 00:30:38,910
and rolling with it, because in this business, it
499
00:30:38,942 --> 00:30:42,680
continues to change. It also repeats
500
00:30:42,712 --> 00:30:46,136
the past, too, and just, you know,
501
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:49,776
reinvents the wheel. But anyways,
502
00:30:49,920 --> 00:30:53,504
how long was it before. You felt like, or did you ever feel,
503
00:30:53,544 --> 00:30:57,152
like, absolutely accepted by the rank, rank and
504
00:30:57,168 --> 00:31:00,448
file and the management? So that
505
00:31:00,616 --> 00:31:04,280
goes back to what I first mentioned when we started. It goes in waves,
506
00:31:04,352 --> 00:31:08,044
because if you are working for a manager that doesn't
507
00:31:08,124 --> 00:31:11,628
accept the opinion of women or
508
00:31:11,716 --> 00:31:15,004
accept how a woman got something
509
00:31:15,124 --> 00:31:18,868
done, it's going to be a different
510
00:31:18,916 --> 00:31:22,764
experience versus a manager who
511
00:31:22,804 --> 00:31:26,596
takes a step back and says, go. Just
512
00:31:26,660 --> 00:31:30,380
go be you. Rock and roll. Let me know what you
513
00:31:30,412 --> 00:31:33,986
need, any support, anything like that. And then you got your supply
514
00:31:34,100 --> 00:31:37,790
behind you, too. I mean, you can do anything.
515
00:31:37,862 --> 00:31:41,286
So, fortunately, the last couple
516
00:31:41,430 --> 00:31:45,070
I had were like that, and it made
517
00:31:45,182 --> 00:31:48,194
it made it easier for me to retire because
518
00:31:49,414 --> 00:31:53,238
at that point, I felt like I had broken every glass ceiling I could
519
00:31:53,286 --> 00:31:56,914
break and done everything that I could do there.
520
00:31:57,254 --> 00:32:00,808
And my purpose and my time was. Was done, and it was.
521
00:32:00,936 --> 00:32:04,136
I needed to move on to taking care of the kids. I have to tell
522
00:32:04,160 --> 00:32:07,728
you, Sandra and I talk about this. My wife and I talk about this all
523
00:32:07,736 --> 00:32:11,240
the time for the listeners that when we
524
00:32:11,272 --> 00:32:14,976
retired, was the same day you retired. Oh, yeah. March 31.
525
00:32:15,080 --> 00:32:18,256
Wow. Oh, yeah. April. Mine was April 3, but yeah.
526
00:32:18,440 --> 00:32:22,184
And I say, you know, without Julie's help
527
00:32:22,224 --> 00:32:25,964
all these years, and I want to make sure I helped her
528
00:32:26,284 --> 00:32:29,900
do the things that she needed to do. We retired at the right
529
00:32:29,932 --> 00:32:33,708
time on that relationship alone because I would have had to start all over
530
00:32:33,756 --> 00:32:37,540
again with a new rep who has different motivations,
531
00:32:37,612 --> 00:32:40,740
who doesn't. Whatever it is, our relationship
532
00:32:40,932 --> 00:32:44,424
synergized, and we got a lot done together. And
533
00:32:44,844 --> 00:32:47,396
that was kind of writing on the wall when you say things happen for a
534
00:32:47,420 --> 00:32:50,664
reason. That was an important relationship that I lost.
535
00:32:50,964 --> 00:32:54,092
That would have been hard to replace, would have made my job a lot harder.
536
00:32:54,188 --> 00:32:56,932
Yeah. I have to tell you an anecdotal story. In
537
00:32:56,948 --> 00:33:00,624
1982, when I was selling copiers to
538
00:33:01,204 --> 00:33:04,948
Vernon, 82, by the way, is. A very important
539
00:33:05,036 --> 00:33:08,644
year. Why? Oh, the year I was
540
00:33:08,684 --> 00:33:12,344
born, I was gonna say. And the year started his business.
541
00:33:12,804 --> 00:33:16,620
Really? When you were talking about Phelps earlier, that was one of the first places
542
00:33:16,692 --> 00:33:20,484
we went away with when we. Together with Joseph Phelps.
543
00:33:20,564 --> 00:33:24,266
Yep. And we drank 1982. Wow. Okay. So it's all right. This
544
00:33:24,290 --> 00:33:27,482
all comes for a circle. Full circle again. There was a guy named Bill. He
545
00:33:27,498 --> 00:33:30,454
was one of my great
546
00:33:31,394 --> 00:33:35,210
relationships in my career and a very interesting business because they made
547
00:33:35,242 --> 00:33:38,834
the machines that bottle or canned seven up in coke and stuff.
548
00:33:38,954 --> 00:33:42,778
So they're the colangelist can company. And so my knowledge of
549
00:33:42,826 --> 00:33:46,330
canning wine goes back to 1982 when I used to watch these
550
00:33:46,362 --> 00:33:50,042
machines. Anyway, it was clear he did not
551
00:33:50,218 --> 00:33:53,786
appreciate women in the workforce. Obvious. And I did.
552
00:33:53,850 --> 00:33:57,546
Never asked him. Never came across the
553
00:33:57,570 --> 00:34:01,410
conversation. We'd never discussed it. But he was
554
00:34:01,522 --> 00:34:05,226
a short sleeve, polyester white button down shirt guy. And you could
555
00:34:05,250 --> 00:34:08,770
just. I knew it. And I had to call my
556
00:34:08,802 --> 00:34:11,794
boss, who was a female at the time, great
557
00:34:11,834 --> 00:34:15,306
manager. She says, I want you to call his
558
00:34:15,330 --> 00:34:18,895
boss. And, you know, going over somebody's head is not a good
559
00:34:18,919 --> 00:34:22,615
idea generally. No. I go, look. She goes, I need this
560
00:34:22,639 --> 00:34:26,135
sale. And it was a big sale. It was like a $200,000 copy. Okay.
561
00:34:26,159 --> 00:34:28,763
$200,000 copy. Yeah. Okay. That's a lot.
562
00:34:29,223 --> 00:34:32,895
1982 also. Yeah. So I call the company, and I asked for the
563
00:34:32,919 --> 00:34:36,151
president. The answer she goes, hello? And I said, this Paul from
564
00:34:36,167 --> 00:34:39,959
Xerox, blah, blah. And he goes, we're gonna buy it. Thank
565
00:34:39,991 --> 00:34:43,812
you for calling. I got a phone call immediately after from Bill saying, what
566
00:34:43,828 --> 00:34:47,012
are you doing? How can you go over my head like this? You know, that's
567
00:34:47,028 --> 00:34:50,588
the kind of manager he was. I'm reflecting on the reason, because this probably
568
00:34:50,636 --> 00:34:54,396
exists in the wine and booze business. And I knew if
569
00:34:54,420 --> 00:34:57,844
I was able to discreetly say that my
570
00:34:57,964 --> 00:35:01,732
woman manager asked me to call him, that I'd
571
00:35:01,748 --> 00:35:05,516
be off the hook. So I said, bill, I was
572
00:35:05,540 --> 00:35:09,232
talking to my manager, and she told me to call. That's all I said. And
573
00:35:09,248 --> 00:35:13,016
he goes, your boss is a woman? I go, yeah. He goes, you know,
574
00:35:13,040 --> 00:35:16,760
they shouldn't be in the workforce. And I was totally off the hook because
575
00:35:16,792 --> 00:35:20,232
of his sexism. Totally off the hook. And I
576
00:35:20,248 --> 00:35:23,704
thought, wow. But you're talking about different part of America.
577
00:35:23,824 --> 00:35:27,504
But there still is a disparity in
578
00:35:27,544 --> 00:35:31,384
corporate America in executives, particularly in the wine and liquor industry
579
00:35:31,504 --> 00:35:35,292
of executive women. Did that change at all when you were going through this?
580
00:35:35,408 --> 00:35:38,836
Um, no, it doesn't. I. I mean, I can't tell you. I've been
581
00:35:38,860 --> 00:35:42,500
in a lot of meetings where I've had men
582
00:35:42,532 --> 00:35:45,544
just not even look at me because
583
00:35:46,084 --> 00:35:49,628
they don't. Are they nuts? They don't know. Well, they just. They don't
584
00:35:49,676 --> 00:35:53,076
know. They think I'm just there, like, taking notes. Yeah.
585
00:35:53,180 --> 00:35:56,860
Um, I'd say for a lot of my meetings,
586
00:35:56,892 --> 00:35:59,820
if I am walking in with a male sales
587
00:35:59,892 --> 00:36:03,684
representative, I mean, I could be three levels higher.
588
00:36:04,024 --> 00:36:07,712
And they would assume the sales rep was the manager.
589
00:36:07,768 --> 00:36:11,216
Wow. And they would always have to correct the
590
00:36:11,240 --> 00:36:14,456
buyer to say, actually, this is, you know, she's
591
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,936
director, she's a division manager. Whatever it was at the
592
00:36:17,960 --> 00:36:21,624
time, that happened a lot. That's amazing.
593
00:36:21,664 --> 00:36:25,456
Really. Yeah. So. So let's say now
594
00:36:25,520 --> 00:36:28,684
you've done this. You. You were very successful.
595
00:36:29,584 --> 00:36:32,604
You were put in charge of some rather important,
596
00:36:34,024 --> 00:36:37,864
what they call allocations for the listener. If there's only so much available
597
00:36:37,944 --> 00:36:40,644
to the whole country, then each market
598
00:36:41,384 --> 00:36:44,944
area gets so many bottles of whatever it is, whether it's bourbon
599
00:36:44,984 --> 00:36:48,736
or wine or whatever. And you became in
600
00:36:48,760 --> 00:36:51,824
charge of some of this high level allocations?
601
00:36:51,944 --> 00:36:54,704
Yes. Was that a promotion at that point?
602
00:36:56,124 --> 00:36:59,356
Nobody else wanted to do it? Yeah, it's definitely a job
603
00:36:59,420 --> 00:37:02,940
everybody wants because, I mean, you have
604
00:37:03,012 --> 00:37:06,564
access to the best of the best, and they
605
00:37:06,604 --> 00:37:09,584
are extremely limited. And
606
00:37:10,404 --> 00:37:13,540
I think COVID changed a lot of it.
607
00:37:13,732 --> 00:37:16,940
But, yeah, there were bottles that
608
00:37:17,132 --> 00:37:20,724
sometimes I would get, like, three bottles for all of Southern
609
00:37:20,764 --> 00:37:23,384
California or my region,
610
00:37:24,404 --> 00:37:27,964
and I'd have to allocate them out to the right
611
00:37:28,084 --> 00:37:31,380
buyers. And it was tough. So tough. It's really tough.
612
00:37:31,532 --> 00:37:35,292
But was that a promotion inside the company or just added to your job?
613
00:37:35,428 --> 00:37:39,028
Okay, so I went from on premise sales
614
00:37:39,076 --> 00:37:42,876
representative. Then I became a key account manager, and then I became a
615
00:37:42,900 --> 00:37:46,412
division manager, and then COVID hit,
616
00:37:46,508 --> 00:37:50,140
and I became a
617
00:37:50,172 --> 00:37:53,548
director of sales. That's where that job became.
618
00:37:53,636 --> 00:37:57,420
Yeah. So when did you say
619
00:37:57,452 --> 00:38:01,004
you had. How old are your kids now? Four years? They're seven. They're seven?
620
00:38:01,084 --> 00:38:04,916
Yeah. Wow. Triplets. So when did
621
00:38:04,940 --> 00:38:08,504
it hit you that, wait a minute,
622
00:38:09,524 --> 00:38:13,276
I can't do it all having. Well, the triplets, which is, you know,
623
00:38:13,300 --> 00:38:16,884
not easy for anybody, let alone a full time mom. But you weren't a full
624
00:38:16,924 --> 00:38:20,624
time mom. You were working in the streets. This is a very demanding job. Still
625
00:38:21,364 --> 00:38:24,860
district manager. When did you start thinking, well,
626
00:38:24,892 --> 00:38:28,492
it's in that business. You're out late
627
00:38:28,628 --> 00:38:31,984
all the time. You're doing several dinners a week.
628
00:38:33,284 --> 00:38:36,884
You're playing golf a lot, which is awesome.
629
00:38:36,964 --> 00:38:40,812
It's fun. But when you're out, everyone
630
00:38:40,868 --> 00:38:44,532
knows it slows you down. You can't do what you could do if you were
631
00:38:44,548 --> 00:38:48,172
in the office or out in the field. So there's a lot of
632
00:38:48,188 --> 00:38:51,644
trips away, a lot of nights staying in other
633
00:38:51,684 --> 00:38:55,132
counties, for example, lots of
634
00:38:55,228 --> 00:38:58,304
alcohol, amazing food.
635
00:38:59,524 --> 00:39:03,356
There's a lot of perks and stuff. But you're away, and you're not
636
00:39:03,460 --> 00:39:07,138
present with your family or with what
637
00:39:07,186 --> 00:39:10,746
maybe yourself, you know, and taking care of yourself.
638
00:39:10,930 --> 00:39:14,574
And I think what happened was
639
00:39:15,074 --> 00:39:17,774
I got into that director position,
640
00:39:18,274 --> 00:39:21,946
and I saw that there was nowhere else to
641
00:39:21,970 --> 00:39:25,722
go. And it's funny, like, when you want
642
00:39:25,738 --> 00:39:29,362
to work on your career and you want to continue growing and making more money
643
00:39:29,418 --> 00:39:33,060
and climbing that ladder, it really is like a
644
00:39:33,092 --> 00:39:36,812
chess game. You have to think a couple steps
645
00:39:36,908 --> 00:39:40,364
ahead. And what happens if this person goes here
646
00:39:40,444 --> 00:39:44,140
or this happens or they realign this division
647
00:39:44,252 --> 00:39:48,036
or take away these positions? So
648
00:39:48,060 --> 00:39:51,732
it's just a lot of thinking ahead and planning, but
649
00:39:51,868 --> 00:39:54,464
I feel like every move I made
650
00:39:55,164 --> 00:39:58,484
was done for a certain reason at the right
651
00:39:58,524 --> 00:40:01,584
time. And when COVID hit, they furloughed
652
00:40:01,624 --> 00:40:05,080
everybody, so there was just a few of us left.
653
00:40:05,192 --> 00:40:09,024
And I never worked so hard in my life when I thought I had
654
00:40:09,064 --> 00:40:12,560
already worked so hard. Like, I feel like I'd already,
655
00:40:12,712 --> 00:40:16,096
you know, even when I was pregnant with the triplets, like, I won
656
00:40:16,240 --> 00:40:19,124
manager of the year that year, and,
657
00:40:19,744 --> 00:40:23,560
like, so I felt like I just done everything I
658
00:40:23,592 --> 00:40:27,292
could, and that business everything shut down.
659
00:40:27,348 --> 00:40:31,140
Like, LA is still recovering from it. If you drive down there, they're
660
00:40:31,172 --> 00:40:33,584
still boarded off. And
661
00:40:34,404 --> 00:40:37,964
so going through that was hard because it
662
00:40:38,004 --> 00:40:41,580
was from basically 06:00 a.m. To about 02:00 a.m. No
663
00:40:41,612 --> 00:40:45,436
joke. Because it was dealing with people's credit and trying to get
664
00:40:45,460 --> 00:40:49,236
them up and running again because they had been closed, they hadn't had
665
00:40:49,260 --> 00:40:53,024
a liquor order since St. Patrick's Day.
666
00:40:53,644 --> 00:40:57,412
So it was just a crazy time. And then I
667
00:40:57,428 --> 00:41:01,004
had a dinner one night with a female executive,
668
00:41:01,124 --> 00:41:04,508
very few, but this one runs quite a few
669
00:41:04,556 --> 00:41:07,932
states. And I just, I was
670
00:41:07,988 --> 00:41:11,764
overhearing her talk about her kids, and I said, oh, you have two kids? Yes.
671
00:41:11,884 --> 00:41:15,612
Oh, who's taking care of the kids? Oh, my husband. Oh,
672
00:41:15,668 --> 00:41:19,458
okay. Does he stay at home? Yeah, he stays at home. So I'm just like,
673
00:41:19,506 --> 00:41:23,294
putting this all together and, you know, they say, like,
674
00:41:24,314 --> 00:41:27,134
I don't think you can have it all
675
00:41:28,154 --> 00:41:31,970
because you can't give everything
676
00:41:32,082 --> 00:41:35,666
100% of yourself. Like, you can't be present for
677
00:41:35,730 --> 00:41:38,978
everything. It's like the same as they say. Multitasking really isn't, like,
678
00:41:39,106 --> 00:41:42,866
efficient. I'm a multitasker. But they
679
00:41:42,890 --> 00:41:46,272
say it's really not efficient because you're not giving that one thing
680
00:41:46,458 --> 00:41:49,304
everything and you're not just finishing it. So
681
00:41:50,444 --> 00:41:54,036
I wanted to be more present
682
00:41:54,220 --> 00:41:57,612
because if it's not your significant
683
00:41:57,748 --> 00:42:01,388
other doing it for you at home, it's
684
00:42:01,436 --> 00:42:05,036
somebody else and it's not you. Your husband
685
00:42:05,060 --> 00:42:08,756
is a thriving electrical business. He's not
686
00:42:08,780 --> 00:42:12,476
home. Very successful business. He's hardest worker
687
00:42:12,500 --> 00:42:16,340
I know. He's out of the house by 415 to meet a load,
688
00:42:16,412 --> 00:42:19,740
and he comes home at 630 for dinner. And it's
689
00:42:19,772 --> 00:42:23,492
just, that's how we, we were. We're just like, so
690
00:42:23,508 --> 00:42:27,212
you're both doing this crazy machine where I have a
691
00:42:27,228 --> 00:42:30,024
nanny, and then it's like I have to hire someone to
692
00:42:30,444 --> 00:42:33,980
overlay, like, because I can't fit 8 hours
693
00:42:34,052 --> 00:42:37,900
in that business and do an eight hour work day. Was that gnawing
694
00:42:37,932 --> 00:42:41,388
on you for a while until you had this conversation or you just kind of
695
00:42:41,436 --> 00:42:44,900
woke up to it? No, this is something I had actually been
696
00:42:44,932 --> 00:42:48,762
asking, you know, for years. And you kind of. You have to wait for
697
00:42:48,778 --> 00:42:52,574
the right moment for your family too, you know, for it to make sense
698
00:42:53,114 --> 00:42:56,866
for the family to do that, to
699
00:42:57,050 --> 00:43:00,014
step away from a very
700
00:43:01,114 --> 00:43:04,426
great position. Well, there's obviously
701
00:43:04,450 --> 00:43:08,066
the salary and the work that's obviously
702
00:43:08,210 --> 00:43:11,850
counts. You're eating at the best places, you're drinking the
703
00:43:11,882 --> 00:43:15,470
best stuff, you know, private
704
00:43:15,542 --> 00:43:19,190
dinners all the time, golfing of the best courses. I mean,
705
00:43:19,222 --> 00:43:22,354
it's. It's. It's amazing, but it just.
706
00:43:22,894 --> 00:43:26,742
It became where I just wasn't present, and that's what I wanted to
707
00:43:26,758 --> 00:43:30,566
do. And I wonder, and I also felt that I had another purpose like
708
00:43:30,590 --> 00:43:34,114
this. I had done everything I could. Yeah,
709
00:43:34,454 --> 00:43:38,206
that's a pretty serious revelation. Mm hmm. To
710
00:43:38,230 --> 00:43:41,700
try reflect on that. And, you know, we only have one pass through here,
711
00:43:41,732 --> 00:43:45,388
so you want to maximize that value. And I was thinking that
712
00:43:45,556 --> 00:43:48,068
I had a winemaker. Tell me once, man, I eat the best food, I go
713
00:43:48,076 --> 00:43:51,812
to the best places, I drink the best wines, I meet
714
00:43:51,828 --> 00:43:55,284
the most amazing people. But his comment was, I don't make a lot of money
715
00:43:55,324 --> 00:43:58,980
doing this. And, you know, even me having done
716
00:43:59,012 --> 00:44:02,076
all this, and now we're starting to travel and get around and try to use
717
00:44:02,100 --> 00:44:05,708
some of the relationships, I still feel like I want
718
00:44:05,716 --> 00:44:09,442
to be home sometimes. Like. Like I want to
719
00:44:09,458 --> 00:44:11,978
lever. We're going to Bordeaux, and I'm going to see all these great people that
720
00:44:11,986 --> 00:44:14,322
I've interviewed on the show, and we're going to have so much fun together. But
721
00:44:14,338 --> 00:44:17,938
I'm also sort of thinking, I can't wait to get home when that's done. And
722
00:44:17,946 --> 00:44:21,658
I'm wondering if even a single person, even if you weren't married,
723
00:44:21,706 --> 00:44:24,802
even I wasn't married and we were doing that, we'd probably still burn out a
724
00:44:24,818 --> 00:44:28,154
little bit. Yeah. I mean, think about this. How often do you go
725
00:44:28,194 --> 00:44:31,874
and do you really just, like, stop for a second and go
726
00:44:31,914 --> 00:44:35,626
walk in the vineyard by yourself? No, like, when's the last time you've done
727
00:44:35,650 --> 00:44:39,322
that? Yeah. Right. And if you think about it, every time you go visit
728
00:44:39,378 --> 00:44:42,938
one of those awesome wineries and you're hearing about the history
729
00:44:43,026 --> 00:44:46,202
and the views, like, I can see napa in my head right now is what
730
00:44:46,218 --> 00:44:50,010
I can see. I see a liquor store.
731
00:44:50,122 --> 00:44:53,610
Yeah, but you should be doing that. You know what I mean? It's like stopping
732
00:44:53,642 --> 00:44:57,466
and smelling the roses. Like, it just has become too
733
00:44:57,530 --> 00:45:01,342
fast paced. Like, a text isn't a text. An
734
00:45:01,358 --> 00:45:04,286
email is not an email. It's like, you better be looking at all of it.
735
00:45:04,430 --> 00:45:07,750
Twenty four seven. And, you know, especially in that business, there's no
736
00:45:07,782 --> 00:45:11,278
boundaries. No, because some places. No time
737
00:45:11,326 --> 00:45:14,926
borders. No. Some close at 02:00 a.m., hey, there's some out there that close at
738
00:45:14,950 --> 00:45:18,646
04:00 a.m. And then guess what? They open at 06:00 a.m. So restaurant
739
00:45:18,670 --> 00:45:22,326
tours aren't exactly the nicest people when it comes to respect of your
740
00:45:22,470 --> 00:45:26,126
time and your family. If, you know, for the listeners. I wanted to just touch
741
00:45:26,150 --> 00:45:29,806
on the COVID side. What happened in the La market all over the country
742
00:45:29,950 --> 00:45:33,598
is that most businesses, if you and I were going to start a
743
00:45:33,606 --> 00:45:37,046
winery, we would want to be in a restaurant because it's a house pour or
744
00:45:37,070 --> 00:45:40,566
it's on a list. It's like an annuity. People buy the glass
745
00:45:40,710 --> 00:45:44,430
volume. Yeah, it's volume. Right. And when the COVID shut
746
00:45:44,462 --> 00:45:47,354
down all the restaurants, then 80% of the businesses,
747
00:45:48,094 --> 00:45:51,894
suppliers, I mean, I think your competitor put like 200
748
00:45:51,934 --> 00:45:55,782
people on the street or something. Ridiculous. Yeah. So. But
749
00:45:55,798 --> 00:45:59,512
it didn't matter because there was nothing we could do. And
750
00:45:59,528 --> 00:46:02,324
then it turned into to go business and
751
00:46:03,544 --> 00:46:07,352
packaging, you know, wine and spirits coming out and in different
752
00:46:07,408 --> 00:46:11,088
packaging. And now look at the. Look at the shelves in the grocery store now.
753
00:46:11,136 --> 00:46:14,200
I know. And they always say the on premise builds
754
00:46:14,232 --> 00:46:17,672
brands. You know, we talked about that a lot. Like in this business
755
00:46:17,728 --> 00:46:21,552
and it's true. There's an entire aisle now of
756
00:46:21,608 --> 00:46:25,054
canned wines, spirits, pouches,
757
00:46:25,474 --> 00:46:28,842
all kinds of things like that. You know, you were very funny during this process
758
00:46:28,978 --> 00:46:32,802
and you were self admittedly, and you probably would do it today,
759
00:46:32,858 --> 00:46:36,650
but I would try to teach you something about
760
00:46:36,682 --> 00:46:39,494
wine and you'd go one. Ear, not the other.
761
00:46:41,074 --> 00:46:43,574
Except for when you talked about like your family
762
00:46:44,394 --> 00:46:47,854
and I love those stories. You would go,
763
00:46:48,154 --> 00:46:51,666
okay, so how can I make this deal happen? Yeah, can we just get to
764
00:46:51,770 --> 00:46:55,616
how many cases and what's the bottle cost? I need to get to. And
765
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:59,360
does it have to be Stelvin or quark? All the rest of the stuff is
766
00:46:59,392 --> 00:47:03,016
going on. So are you happy that you did this? Yeah, I'm
767
00:47:03,040 --> 00:47:06,888
very happy. It's taken a few
768
00:47:06,976 --> 00:47:10,824
months to kind of find myself and get back to
769
00:47:10,864 --> 00:47:13,324
just like breathing again.
770
00:47:14,424 --> 00:47:18,200
You mentioned that your kids. And I'm with you on that.
771
00:47:18,232 --> 00:47:21,860
I'm still struggling. I still can't like shut down. I still
772
00:47:21,892 --> 00:47:25,612
can't believe I don't have to be somewhere for something. Yes, a
773
00:47:25,628 --> 00:47:29,444
lot of that. But you said your kids didn't trust you when you got home.
774
00:47:29,564 --> 00:47:33,284
Oh, wow. You remembered that? Yeah, I'm actually still
775
00:47:33,324 --> 00:47:36,988
dealing with that. Really? And I think it has to do with just again,
776
00:47:37,076 --> 00:47:40,484
you're not fully there, you're not present. You have
777
00:47:40,644 --> 00:47:44,180
a team of people that you trust and that you've
778
00:47:44,372 --> 00:47:48,100
overly communicated as much as you can and shown them as
779
00:47:48,132 --> 00:47:51,272
much as you can. But at the end of the day, it's not you. And,
780
00:47:51,328 --> 00:47:54,168
you know, there's a lot of times where it's like, oh yeah, I'll try to
781
00:47:54,176 --> 00:47:57,472
be home at your 830. Like I want to rush it. And I'm sitting there
782
00:47:57,648 --> 00:48:01,120
with owners of brands that have just flown in
783
00:48:01,312 --> 00:48:05,048
and now they're, you know, their head of PR from New York is here
784
00:48:05,096 --> 00:48:08,768
and I'm sitting right next to them and it's now going to be midnight. How
785
00:48:08,816 --> 00:48:12,176
you did that? How did you justify, like, you're sitting with this guy and I
786
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:16,000
know exactly what you're talking about and you're
787
00:48:16,112 --> 00:48:19,096
chomping at the big cause, you know, that the kids are doing whatever Frank's doing,
788
00:48:19,120 --> 00:48:22,282
whatever. How did you justify at that moment? Did you just go, I just gotta
789
00:48:22,298 --> 00:48:25,778
get through this? Well, that's where the trust is
790
00:48:25,866 --> 00:48:29,458
lost because I know that I have a support
791
00:48:29,546 --> 00:48:33,362
team that's gonna, you know, get him into bed and read him
792
00:48:33,378 --> 00:48:37,174
a book and do all the things that I wanted to do.
793
00:48:37,474 --> 00:48:41,094
So I was able, you know, to do that. Frank
794
00:48:42,394 --> 00:48:46,014
always supported me that way to make sure that I could keep working
795
00:48:46,524 --> 00:48:50,220
and stay focused. But I was thinking about it the whole time because,
796
00:48:50,412 --> 00:48:53,436
you know, I probably did say I was going to be home at nine and
797
00:48:53,540 --> 00:48:56,796
next thing you know, he's asleep and I'm walking in. 1130.
798
00:48:56,860 --> 00:49:00,580
Yeah. That cause friction? Oh, yeah. I think
799
00:49:00,612 --> 00:49:04,084
it causes, I mean, it. Would in any marriage. I'm just
800
00:49:04,124 --> 00:49:07,860
wondering. Oh yeah. I mean, think about it. I'm sure the
801
00:49:07,892 --> 00:49:11,108
women are always thinking like, what is my husband going out to do right now?
802
00:49:11,116 --> 00:49:14,908
He's at another bar, he's drinking. Oh, great. At St. Patrick's Day or
803
00:49:14,916 --> 00:49:18,692
it's Cinco de Mayo or whatever it is. And next thing you know,
804
00:49:18,708 --> 00:49:22,100
he has to stay at a hotel. What is he really doing? I mean, you
805
00:49:22,132 --> 00:49:25,784
have to have a solid foundation and,
806
00:49:27,244 --> 00:49:30,344
you know, and just trust your partner.
807
00:49:31,364 --> 00:49:34,916
But it is crazy because, I mean, let's be real. You're in
808
00:49:34,940 --> 00:49:38,740
bars, you're on alcohol. It's, the temptations
809
00:49:38,812 --> 00:49:42,040
are huge. In the eighties, in corporate America was
810
00:49:42,072 --> 00:49:45,560
drugs. I mean, in the halls of the greatest
811
00:49:45,592 --> 00:49:49,136
corporations, drugs. And there was so much infidelity and
812
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:53,016
alcoholism at that time, which probably isn't all that different now. It's just more
813
00:49:53,040 --> 00:49:56,872
discreet. But I can't imagine when you add to
814
00:49:56,888 --> 00:50:00,704
it that the product being sold is, you know,
815
00:50:00,744 --> 00:50:03,804
dependent, mind altering. Yeah. Depends on this, right?
816
00:50:05,104 --> 00:50:08,468
Yes. In order for it to be successful. Yep.
817
00:50:08,636 --> 00:50:12,436
Well, okay. So I will say, though, what I
818
00:50:12,500 --> 00:50:16,224
loved about being a woman in this industry
819
00:50:16,844 --> 00:50:20,284
is once you do prove yourself right, that you can
820
00:50:20,324 --> 00:50:24,044
play with them, that anything they do, you can do better.
821
00:50:24,084 --> 00:50:27,052
I used to say that all the time. Like, anything they do, I can do
822
00:50:27,068 --> 00:50:30,404
better. I can be cliched, but we're gonna do that. But
823
00:50:30,444 --> 00:50:33,244
basically, like, it got to a point where,
824
00:50:34,104 --> 00:50:37,284
respectfully, like, they became brothers.
825
00:50:37,784 --> 00:50:41,616
So I also think that's part of how I was able to
826
00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:45,272
do it for so long, you know, married with. With
827
00:50:45,328 --> 00:50:48,800
little ones, is that I was on a team.
828
00:50:48,992 --> 00:50:52,456
You know, it was like being on a baseball team. Like, those were my
829
00:50:52,520 --> 00:50:55,364
teammates, and they protected me, and
830
00:50:56,304 --> 00:51:00,044
I always felt, you know, safe. So,
831
00:51:00,344 --> 00:51:03,640
you know, there's a double edged sword to this, a little bit. Looking at this
832
00:51:03,672 --> 00:51:07,112
picture over your shoulder of my dad. Oh, yeah, I love that. And I remember
833
00:51:07,168 --> 00:51:10,512
this well. I remember the day he took the picture. I'm like, what are you
834
00:51:10,528 --> 00:51:14,084
doing? Why are you doing this? And thank God he did. But
835
00:51:14,864 --> 00:51:18,672
I was about to do a monologue to test my acting skills, just so you
836
00:51:18,688 --> 00:51:22,524
know. Yeah. And the stories are going to be just snippet stories of my father,
837
00:51:23,694 --> 00:51:26,714
because I think what you taught your children,
838
00:51:27,254 --> 00:51:30,974
even though you're at a crossroads now and you're back
839
00:51:31,014 --> 00:51:34,554
home and the kids are learning that I have a mother here all the time,
840
00:51:35,694 --> 00:51:39,278
they also saw an amazing work ethic. Yes.
841
00:51:39,406 --> 00:51:42,914
And I think there's value to that, even though you can't tell today.
842
00:51:43,574 --> 00:51:46,774
I see it actually already. You do? I do. My
843
00:51:46,854 --> 00:51:50,234
son Vincent, he's very much like Frank
844
00:51:50,974 --> 00:51:54,750
out with. He's helping him every Saturday. He gets in his
845
00:51:54,782 --> 00:51:58,558
precision electric uniform, and so does Frankie now, too.
846
00:51:58,606 --> 00:52:02,406
And Frankie's been working, just modeling, and we're
847
00:52:02,430 --> 00:52:05,958
going to get into acting, hopefully. And he knows
848
00:52:06,006 --> 00:52:08,702
that if I do this job, I'm going to make money, and it can go
849
00:52:08,718 --> 00:52:12,518
into my savings account and I'm going to buy a car later, that's
850
00:52:12,646 --> 00:52:16,314
how he's talking about it. That's great lessons. And Francesca, she's
851
00:52:16,694 --> 00:52:20,390
so brave and strong, and I see her
852
00:52:20,422 --> 00:52:24,086
with her brothers, and, like, I. I see myself in it now. I just gotta
853
00:52:24,110 --> 00:52:27,470
be, like, not so quick to
854
00:52:27,502 --> 00:52:31,118
get angry or snappy, because I see you're getting a little bossy, like
855
00:52:31,166 --> 00:52:33,874
me, but that takes years of, like,
856
00:52:34,254 --> 00:52:38,030
learning, you know, how to finesse that and make
857
00:52:38,062 --> 00:52:41,614
it work to your advantage. But they see two parents that are working hard,
858
00:52:41,654 --> 00:52:45,324
and I don't think there's any greater lesson than that for
859
00:52:45,404 --> 00:52:49,148
particularly in today's generations that are growing up digitally
860
00:52:49,196 --> 00:52:53,036
with information at their fingertips and services at
861
00:52:53,060 --> 00:52:56,064
their fingertips that we never had, you know, and
862
00:52:56,844 --> 00:53:00,308
for them to have a work ethic, because that's what's gonna
863
00:53:00,436 --> 00:53:04,244
prevail when it's all said and done. Like, my kids are very
864
00:53:04,284 --> 00:53:07,796
hard working. They're millennials. They act like it. They're pain in the
865
00:53:07,820 --> 00:53:11,602
ass. But it's from you, and it's from your parents. Right.
866
00:53:11,738 --> 00:53:15,378
And Sandra and her parents, just like it is my
867
00:53:15,426 --> 00:53:19,242
parents and my grandparents who are still alive. My grandma's 89 and my
868
00:53:19,258 --> 00:53:22,834
grandfather's 90. And I
869
00:53:22,954 --> 00:53:26,770
saw how hard they work, and I saw how hard my parents worked
870
00:53:26,882 --> 00:53:30,586
and struggled at times in the beginning. And I
871
00:53:30,610 --> 00:53:34,274
learned at a very young age that if you wanted something, you had to work
872
00:53:34,314 --> 00:53:38,106
for it. And so with the kids now, it's hard because they are
873
00:53:38,130 --> 00:53:41,770
so. They're privileged. I mean, they have everything at their
874
00:53:41,802 --> 00:53:45,410
fingertips, and it's. I'm working on right now,
875
00:53:45,442 --> 00:53:49,050
just teaching them that, you know, it's not so
876
00:53:49,082 --> 00:53:52,698
easy for everybody. No. And you have to work hard and.
877
00:53:52,826 --> 00:53:56,254
And respect the things that you have and be grateful
878
00:53:56,594 --> 00:54:00,282
for everything that you have, you know, gratitude. Even
879
00:54:00,338 --> 00:54:03,410
better lesson. Yeah. And so
880
00:54:03,602 --> 00:54:05,614
triplets. Yes. I mean.
881
00:54:08,354 --> 00:54:10,094
That'S a whole nother story.
882
00:54:12,314 --> 00:54:15,946
That's. Yeah. It's really, really
883
00:54:16,050 --> 00:54:19,586
exciting to watch. I've been very honored to be part
884
00:54:19,610 --> 00:54:23,362
of your career. Oh, thank you. And watch. And you
885
00:54:23,378 --> 00:54:25,854
always had ideas. We're almost on an hour already.
886
00:54:26,914 --> 00:54:30,570
But you always came up with new ideas. You're the person you gotta
887
00:54:30,602 --> 00:54:34,304
call this. Person to take care of. I'm like, Julie, I got, you know. No,
888
00:54:34,424 --> 00:54:37,968
but you gotta call her. She's. Any think tanks out there,
889
00:54:38,056 --> 00:54:41,864
give me a call. I will solve that problem for
890
00:54:41,904 --> 00:54:45,672
you. There is a wine think tank called Adoni Global. It's out of
891
00:54:45,688 --> 00:54:49,168
France, in London, and they think
892
00:54:49,216 --> 00:54:52,696
tank through the industry of fine wine, wines
893
00:54:52,760 --> 00:54:56,584
of caliber, that, you know, the history. Not the history,
894
00:54:56,624 --> 00:54:59,944
but the future of it, because consumerism has changed so
895
00:54:59,984 --> 00:55:03,682
much. And you got out at the right time. Yeah, you
896
00:55:03,698 --> 00:55:06,762
really did. And I feel. I feel extraordinarily
897
00:55:06,818 --> 00:55:10,546
fortunate to have gotten out with a deal like this.
898
00:55:10,570 --> 00:55:14,186
So. Yeah, no, it's very exciting. I'm happy for you. And,
899
00:55:14,290 --> 00:55:17,014
yeah, you're lucky that after. What was it,
900
00:55:17,794 --> 00:55:21,506
day after Christmas? The Stanley cup. Did you see all the, like, feed where
901
00:55:21,530 --> 00:55:25,314
the kids were getting Stanley cups for Christmas? It
902
00:55:25,314 --> 00:55:29,052
was like the hot gift. I would
903
00:55:29,068 --> 00:55:32,676
have been in here that Monday going, all right, we're going to put together a
904
00:55:32,700 --> 00:55:34,784
pouch that fits in the Stanley cup.
905
00:55:38,004 --> 00:55:41,580
So thank goodness, thank goodness, thank goodness.
906
00:55:41,692 --> 00:55:45,100
It's really, really great to see you. It's really great to hear the stories. And
907
00:55:45,172 --> 00:55:48,924
I think we have more to talk about. Maybe in the future as
908
00:55:49,084 --> 00:55:52,636
things settle. Down home and we have dinner together coming up
909
00:55:52,660 --> 00:55:56,396
sometime. Who knows when that is? Yes, we need to do that. And
910
00:55:56,420 --> 00:55:59,900
just thanks for coming in. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Cheers.
911
00:56:00,012 --> 00:56:00,744
Cheers.
912
00:56:09,564 --> 00:56:12,900
Thank you for listening to wine talks with Paul Callum, Cary. And don't forget to
913
00:56:12,932 --> 00:56:16,084
subscribe because there's more great interviews on their way.
914
00:56:16,244 --> 00:56:19,564
Folks, have a great time out there in the wine world. Cheers.
00:00:00,400 --> 00:00:02,674
Carson Leno
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Fallon. Now it's
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wine talks with Paul K.
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Hey, welcome to wine talks with Paul K. And we are in the studio today
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about to have a conversation with Julie. And I always say.
6
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Delaquila. That too. If you say it in italian
7
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with the italian accent, it's different introductions.
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Hernandez. Hernandez. That's right. Oh, that would've been easier.
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Hey, listen. Have a listen to
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Chris Phelps. I just re released his episode. I completely
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forgotten about this winemaker in Napa Valley. If you're going
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up the highway 29, you make a hard left right inside
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St. Helena. Make a hard right after that, and you end up in this very
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understated tasting room where Chris Phelps and his son Josh
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make wines. And he had worked in the greatest
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places in the world to make wine and now makes wine in Napa. It's called
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ad Vivim. Incredible conversation and very philosophical
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about winemaking. Also in the studio last week was Matthew
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Borde from Chateau Lagrange Saint
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Julien, a classified growth Bordeaux. And here
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how he works in what is a very exclusive
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industry in Bordeaux, France, but for corporate
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Japan, actually for Suntory corporation. So you'll hear something very
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interesting from Matthew, but not why we're here. We're here to catch up with an
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old friend, an old, you know, I think almost
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a mentor to me. Right. Really? And,
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yes, and because of you, and I tell this story
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all the time. It's what business is
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about. And you've always said, this is
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like, I'm going to help you, and you
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never asked for help back, but we
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always wanted to help each other. We always wanted to grow each other. And I
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have to tell you, when you first came in here about 20 years ago.
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Sorry, I'm turning it off. 20. Was it 20
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years ago that you walked into actually, almost exactly where you're sitting right now?
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Yeah, probably like about maybe like 17 years ago, because
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I started in the chains and stuff like that. But, yeah, it's.
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It's been a long time. You realize, literally the studio where
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you're sitting is steps away from the day you walked in here
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with Bo and he introduced you. Yeah. You know what my
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thought was? What? You don't know? My thought was what?
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Oh, yeah. I tell you this already. I kind of heard it. But you, I
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think you were just like, oh, my gosh, who would
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emotion in here?
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I'm like, seriously? You know, wine warehouse.
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When they first came out to see me, a young girl came
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and I called the manager and said, look, you know, please don't send me somebody
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who's never done this before because I've been doing it too long, and I need,
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like, I don't want to educate anybody. That's not what I thought about
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you. But Beau had done a really good job before you
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came in, and so I was a little nervous. And what does that mean, a
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good job? You supported us. Well, it
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goes back to this. Business is all about relationships. You
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can't do anything without starting with a
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relationship. And then as you grow
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you, and, like, in that situation and
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you're bringing in somebody, you have to have that foundation and that
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platform where you've built that trust to where he could have
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brought me in through your relationship to be like, hey,
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give her a chance. Let her just come in and bring some
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wines. And. And I think our
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relationship has just been that. Like, I'm sure
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that was the impression of me, but I think
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probably our first meeting, I brought in wines, and I was just like, okay, what
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do you need? What price? Like, how many cases? Like,
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I just was straight with you, too, that I didn't know anything.
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Like, I was new and I'm just learning and, you know, so you
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teach me. Just tell me, like, what you're looking for. The price, the
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profile, all those things that as a
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salesperson, you can narrow down, you know, your
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suggestions and make it work. Not everybody's like that. I mean,
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sales is about matching what you have in your
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quiver to the customer's needs and, or creating the need in
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the customer's mind that what you have is important. So that's not
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natural for one. Salespeople have to learn that took me
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40 years to figure it out. And you were in a very,
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very large organization. And for the listeners, the
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wine and liquor business is rather
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strict or rather rigid in its format. There's not
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a lot of flexibility to run with. And then you add the layers of bureaucracy
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in corporate America, and it's even less flexible.
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And so when did you get. I don't remember having
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this conversation with you. But when did you get into working
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in this industry? Was it always corporate America? No. So
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this, like, whole industry fell out of the sky. It was.
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So what happened was, I'm in college. I actually wanted
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to act and model and do that. I went to Cal State
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Northridge. While I was there, I worked for, you know,
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quest diagnostics, the laboratory. I worked in the managed
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care department with all women, by the way. And then I also
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worked at a tanning salon. And at night I would go and I would do
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promo modeling, because at the time, you could put that on your resume that you
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were doing promo modeling. So, anyways,
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this managed care department, this department of women would literally
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just be like, hey, you go do what you need to do. Check in and
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out. So that's how I was able to get through school and get
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everything accomplished. But I knew that I needed to work my
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butt off to get whatever it was that I needed to get or
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to get where I was going. So, anyways, I would do these jobs
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at night, and this woman walks in, and she's wearing a
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black suit, and I'm probably wearing, like, my little black
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skirt, my little, like, black, you know, tequila t shirt,
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whatever brand it was, and high heels and walking
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around socializing with people, and she walks in a suit. You
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socializing with people? Shocking. So she walks
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in and she starts telling me what to do, and I'm like, so confused.
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Cause I'm like, oh, I don't know. My agency sent me here, and she's like,
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no, I'm the sales representative at this bar
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restaurant, and I booked the promotion so that you could
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help sell the brand. And I'm like, okay. I mean, it's just
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crazy how I had no idea. And, like, going
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through this business talking to people, they have no idea either, like,
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how anything gets behind the bar or why it's listed
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by the glass or by the bottle or what they're pouring you in their. Well,
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if you say, I want, like, a vodka soda, like, you don't know
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how that got there. So you were
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representing the tequila brand. That's why you're wearing the t shirt, and
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you showed up to do this bit. I'm working for the marketing company
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that the supplier. You just walk in the door like, okay, I'm here.
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So what happens is I'm like, I have this light bulb
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moment in my life. It's very clear where I'm like, why is she wearing
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that suit? And I'm wearing this outfit? It was all about the suit, really,
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that just empowered me to be like, okay, I need to go to the
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next level. So that weekend, I
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had a trade show, and I went past a
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gentleman that had, like, four six foot tables, and just, like,
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brand after brand lined up, and I went up to him, like,
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do you represent all these brands? Like, again, I have no clue. I
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have no clue just how anything is
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placed at this point. So he says yes. So I
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take down his info. Turns out it's one of the biggest distributors
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in California. And while looking
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at it, I find the other bigger competitor,
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and turns out I have an interview with both of them on
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the same day. Because you walked in and went to the booth?
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Well, no, because while researching it, I found the top
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two. So I applied it both, coincidentally, which
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I'm saying is more like a miracle. I have an interview with both
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companies. So the first interview, this kind of paints
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the picture for the future and stays with me throughout my
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entire career. It's my competitor. I go in there
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first, and it's like, in some general sales meeting room with tables
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all lined up, and it's three men in suits across
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from me, and I'm sitting by myself in a chair in front of them. Remember,
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I'm like some 22 year old girl. Like, I still have no clue, you know?
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I just know I want to get that job. Like, I want to be in
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that suit, making that money, right? So
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I just recall them, like, laughing and talking to each other
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while I was in the interview. And I just felt, like, so weird. Like, I
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don't even think they're listening to me. So I get my car, and I go
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to the next one. This is in an HR, like,
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office with a gentleman, and he sits me down. He's like, so what is it
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you want to do? And I'm like, oh, there was this girl in the bar,
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and she's wearing the suit. Like, literally went down like that. And he goes, he
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goes, you're talking about the on premise, like, restaurants, bars,
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hotels, clubs. I'm like, yeah, that was it. That sounds good. And he goes, yeah,
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you can't do that. And I'm like, oh, well, how do I get to do
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that? And he goes, you need to be in the chains for at least six
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months. I'm like, okay, well, what's that? And he's like, you gotta get up
160
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at. So you knew nothing? Two in the morning. You literally knew nothing. I know.
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You gotta get up at two in the morning, and you gotta stock the shelves
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and dust them. I'm like, okay, that's okay. I'll do
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that. And so he goes, hold on a second. He goes
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out, another gentleman comes in, he starts asking me questions.
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They go out again. They come back in, and they say, we like to hire
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you. So that company hired me on the spot. How did that
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feel? Like, right away? Did you expect that? And you were. I
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felt like. I feel like I've always kind of just known my
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purpose. Like, if I'm in the right moment, I just kind
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of. It's just like, right now, we're talking, like you're asking me
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questions, and we're just having a conversation.
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And I'm sure it was just like that with them, too, versus
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the other environment where it was just like, almost
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like, yeah, right. It was all makes sense. Yeah. You said that suit thing
175
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I want to go back to just for a second. And I worked for corporate
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America. I worked for Xerox. It was the greatest sales organization in the world at
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the time, or one of them, anyway. And one of our. My
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teammates, her husband owned a sporting goods store or worked at
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a sporting goods store, and he used to come to these events that Xerox hosted,
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and we'd all be wearing suits. And one day he pulled me aside, he
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goes, one day I'm gonna wear a suit, too. And I thought,
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you know, I didn't know any different. I just applied for the job. I got
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a job. I wore a suit. That's what you're supposed to do, I thought. But
184
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there was some kind of ambiance about that. There was some kind of
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aristocracy about seeing somebody in a suit for this gentleman
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that he aspired to do. That sounds like what was happening with you.
187
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Well, I think it goes back to a generation, too, like
188
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your parents, your dad being here, and
189
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it's a form of respect. And I,
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coming from a family that's very, you know, that's. It's important.
191
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So if that's the attire, that's what I'm gonna wear. You
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know, I don't. That. So that kind of
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goes into. I was immediately put in a male
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dominated business. Yeah, well, it is. There were not any females.
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I mean, it was very few females.
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Saleswomen. And then as far as leadership, there was none at that time.
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What year was that? Do you remember? So that was
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2004. Wow. It's well
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past. And I was in the corporate America in the eighties, and
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I had to apologize to every woman in my branch, all the salespeople. I
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had to apologize for. What would you do? Because I demonstrated a
202
00:12:18,480 --> 00:12:22,264
copier, and I alluded to the fact that any secretary
203
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could do this. And then later, I used her as the pronoun for
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secretaries, and the shit hit the fan. And I was told to
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write, and I had to stuff an apology letter in every key, every
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mail slot at the company saying, I did not mean to
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insinuate that secretaries are women and women are stupid. Yeah.
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So you're talking about 2004, and still there's nobody,
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nobody in corporate America. So maybe it's the liquor business,
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wine. Business, but the thing is, you see something right there where it's
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like every generation has the opportunity
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to make the change, and if you think about, like,
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I think about my managers. The best
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ones were the ones that had women around them,
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and the worst were the
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ones that if I raised my
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voice, I was screaming. If I made a certain face, I'm in a bad
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mood. You know what I mean? Like, never.
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I see. Yes. Yeah. So
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I feel like with what you're saying, too, like, it's important. It
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changes with each of us. And
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so did you feel like then, because of
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that role, because you saw that there was. I mean, you've been here how many
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years? I'm almost entirely staffed by women here. I
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always just work better with them. But did you feel
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like you had a task then to. I always had to prove
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myself. Cause it was always. It was always
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different, especially when you're younger. Like, I grew
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up in this business in my twenties and in my thirties,
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I didn't have my kids till I was
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36, and so
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I gave a lot to this business. And the thing is, is
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you have to give up a lot if you want to keep moving forward.
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And I remember feeling like, in my twenties,
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I was married to the job. Like, it was literally my husband. Like,
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it was just night and day and pretty much
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all the way through. COVID. Pretty much, yeah. I mean, that's why you acted
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here. So. So the chain work is probably the toughest work,
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and the chains for the listeners, I mean, you're. For the listeners. I don't understand
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that when it's what made Gallo famous is how they
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handled merchandising in these big stores. And so you were
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boots in the field. Yeah, you're in the field. You're in the field. You're fronting
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merchandise. You're basically getting up super early,
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and you're meeting all the trucks and all the pallets
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come out into the aisles, and you're just throwing
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loads. And so let's talk about that for a second.
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That was something. Again, as a female. Yeah, I'd be in
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heels because I didn't. You know, a lot of times, I would wear high heels
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to make sure I was at the same eye level as some man that
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I worked with. It was, like, a strategic thing. Like, those
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are things I think about. And so. But then you had
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to. But then I would never give an excuse, like, if I'm in heels or,
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like, someone say, like, can I help you? It's actually something that I deal
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with, like, where I don't like asking for help, because I never
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wanted to give anybody that reason to be able
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to say, like, oh, well, she this or you know, like,
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I just wanted to always be able to do it myself. Yeah. And show them
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that it could be done in three inch heels and with
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nails and. But, yeah, you were throwing cases.
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Cases. Actually, two things that I never liked.
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The hardest part of the business, carrying cases and dealing with
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people's credit. But, yeah, I mean, the cases, like, some of them are
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super heavy, depending on the glass. But you did it. You just did it. Because
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that's what they were having to. Do for the listeners. A case of wine, typical
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bottle of wine is 36 pounds, and if they decide to put it in heavy
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glass, they call it. It's around 50 pounds. So. And I remember
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carrying two cases at a time, my dad's store, but I was 16 and 18
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years old. But let's just focus really fast. Cause this is
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really interesting. But chain work, meaning
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Ralph's, whatever large, big box store there is,
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is more than just sort of handling the account and make sure the wine gets
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there, make sure the booze gets there. It's. You're sort of fighting for shelf space.
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The most famous, I think I mentioned earlier, is the Gallo brothers
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themselves would go into, like, thrifty, the
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pharmacy, and front their own stuff. Yes. And then, can
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I ask you, is that shelf space random? No,
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it's definitely not random. So we have
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surveys. They still go on today, but
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basically, the suppliers are working with Ralph's
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or whoever the chain is. The supplier being the person
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that brings the stuff to you as a distributor? Yes.
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And so that supplier is pretty much sponsoring or
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buying space on the end caps. So you have your aisles, and at
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the end, you'll have featured products. And that's all planned
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out throughout the calendar year for an x amount
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of dollars. So that's how those get
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actually placed in the grocery
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stores. So I did a show with Mike
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Houlihan and Bonnie, and they established the
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brand barefoot cellars. And they're the ones that told me the
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stories about running into Ernest Gallo, fronting merchandise, and they decided to
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copy him. But when he first came to me, and this is
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anecdotal, in 1989, he came to my office, and he
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says, we have a barefoot cellars wine. It's the
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chateau Lafitte feet of the California wine business.
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And the guy left, and I called my dad. I go, this is the dumbest
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thing I've ever heard in my life. I can't believe he's trying to do this,
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and he ends up being the biggest brand in America. So that's what I know.
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So you go through this chain part and are you dying to get out of
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it to do the next level? Yeah. I mean, it's tough because you have all
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those big wigs coming in and wanting to make sure that
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everything that they paid for is in its space,
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but that's, you know, how you grow brands. So then
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you had. I had to be in there for six months, and the
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first month I started, you know,
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applying for positions. You try to find an
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area, a territory, you know, where you're gonna have
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anywhere from 40 to, like, 120
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accounts. You usually want it to be somewhat in your
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backyard. So that took about a month, and one came
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up. And that's actually when I first met our good
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friend Melissa. Wow. Bo had a
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cherry, picked her right out of Buca de Beppo. And
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so I show up, and it's just. It's actually a funny thing
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because she wouldn't even look at me like she knew who I was. But again,
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I'm walking in like, hello, you know? That's funny.
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And so she got the job, and.
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But it was crazy. Again, another miracle,
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another position open the next month, and then Beau hired
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me that month. I didn't realize that Melissa has such
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pedigree working at Bucca de Beppo.
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Hey, she is literally, she's a hustler. She's the best
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in. She's the best in Cali, for sure.
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So Beau hires you. So you were. So
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when you came here, you were working for Beau, or you
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were. So basically, I started in the chains, and then I got
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hired on with Bo as a sales rep in the
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union for the on premise. So I had, like, burbank lunch
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restaurants where they pour stuff. Yeah. So
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it was a lot of fun because Pasadena at the time, like, it. It
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was a great time. Again, we were, Melissa and I were, like, in our twenties
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and twenties and thirties, and we just went out
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and goes back to relationships. We would
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go there, support our accounts, come through with
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whatever anybody needed the next week, and just grew the
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business. And that was a new learning curve for you. Yeah. And you're
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still, what, 10 hours a day, 12 hours a day? Oh, yeah. I mean, it's
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crazy. You're starting early in the morning because you have to plan
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out your day. What does it need to sell? Your goals, all that kind of
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stuff. Quotas. And then you're taking care of any
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unfinished business, and you're just hitting the field and just seeing as
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many people as you can, you know, throughout the day. So let's
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delineate for the listeners that understand, you know, because I think
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by design. And really no reason for the consumer to understand that. But when you
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walk into a restaurant and you're handed that wine list, that's
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not by accident. And if you order vodka on the
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rocks, like you said earlier, or something that's coming from the well, which is the.
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What they call the main pour of that store.
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But if you call a drink, you ask for something
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in particular, like Belvedere or something, then that's a different level.
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Tito's. Tito's still pumping. Tito's.
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So for the listeners,
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all that is organized by people like
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you coming in. And saying, look, and our relationship.
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Yes. So just like if
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a consumer had a relationship with an owner and they like to drink something
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specific, the owner brings it in. Right? So
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for the sales person, it's the relationship. I
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mean, that's it. I mean, that's basically the
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recipe to anyone's success in this business. But how do you build that
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relationship? Is just. Is me showing up saying,
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Paul, you're way more versed in wine
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and spirits than I am at the time that I met you. And even
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still now, and just being honest
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about who you really are and what you're capable of doing. I know
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that I might not be able to talk about it, but if you tell me
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something specific, I'll go. I'll make sure it's the right thing. I'll
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research it so I can come back and talk about features and
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benefits and then get you the price point you need. And
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then that just builds trust, you know, showing up again and again.
371
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You don't have to be a genius in any field as long
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as you have the passion to want to go out and
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figure it out and win and be successful and do what you. Say you're gonna
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do. Exactly. I have to say, the 35 years I did this,
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the cycle of sales reps, all the various
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suppliers, let's just take the big guys.
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It ebbed and flows. There was one time where I was doing a lot of
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business with one of your competitors, and that gentleman moved on,
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and it plummeted. It literally plummeted from, like seven,
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$800,000 a year to like, nothing. And what's sad is,
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well, and it's sad that they had the opportunity.
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They never didn't have the opportunity. It's
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just taking advantage of it, seeing how far
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we can go with something. And when you build that trust,
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that's when it gets super fun in the business, because
386
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that's when both parties can be super
387
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creative and come up with all kinds of
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ways to innovate. And to change, like, okay, well, this isn't
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selling anymore. How can we make it work and then sell
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it? So I just. That's the best part about building the
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relationship for me, was just, like, being able
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to collaborate and just get super creative and make
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fun, because we all have to move boxes. No, you're right.
394
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We both have to move boxes. So if you can't move that box for that
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00:24:13,602 --> 00:24:17,338
reason, we need to figure out why and fix it. There was
396
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the success that you had here, and I want to get into
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the gender specific problems that you encountered, but
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it always seemed to me, and I, of course, don't know the
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emaciations of corporate wine and
400
00:24:32,490 --> 00:24:36,298
distilled spirits, America, but it was always obvious,
401
00:24:36,386 --> 00:24:39,626
particularly with the volume that we were buying, which was quite a bit at our
402
00:24:39,650 --> 00:24:42,934
peak. I mean, we were buying 8700 cases of wine at a time
403
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that it was your fearlessness
404
00:24:47,498 --> 00:24:50,926
inside the company. Yes. Like, how much work you're going to put into doing this
405
00:24:50,950 --> 00:24:54,694
for Paul and then trying to do it. And you were successful.
406
00:24:54,734 --> 00:24:58,046
I'd say 90% of the time, when I needed something from you, you'd pull it
407
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off. Yeah. And not knowing how high up the ranks you had to go to
408
00:25:01,638 --> 00:25:05,366
do that, it, um. That's one of the
409
00:25:05,390 --> 00:25:08,982
crazy things that I think gets you towards the end is, like,
410
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you move mountains for people because you really care.
411
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And it just. I think that's what kind of, like, it gets to
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be a lot, but that's what you're doing. You're literally. You have to start
413
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selling to your own company. I got to sell to the credit department
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that the order's going to release and he's going to cut a check. I have
415
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to tell the inventory person, yes. I have to line up
416
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everything, that here's a contract that he's going to take the 700
417
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cases I'm having to sell to everybody
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to get it done. And at the end of the day, it goes back to
419
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just being true to yourself and
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just everyone just being like, you know, you're gonna need to
421
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sell it for that price point at some point. Like, do it now. I
422
00:25:54,438 --> 00:25:57,766
can't tell how many people, and they would. Wouldn't do it in previous
423
00:25:57,830 --> 00:26:01,662
deals, and then would come back a year later, nine months later, and
424
00:26:01,678 --> 00:26:04,702
say, we still have it then the wines, not the wine, wasn't any good at
425
00:26:04,718 --> 00:26:08,536
that point, and so they had their shot. So inside
426
00:26:08,600 --> 00:26:12,272
selling corporate America, we've got hierarchies, we've got to go up the
427
00:26:12,288 --> 00:26:15,680
ladder, we have to go to the supplier sometimes, like, paul's going to buy this
428
00:26:15,712 --> 00:26:19,232
wine, like the hess. You remember the Hess shirt tail cabernet? I mean, that was
429
00:26:19,248 --> 00:26:22,444
like incredible price, right? Because
430
00:26:23,024 --> 00:26:26,776
I'll just tell the listeners that that deal came down to
431
00:26:26,920 --> 00:26:30,688
such a substantial discount, but it was less money than the
432
00:26:30,736 --> 00:26:34,192
penalty imposed by the supplier or the winery or the group supplying the
433
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wine was going to fine at the end of the year because the inventory was
434
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still here. So this is like stuff that people. Well, that's one where I had
435
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:44,184
to get creative. That's one where the creative side came out.
436
00:26:44,224 --> 00:26:47,768
Cause that's a well known brand, but the brand
437
00:26:47,856 --> 00:26:51,600
that you had access to, not everybody else
438
00:26:51,632 --> 00:26:55,216
had access to because, you know, it was a
439
00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:58,744
restaurant, right? So true. That was a
440
00:26:58,784 --> 00:27:02,344
selling point for me to be able to go to them, to be like,
441
00:27:02,464 --> 00:27:05,874
how cool is this that we're gonna get this wine
442
00:27:05,954 --> 00:27:09,770
in, you know, 200 homes and they're gonna
443
00:27:09,802 --> 00:27:13,586
see the brand name and those impressions. And
444
00:27:13,610 --> 00:27:15,054
so that's what I'm selling too.
445
00:27:18,234 --> 00:27:21,954
So this is not an easy task. I mean, for a male,
446
00:27:22,034 --> 00:27:25,730
not an easy task. Like I said, I worked at corporate America. I totally
447
00:27:25,762 --> 00:27:29,466
understand the hierarchies and the outlooks. The 30 day, 60 day, 90 day
448
00:27:29,490 --> 00:27:32,802
outlooks, the brand. What are you doing with this account? I know all those conversations.
449
00:27:32,938 --> 00:27:36,754
I know them well. But you're
450
00:27:36,874 --> 00:27:40,570
one of a few women that are in the street fighting
451
00:27:40,602 --> 00:27:44,026
for this position. And you talked about earlier how it was
452
00:27:44,170 --> 00:27:47,546
married to the job. I mean, that sounds like it
453
00:27:47,570 --> 00:27:50,934
anyway. But tell me about headwinds.
454
00:27:51,234 --> 00:27:53,614
Not to say disrespect, and I don't mean,
455
00:27:54,514 --> 00:27:57,694
but that extra effort it took because you're a woman.
456
00:27:58,734 --> 00:28:02,390
Um, I definitely, it
457
00:28:02,542 --> 00:28:05,354
first starts with appearance, so
458
00:28:06,174 --> 00:28:09,726
I can't tell you how many women. It's funny,
459
00:28:09,790 --> 00:28:13,354
I, I don't, I feel like, in a way,
460
00:28:14,614 --> 00:28:18,342
as much as I want to empower women
461
00:28:18,518 --> 00:28:22,126
at the same time, I'm like, but you gotta play the
462
00:28:22,150 --> 00:28:25,806
game, okay? And especially when you're in sales.
463
00:28:25,910 --> 00:28:29,694
So for sure, when you show up and it's four men, don't
464
00:28:29,774 --> 00:28:33,478
give them limp hand shake. Like, give them a hard
465
00:28:33,526 --> 00:28:36,686
handshake, look at them in the eye and let them know you're ready to rock
466
00:28:36,710 --> 00:28:40,142
and roll. Like, that's against the grain. Do you
467
00:28:40,158 --> 00:28:43,734
think for most women, I. Don'T think
468
00:28:43,814 --> 00:28:47,558
that they think like that. Yeah. And you? I think
469
00:28:47,606 --> 00:28:50,594
it comes from being an athlete
470
00:28:51,674 --> 00:28:55,330
and being very competitive. I'm very competitive
471
00:28:55,402 --> 00:28:59,106
wanting to win, and you have to have that in
472
00:28:59,130 --> 00:29:02,378
you. No one can teach you to do that. I mean, at the end of
473
00:29:02,386 --> 00:29:05,962
the day, you're gonna either grab someone's hand and give them a
474
00:29:05,978 --> 00:29:09,754
firm handshake, or you're not males. I know men that don't do that.
475
00:29:09,834 --> 00:29:13,450
Yeah. And it's first impression for me. Side note, real
476
00:29:13,482 --> 00:29:17,106
fast, we're talking about acting. Yeah. And there's this one methodology
477
00:29:17,210 --> 00:29:20,438
called Chubbuck. And she. I've been reading her book, and it's
478
00:29:20,606 --> 00:29:24,262
exactly that. It's like you have to
479
00:29:24,318 --> 00:29:28,030
embrace that you want to win. Whatever, whatever role you're playing
480
00:29:28,142 --> 00:29:31,726
and whatever emotions you're pulling back or pulling from,
481
00:29:31,870 --> 00:29:35,678
it's basically about winning. Your objective as the actor,
482
00:29:35,726 --> 00:29:39,342
whatever your role is in this job and this overall thing, I thought when you
483
00:29:39,358 --> 00:29:42,382
said that, I go, wow, that's really what it is. It's like you. If you're
484
00:29:42,398 --> 00:29:46,050
not motivated to, it's not win. Like, you don't mean
485
00:29:46,082 --> 00:29:49,642
winning by cheating somebody else. You mean winning by
486
00:29:49,778 --> 00:29:53,434
accomplishing your goal. Well, you have to stay ahead. That's the other
487
00:29:53,474 --> 00:29:57,154
thing, too. So in a way, you have to win, especially
488
00:29:57,274 --> 00:30:01,034
if you're just getting started. You have to prove yourself, and you're going
489
00:30:01,034 --> 00:30:04,754
to have to prove yourself again and again. You're going to have to reinvent
490
00:30:04,834 --> 00:30:08,570
yourself by accepting change and growing with the
491
00:30:08,602 --> 00:30:12,270
changing times. I mean, when I first started, we were using those, like,
492
00:30:12,342 --> 00:30:16,126
brick tells on units where you, like, used the payphone that was
493
00:30:16,190 --> 00:30:19,942
all sticky and the facts, like, you'd hold it up
494
00:30:19,958 --> 00:30:23,594
to the phone, to pagers and, you know what I mean?
495
00:30:24,094 --> 00:30:27,910
Now everyone's just got their head in the computer, not building
496
00:30:27,982 --> 00:30:31,794
that relationship with the customer. So
497
00:30:32,094 --> 00:30:35,694
it has to do with you just accepting change
498
00:30:35,774 --> 00:30:38,910
and rolling with it, because in this business, it
499
00:30:38,942 --> 00:30:42,680
continues to change. It also repeats
500
00:30:42,712 --> 00:30:46,136
the past, too, and just, you know,
501
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:49,776
reinvents the wheel. But anyways,
502
00:30:49,920 --> 00:30:53,504
how long was it before. You felt like, or did you ever feel,
503
00:30:53,544 --> 00:30:57,152
like, absolutely accepted by the rank, rank and
504
00:30:57,168 --> 00:31:00,448
file and the management? So that
505
00:31:00,616 --> 00:31:04,280
goes back to what I first mentioned when we started. It goes in waves,
506
00:31:04,352 --> 00:31:08,044
because if you are working for a manager that doesn't
507
00:31:08,124 --> 00:31:11,628
accept the opinion of women or
508
00:31:11,716 --> 00:31:15,004
accept how a woman got something
509
00:31:15,124 --> 00:31:18,868
done, it's going to be a different
510
00:31:18,916 --> 00:31:22,764
experience versus a manager who
511
00:31:22,804 --> 00:31:26,596
takes a step back and says, go. Just
512
00:31:26,660 --> 00:31:30,380
go be you. Rock and roll. Let me know what you
513
00:31:30,412 --> 00:31:33,986
need, any support, anything like that. And then you got your supply
514
00:31:34,100 --> 00:31:37,790
behind you, too. I mean, you can do anything.
515
00:31:37,862 --> 00:31:41,286
So, fortunately, the last couple
516
00:31:41,430 --> 00:31:45,070
I had were like that, and it made
517
00:31:45,182 --> 00:31:48,194
it made it easier for me to retire because
518
00:31:49,414 --> 00:31:53,238
at that point, I felt like I had broken every glass ceiling I could
519
00:31:53,286 --> 00:31:56,914
break and done everything that I could do there.
520
00:31:57,254 --> 00:32:00,808
And my purpose and my time was. Was done, and it was.
521
00:32:00,936 --> 00:32:04,136
I needed to move on to taking care of the kids. I have to tell
522
00:32:04,160 --> 00:32:07,728
you, Sandra and I talk about this. My wife and I talk about this all
523
00:32:07,736 --> 00:32:11,240
the time for the listeners that when we
524
00:32:11,272 --> 00:32:14,976
retired, was the same day you retired. Oh, yeah. March 31.
525
00:32:15,080 --> 00:32:18,256
Wow. Oh, yeah. April. Mine was April 3, but yeah.
526
00:32:18,440 --> 00:32:22,184
And I say, you know, without Julie's help
527
00:32:22,224 --> 00:32:25,964
all these years, and I want to make sure I helped her
528
00:32:26,284 --> 00:32:29,900
do the things that she needed to do. We retired at the right
529
00:32:29,932 --> 00:32:33,708
time on that relationship alone because I would have had to start all over
530
00:32:33,756 --> 00:32:37,540
again with a new rep who has different motivations,
531
00:32:37,612 --> 00:32:40,740
who doesn't. Whatever it is, our relationship
532
00:32:40,932 --> 00:32:44,424
synergized, and we got a lot done together. And
533
00:32:44,844 --> 00:32:47,396
that was kind of writing on the wall when you say things happen for a
534
00:32:47,420 --> 00:32:50,664
reason. That was an important relationship that I lost.
535
00:32:50,964 --> 00:32:54,092
That would have been hard to replace, would have made my job a lot harder.
536
00:32:54,188 --> 00:32:56,932
Yeah. I have to tell you an anecdotal story. In
537
00:32:56,948 --> 00:33:00,624
1982, when I was selling copiers to
538
00:33:01,204 --> 00:33:04,948
Vernon, 82, by the way, is. A very important
539
00:33:05,036 --> 00:33:08,644
year. Why? Oh, the year I was
540
00:33:08,684 --> 00:33:12,344
born, I was gonna say. And the year started his business.
541
00:33:12,804 --> 00:33:16,620
Really? When you were talking about Phelps earlier, that was one of the first places
542
00:33:16,692 --> 00:33:20,484
we went away with when we. Together with Joseph Phelps.
543
00:33:20,564 --> 00:33:24,266
Yep. And we drank 1982. Wow. Okay. So it's all right. This
544
00:33:24,290 --> 00:33:27,482
all comes for a circle. Full circle again. There was a guy named Bill. He
545
00:33:27,498 --> 00:33:30,454
was one of my great
546
00:33:31,394 --> 00:33:35,210
relationships in my career and a very interesting business because they made
547
00:33:35,242 --> 00:33:38,834
the machines that bottle or canned seven up in coke and stuff.
548
00:33:38,954 --> 00:33:42,778
So they're the colangelist can company. And so my knowledge of
549
00:33:42,826 --> 00:33:46,330
canning wine goes back to 1982 when I used to watch these
550
00:33:46,362 --> 00:33:50,042
machines. Anyway, it was clear he did not
551
00:33:50,218 --> 00:33:53,786
appreciate women in the workforce. Obvious. And I did.
552
00:33:53,850 --> 00:33:57,546
Never asked him. Never came across the
553
00:33:57,570 --> 00:34:01,410
conversation. We'd never discussed it. But he was
554
00:34:01,522 --> 00:34:05,226
a short sleeve, polyester white button down shirt guy. And you could
555
00:34:05,250 --> 00:34:08,770
just. I knew it. And I had to call my
556
00:34:08,802 --> 00:34:11,794
boss, who was a female at the time, great
557
00:34:11,834 --> 00:34:15,306
manager. She says, I want you to call his
558
00:34:15,330 --> 00:34:18,895
boss. And, you know, going over somebody's head is not a good
559
00:34:18,919 --> 00:34:22,615
idea generally. No. I go, look. She goes, I need this
560
00:34:22,639 --> 00:34:26,135
sale. And it was a big sale. It was like a $200,000 copy. Okay.
561
00:34:26,159 --> 00:34:28,763
$200,000 copy. Yeah. Okay. That's a lot.
562
00:34:29,223 --> 00:34:32,895
1982 also. Yeah. So I call the company, and I asked for the
563
00:34:32,919 --> 00:34:36,151
president. The answer she goes, hello? And I said, this Paul from
564
00:34:36,167 --> 00:34:39,959
Xerox, blah, blah. And he goes, we're gonna buy it. Thank
565
00:34:39,991 --> 00:34:43,812
you for calling. I got a phone call immediately after from Bill saying, what
566
00:34:43,828 --> 00:34:47,012
are you doing? How can you go over my head like this? You know, that's
567
00:34:47,028 --> 00:34:50,588
the kind of manager he was. I'm reflecting on the reason, because this probably
568
00:34:50,636 --> 00:34:54,396
exists in the wine and booze business. And I knew if
569
00:34:54,420 --> 00:34:57,844
I was able to discreetly say that my
570
00:34:57,964 --> 00:35:01,732
woman manager asked me to call him, that I'd
571
00:35:01,748 --> 00:35:05,516
be off the hook. So I said, bill, I was
572
00:35:05,540 --> 00:35:09,232
talking to my manager, and she told me to call. That's all I said. And
573
00:35:09,248 --> 00:35:13,016
he goes, your boss is a woman? I go, yeah. He goes, you know,
574
00:35:13,040 --> 00:35:16,760
they shouldn't be in the workforce. And I was totally off the hook because
575
00:35:16,792 --> 00:35:20,232
of his sexism. Totally off the hook. And I
576
00:35:20,248 --> 00:35:23,704
thought, wow. But you're talking about different part of America.
577
00:35:23,824 --> 00:35:27,504
But there still is a disparity in
578
00:35:27,544 --> 00:35:31,384
corporate America in executives, particularly in the wine and liquor industry
579
00:35:31,504 --> 00:35:35,292
of executive women. Did that change at all when you were going through this?
580
00:35:35,408 --> 00:35:38,836
Um, no, it doesn't. I. I mean, I can't tell you. I've been
581
00:35:38,860 --> 00:35:42,500
in a lot of meetings where I've had men
582
00:35:42,532 --> 00:35:45,544
just not even look at me because
583
00:35:46,084 --> 00:35:49,628
they don't. Are they nuts? They don't know. Well, they just. They don't
584
00:35:49,676 --> 00:35:53,076
know. They think I'm just there, like, taking notes. Yeah.
585
00:35:53,180 --> 00:35:56,860
Um, I'd say for a lot of my meetings,
586
00:35:56,892 --> 00:35:59,820
if I am walking in with a male sales
587
00:35:59,892 --> 00:36:03,684
representative, I mean, I could be three levels higher.
588
00:36:04,024 --> 00:36:07,712
And they would assume the sales rep was the manager.
589
00:36:07,768 --> 00:36:11,216
Wow. And they would always have to correct the
590
00:36:11,240 --> 00:36:14,456
buyer to say, actually, this is, you know, she's
591
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,936
director, she's a division manager. Whatever it was at the
592
00:36:17,960 --> 00:36:21,624
time, that happened a lot. That's amazing.
593
00:36:21,664 --> 00:36:25,456
Really. Yeah. So. So let's say now
594
00:36:25,520 --> 00:36:28,684
you've done this. You. You were very successful.
595
00:36:29,584 --> 00:36:32,604
You were put in charge of some rather important,
596
00:36:34,024 --> 00:36:37,864
what they call allocations for the listener. If there's only so much available
597
00:36:37,944 --> 00:36:40,644
to the whole country, then each market
598
00:36:41,384 --> 00:36:44,944
area gets so many bottles of whatever it is, whether it's bourbon
599
00:36:44,984 --> 00:36:48,736
or wine or whatever. And you became in
600
00:36:48,760 --> 00:36:51,824
charge of some of this high level allocations?
601
00:36:51,944 --> 00:36:54,704
Yes. Was that a promotion at that point?
602
00:36:56,124 --> 00:36:59,356
Nobody else wanted to do it? Yeah, it's definitely a job
603
00:36:59,420 --> 00:37:02,940
everybody wants because, I mean, you have
604
00:37:03,012 --> 00:37:06,564
access to the best of the best, and they
605
00:37:06,604 --> 00:37:09,584
are extremely limited. And
606
00:37:10,404 --> 00:37:13,540
I think COVID changed a lot of it.
607
00:37:13,732 --> 00:37:16,940
But, yeah, there were bottles that
608
00:37:17,132 --> 00:37:20,724
sometimes I would get, like, three bottles for all of Southern
609
00:37:20,764 --> 00:37:23,384
California or my region,
610
00:37:24,404 --> 00:37:27,964
and I'd have to allocate them out to the right
611
00:37:28,084 --> 00:37:31,380
buyers. And it was tough. So tough. It's really tough.
612
00:37:31,532 --> 00:37:35,292
But was that a promotion inside the company or just added to your job?
613
00:37:35,428 --> 00:37:39,028
Okay, so I went from on premise sales
614
00:37:39,076 --> 00:37:42,876
representative. Then I became a key account manager, and then I became a
615
00:37:42,900 --> 00:37:46,412
division manager, and then COVID hit,
616
00:37:46,508 --> 00:37:50,140
and I became a
617
00:37:50,172 --> 00:37:53,548
director of sales. That's where that job became.
618
00:37:53,636 --> 00:37:57,420
Yeah. So when did you say
619
00:37:57,452 --> 00:38:01,004
you had. How old are your kids now? Four years? They're seven. They're seven?
620
00:38:01,084 --> 00:38:04,916
Yeah. Wow. Triplets. So when did
621
00:38:04,940 --> 00:38:08,504
it hit you that, wait a minute,
622
00:38:09,524 --> 00:38:13,276
I can't do it all having. Well, the triplets, which is, you know,
623
00:38:13,300 --> 00:38:16,884
not easy for anybody, let alone a full time mom. But you weren't a full
624
00:38:16,924 --> 00:38:20,624
time mom. You were working in the streets. This is a very demanding job. Still
625
00:38:21,364 --> 00:38:24,860
district manager. When did you start thinking, well,
626
00:38:24,892 --> 00:38:28,492
it's in that business. You're out late
627
00:38:28,628 --> 00:38:31,984
all the time. You're doing several dinners a week.
628
00:38:33,284 --> 00:38:36,884
You're playing golf a lot, which is awesome.
629
00:38:36,964 --> 00:38:40,812
It's fun. But when you're out, everyone
630
00:38:40,868 --> 00:38:44,532
knows it slows you down. You can't do what you could do if you were
631
00:38:44,548 --> 00:38:48,172
in the office or out in the field. So there's a lot of
632
00:38:48,188 --> 00:38:51,644
trips away, a lot of nights staying in other
633
00:38:51,684 --> 00:38:55,132
counties, for example, lots of
634
00:38:55,228 --> 00:38:58,304
alcohol, amazing food.
635
00:38:59,524 --> 00:39:03,356
There's a lot of perks and stuff. But you're away, and you're not
636
00:39:03,460 --> 00:39:07,138
present with your family or with what
637
00:39:07,186 --> 00:39:10,746
maybe yourself, you know, and taking care of yourself.
638
00:39:10,930 --> 00:39:14,574
And I think what happened was
639
00:39:15,074 --> 00:39:17,774
I got into that director position,
640
00:39:18,274 --> 00:39:21,946
and I saw that there was nowhere else to
641
00:39:21,970 --> 00:39:25,722
go. And it's funny, like, when you want
642
00:39:25,738 --> 00:39:29,362
to work on your career and you want to continue growing and making more money
643
00:39:29,418 --> 00:39:33,060
and climbing that ladder, it really is like a
644
00:39:33,092 --> 00:39:36,812
chess game. You have to think a couple steps
645
00:39:36,908 --> 00:39:40,364
ahead. And what happens if this person goes here
646
00:39:40,444 --> 00:39:44,140
or this happens or they realign this division
647
00:39:44,252 --> 00:39:48,036
or take away these positions? So
648
00:39:48,060 --> 00:39:51,732
it's just a lot of thinking ahead and planning, but
649
00:39:51,868 --> 00:39:54,464
I feel like every move I made
650
00:39:55,164 --> 00:39:58,484
was done for a certain reason at the right
651
00:39:58,524 --> 00:40:01,584
time. And when COVID hit, they furloughed
652
00:40:01,624 --> 00:40:05,080
everybody, so there was just a few of us left.
653
00:40:05,192 --> 00:40:09,024
And I never worked so hard in my life when I thought I had
654
00:40:09,064 --> 00:40:12,560
already worked so hard. Like, I feel like I'd already,
655
00:40:12,712 --> 00:40:16,096
you know, even when I was pregnant with the triplets, like, I won
656
00:40:16,240 --> 00:40:19,124
manager of the year that year, and,
657
00:40:19,744 --> 00:40:23,560
like, so I felt like I just done everything I
658
00:40:23,592 --> 00:40:27,292
could, and that business everything shut down.
659
00:40:27,348 --> 00:40:31,140
Like, LA is still recovering from it. If you drive down there, they're
660
00:40:31,172 --> 00:40:33,584
still boarded off. And
661
00:40:34,404 --> 00:40:37,964
so going through that was hard because it
662
00:40:38,004 --> 00:40:41,580
was from basically 06:00 a.m. To about 02:00 a.m. No
663
00:40:41,612 --> 00:40:45,436
joke. Because it was dealing with people's credit and trying to get
664
00:40:45,460 --> 00:40:49,236
them up and running again because they had been closed, they hadn't had
665
00:40:49,260 --> 00:40:53,024
a liquor order since St. Patrick's Day.
666
00:40:53,644 --> 00:40:57,412
So it was just a crazy time. And then I
667
00:40:57,428 --> 00:41:01,004
had a dinner one night with a female executive,
668
00:41:01,124 --> 00:41:04,508
very few, but this one runs quite a few
669
00:41:04,556 --> 00:41:07,932
states. And I just, I was
670
00:41:07,988 --> 00:41:11,764
overhearing her talk about her kids, and I said, oh, you have two kids? Yes.
671
00:41:11,884 --> 00:41:15,612
Oh, who's taking care of the kids? Oh, my husband. Oh,
672
00:41:15,668 --> 00:41:19,458
okay. Does he stay at home? Yeah, he stays at home. So I'm just like,
673
00:41:19,506 --> 00:41:23,294
putting this all together and, you know, they say, like,
674
00:41:24,314 --> 00:41:27,134
I don't think you can have it all
675
00:41:28,154 --> 00:41:31,970
because you can't give everything
676
00:41:32,082 --> 00:41:35,666
100% of yourself. Like, you can't be present for
677
00:41:35,730 --> 00:41:38,978
everything. It's like the same as they say. Multitasking really isn't, like,
678
00:41:39,106 --> 00:41:42,866
efficient. I'm a multitasker. But they
679
00:41:42,890 --> 00:41:46,272
say it's really not efficient because you're not giving that one thing
680
00:41:46,458 --> 00:41:49,304
everything and you're not just finishing it. So
681
00:41:50,444 --> 00:41:54,036
I wanted to be more present
682
00:41:54,220 --> 00:41:57,612
because if it's not your significant
683
00:41:57,748 --> 00:42:01,388
other doing it for you at home, it's
684
00:42:01,436 --> 00:42:05,036
somebody else and it's not you. Your husband
685
00:42:05,060 --> 00:42:08,756
is a thriving electrical business. He's not
686
00:42:08,780 --> 00:42:12,476
home. Very successful business. He's hardest worker
687
00:42:12,500 --> 00:42:16,340
I know. He's out of the house by 415 to meet a load,
688
00:42:16,412 --> 00:42:19,740
and he comes home at 630 for dinner. And it's
689
00:42:19,772 --> 00:42:23,492
just, that's how we, we were. We're just like, so
690
00:42:23,508 --> 00:42:27,212
you're both doing this crazy machine where I have a
691
00:42:27,228 --> 00:42:30,024
nanny, and then it's like I have to hire someone to
692
00:42:30,444 --> 00:42:33,980
overlay, like, because I can't fit 8 hours
693
00:42:34,052 --> 00:42:37,900
in that business and do an eight hour work day. Was that gnawing
694
00:42:37,932 --> 00:42:41,388
on you for a while until you had this conversation or you just kind of
695
00:42:41,436 --> 00:42:44,900
woke up to it? No, this is something I had actually been
696
00:42:44,932 --> 00:42:48,762
asking, you know, for years. And you kind of. You have to wait for
697
00:42:48,778 --> 00:42:52,574
the right moment for your family too, you know, for it to make sense
698
00:42:53,114 --> 00:42:56,866
for the family to do that, to
699
00:42:57,050 --> 00:43:00,014
step away from a very
700
00:43:01,114 --> 00:43:04,426
great position. Well, there's obviously
701
00:43:04,450 --> 00:43:08,066
the salary and the work that's obviously
702
00:43:08,210 --> 00:43:11,850
counts. You're eating at the best places, you're drinking the
703
00:43:11,882 --> 00:43:15,470
best stuff, you know, private
704
00:43:15,542 --> 00:43:19,190
dinners all the time, golfing of the best courses. I mean,
705
00:43:19,222 --> 00:43:22,354
it's. It's. It's amazing, but it just.
706
00:43:22,894 --> 00:43:26,742
It became where I just wasn't present, and that's what I wanted to
707
00:43:26,758 --> 00:43:30,566
do. And I wonder, and I also felt that I had another purpose like
708
00:43:30,590 --> 00:43:34,114
this. I had done everything I could. Yeah,
709
00:43:34,454 --> 00:43:38,206
that's a pretty serious revelation. Mm hmm. To
710
00:43:38,230 --> 00:43:41,700
try reflect on that. And, you know, we only have one pass through here,
711
00:43:41,732 --> 00:43:45,388
so you want to maximize that value. And I was thinking that
712
00:43:45,556 --> 00:43:48,068
I had a winemaker. Tell me once, man, I eat the best food, I go
713
00:43:48,076 --> 00:43:51,812
to the best places, I drink the best wines, I meet
714
00:43:51,828 --> 00:43:55,284
the most amazing people. But his comment was, I don't make a lot of money
715
00:43:55,324 --> 00:43:58,980
doing this. And, you know, even me having done
716
00:43:59,012 --> 00:44:02,076
all this, and now we're starting to travel and get around and try to use
717
00:44:02,100 --> 00:44:05,708
some of the relationships, I still feel like I want
718
00:44:05,716 --> 00:44:09,442
to be home sometimes. Like. Like I want to
719
00:44:09,458 --> 00:44:11,978
lever. We're going to Bordeaux, and I'm going to see all these great people that
720
00:44:11,986 --> 00:44:14,322
I've interviewed on the show, and we're going to have so much fun together. But
721
00:44:14,338 --> 00:44:17,938
I'm also sort of thinking, I can't wait to get home when that's done. And
722
00:44:17,946 --> 00:44:21,658
I'm wondering if even a single person, even if you weren't married,
723
00:44:21,706 --> 00:44:24,802
even I wasn't married and we were doing that, we'd probably still burn out a
724
00:44:24,818 --> 00:44:28,154
little bit. Yeah. I mean, think about this. How often do you go
725
00:44:28,194 --> 00:44:31,874
and do you really just, like, stop for a second and go
726
00:44:31,914 --> 00:44:35,626
walk in the vineyard by yourself? No, like, when's the last time you've done
727
00:44:35,650 --> 00:44:39,322
that? Yeah. Right. And if you think about it, every time you go visit
728
00:44:39,378 --> 00:44:42,938
one of those awesome wineries and you're hearing about the history
729
00:44:43,026 --> 00:44:46,202
and the views, like, I can see napa in my head right now is what
730
00:44:46,218 --> 00:44:50,010
I can see. I see a liquor store.
731
00:44:50,122 --> 00:44:53,610
Yeah, but you should be doing that. You know what I mean? It's like stopping
732
00:44:53,642 --> 00:44:57,466
and smelling the roses. Like, it just has become too
733
00:44:57,530 --> 00:45:01,342
fast paced. Like, a text isn't a text. An
734
00:45:01,358 --> 00:45:04,286
email is not an email. It's like, you better be looking at all of it.
735
00:45:04,430 --> 00:45:07,750
Twenty four seven. And, you know, especially in that business, there's no
736
00:45:07,782 --> 00:45:11,278
boundaries. No, because some places. No time
737
00:45:11,326 --> 00:45:14,926
borders. No. Some close at 02:00 a.m., hey, there's some out there that close at
738
00:45:14,950 --> 00:45:18,646
04:00 a.m. And then guess what? They open at 06:00 a.m. So restaurant
739
00:45:18,670 --> 00:45:22,326
tours aren't exactly the nicest people when it comes to respect of your
740
00:45:22,470 --> 00:45:26,126
time and your family. If, you know, for the listeners. I wanted to just touch
741
00:45:26,150 --> 00:45:29,806
on the COVID side. What happened in the La market all over the country
742
00:45:29,950 --> 00:45:33,598
is that most businesses, if you and I were going to start a
743
00:45:33,606 --> 00:45:37,046
winery, we would want to be in a restaurant because it's a house pour or
744
00:45:37,070 --> 00:45:40,566
it's on a list. It's like an annuity. People buy the glass
745
00:45:40,710 --> 00:45:44,430
volume. Yeah, it's volume. Right. And when the COVID shut
746
00:45:44,462 --> 00:45:47,354
down all the restaurants, then 80% of the businesses,
747
00:45:48,094 --> 00:45:51,894
suppliers, I mean, I think your competitor put like 200
748
00:45:51,934 --> 00:45:55,782
people on the street or something. Ridiculous. Yeah. So. But
749
00:45:55,798 --> 00:45:59,512
it didn't matter because there was nothing we could do. And
750
00:45:59,528 --> 00:46:02,324
then it turned into to go business and
751
00:46:03,544 --> 00:46:07,352
packaging, you know, wine and spirits coming out and in different
752
00:46:07,408 --> 00:46:11,088
packaging. And now look at the. Look at the shelves in the grocery store now.
753
00:46:11,136 --> 00:46:14,200
I know. And they always say the on premise builds
754
00:46:14,232 --> 00:46:17,672
brands. You know, we talked about that a lot. Like in this business
755
00:46:17,728 --> 00:46:21,552
and it's true. There's an entire aisle now of
756
00:46:21,608 --> 00:46:25,054
canned wines, spirits, pouches,
757
00:46:25,474 --> 00:46:28,842
all kinds of things like that. You know, you were very funny during this process
758
00:46:28,978 --> 00:46:32,802
and you were self admittedly, and you probably would do it today,
759
00:46:32,858 --> 00:46:36,650
but I would try to teach you something about
760
00:46:36,682 --> 00:46:39,494
wine and you'd go one. Ear, not the other.
761
00:46:41,074 --> 00:46:43,574
Except for when you talked about like your family
762
00:46:44,394 --> 00:46:47,854
and I love those stories. You would go,
763
00:46:48,154 --> 00:46:51,666
okay, so how can I make this deal happen? Yeah, can we just get to
764
00:46:51,770 --> 00:46:55,616
how many cases and what's the bottle cost? I need to get to. And
765
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:59,360
does it have to be Stelvin or quark? All the rest of the stuff is
766
00:46:59,392 --> 00:47:03,016
going on. So are you happy that you did this? Yeah, I'm
767
00:47:03,040 --> 00:47:06,888
very happy. It's taken a few
768
00:47:06,976 --> 00:47:10,824
months to kind of find myself and get back to
769
00:47:10,864 --> 00:47:13,324
just like breathing again.
770
00:47:14,424 --> 00:47:18,200
You mentioned that your kids. And I'm with you on that.
771
00:47:18,232 --> 00:47:21,860
I'm still struggling. I still can't like shut down. I still
772
00:47:21,892 --> 00:47:25,612
can't believe I don't have to be somewhere for something. Yes, a
773
00:47:25,628 --> 00:47:29,444
lot of that. But you said your kids didn't trust you when you got home.
774
00:47:29,564 --> 00:47:33,284
Oh, wow. You remembered that? Yeah, I'm actually still
775
00:47:33,324 --> 00:47:36,988
dealing with that. Really? And I think it has to do with just again,
776
00:47:37,076 --> 00:47:40,484
you're not fully there, you're not present. You have
777
00:47:40,644 --> 00:47:44,180
a team of people that you trust and that you've
778
00:47:44,372 --> 00:47:48,100
overly communicated as much as you can and shown them as
779
00:47:48,132 --> 00:47:51,272
much as you can. But at the end of the day, it's not you. And,
780
00:47:51,328 --> 00:47:54,168
you know, there's a lot of times where it's like, oh yeah, I'll try to
781
00:47:54,176 --> 00:47:57,472
be home at your 830. Like I want to rush it. And I'm sitting there
782
00:47:57,648 --> 00:48:01,120
with owners of brands that have just flown in
783
00:48:01,312 --> 00:48:05,048
and now they're, you know, their head of PR from New York is here
784
00:48:05,096 --> 00:48:08,768
and I'm sitting right next to them and it's now going to be midnight. How
785
00:48:08,816 --> 00:48:12,176
you did that? How did you justify, like, you're sitting with this guy and I
786
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:16,000
know exactly what you're talking about and you're
787
00:48:16,112 --> 00:48:19,096
chomping at the big cause, you know, that the kids are doing whatever Frank's doing,
788
00:48:19,120 --> 00:48:22,282
whatever. How did you justify at that moment? Did you just go, I just gotta
789
00:48:22,298 --> 00:48:25,778
get through this? Well, that's where the trust is
790
00:48:25,866 --> 00:48:29,458
lost because I know that I have a support
791
00:48:29,546 --> 00:48:33,362
team that's gonna, you know, get him into bed and read him
792
00:48:33,378 --> 00:48:37,174
a book and do all the things that I wanted to do.
793
00:48:37,474 --> 00:48:41,094
So I was able, you know, to do that. Frank
794
00:48:42,394 --> 00:48:46,014
always supported me that way to make sure that I could keep working
795
00:48:46,524 --> 00:48:50,220
and stay focused. But I was thinking about it the whole time because,
796
00:48:50,412 --> 00:48:53,436
you know, I probably did say I was going to be home at nine and
797
00:48:53,540 --> 00:48:56,796
next thing you know, he's asleep and I'm walking in. 1130.
798
00:48:56,860 --> 00:49:00,580
Yeah. That cause friction? Oh, yeah. I think
799
00:49:00,612 --> 00:49:04,084
it causes, I mean, it. Would in any marriage. I'm just
800
00:49:04,124 --> 00:49:07,860
wondering. Oh yeah. I mean, think about it. I'm sure the
801
00:49:07,892 --> 00:49:11,108
women are always thinking like, what is my husband going out to do right now?
802
00:49:11,116 --> 00:49:14,908
He's at another bar, he's drinking. Oh, great. At St. Patrick's Day or
803
00:49:14,916 --> 00:49:18,692
it's Cinco de Mayo or whatever it is. And next thing you know,
804
00:49:18,708 --> 00:49:22,100
he has to stay at a hotel. What is he really doing? I mean, you
805
00:49:22,132 --> 00:49:25,784
have to have a solid foundation and,
806
00:49:27,244 --> 00:49:30,344
you know, and just trust your partner.
807
00:49:31,364 --> 00:49:34,916
But it is crazy because, I mean, let's be real. You're in
808
00:49:34,940 --> 00:49:38,740
bars, you're on alcohol. It's, the temptations
809
00:49:38,812 --> 00:49:42,040
are huge. In the eighties, in corporate America was
810
00:49:42,072 --> 00:49:45,560
drugs. I mean, in the halls of the greatest
811
00:49:45,592 --> 00:49:49,136
corporations, drugs. And there was so much infidelity and
812
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:53,016
alcoholism at that time, which probably isn't all that different now. It's just more
813
00:49:53,040 --> 00:49:56,872
discreet. But I can't imagine when you add to
814
00:49:56,888 --> 00:50:00,704
it that the product being sold is, you know,
815
00:50:00,744 --> 00:50:03,804
dependent, mind altering. Yeah. Depends on this, right?
816
00:50:05,104 --> 00:50:08,468
Yes. In order for it to be successful. Yep.
817
00:50:08,636 --> 00:50:12,436
Well, okay. So I will say, though, what I
818
00:50:12,500 --> 00:50:16,224
loved about being a woman in this industry
819
00:50:16,844 --> 00:50:20,284
is once you do prove yourself right, that you can
820
00:50:20,324 --> 00:50:24,044
play with them, that anything they do, you can do better.
821
00:50:24,084 --> 00:50:27,052
I used to say that all the time. Like, anything they do, I can do
822
00:50:27,068 --> 00:50:30,404
better. I can be cliched, but we're gonna do that. But
823
00:50:30,444 --> 00:50:33,244
basically, like, it got to a point where,
824
00:50:34,104 --> 00:50:37,284
respectfully, like, they became brothers.
825
00:50:37,784 --> 00:50:41,616
So I also think that's part of how I was able to
826
00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:45,272
do it for so long, you know, married with. With
827
00:50:45,328 --> 00:50:48,800
little ones, is that I was on a team.
828
00:50:48,992 --> 00:50:52,456
You know, it was like being on a baseball team. Like, those were my
829
00:50:52,520 --> 00:50:55,364
teammates, and they protected me, and
830
00:50:56,304 --> 00:51:00,044
I always felt, you know, safe. So,
831
00:51:00,344 --> 00:51:03,640
you know, there's a double edged sword to this, a little bit. Looking at this
832
00:51:03,672 --> 00:51:07,112
picture over your shoulder of my dad. Oh, yeah, I love that. And I remember
833
00:51:07,168 --> 00:51:10,512
this well. I remember the day he took the picture. I'm like, what are you
834
00:51:10,528 --> 00:51:14,084
doing? Why are you doing this? And thank God he did. But
835
00:51:14,864 --> 00:51:18,672
I was about to do a monologue to test my acting skills, just so you
836
00:51:18,688 --> 00:51:22,524
know. Yeah. And the stories are going to be just snippet stories of my father,
837
00:51:23,694 --> 00:51:26,714
because I think what you taught your children,
838
00:51:27,254 --> 00:51:30,974
even though you're at a crossroads now and you're back
839
00:51:31,014 --> 00:51:34,554
home and the kids are learning that I have a mother here all the time,
840
00:51:35,694 --> 00:51:39,278
they also saw an amazing work ethic. Yes.
841
00:51:39,406 --> 00:51:42,914
And I think there's value to that, even though you can't tell today.
842
00:51:43,574 --> 00:51:46,774
I see it actually already. You do? I do. My
843
00:51:46,854 --> 00:51:50,234
son Vincent, he's very much like Frank
844
00:51:50,974 --> 00:51:54,750
out with. He's helping him every Saturday. He gets in his
845
00:51:54,782 --> 00:51:58,558
precision electric uniform, and so does Frankie now, too.
846
00:51:58,606 --> 00:52:02,406
And Frankie's been working, just modeling, and we're
847
00:52:02,430 --> 00:52:05,958
going to get into acting, hopefully. And he knows
848
00:52:06,006 --> 00:52:08,702
that if I do this job, I'm going to make money, and it can go
849
00:52:08,718 --> 00:52:12,518
into my savings account and I'm going to buy a car later, that's
850
00:52:12,646 --> 00:52:16,314
how he's talking about it. That's great lessons. And Francesca, she's
851
00:52:16,694 --> 00:52:20,390
so brave and strong, and I see her
852
00:52:20,422 --> 00:52:24,086
with her brothers, and, like, I. I see myself in it now. I just gotta
853
00:52:24,110 --> 00:52:27,470
be, like, not so quick to
854
00:52:27,502 --> 00:52:31,118
get angry or snappy, because I see you're getting a little bossy, like
855
00:52:31,166 --> 00:52:33,874
me, but that takes years of, like,
856
00:52:34,254 --> 00:52:38,030
learning, you know, how to finesse that and make
857
00:52:38,062 --> 00:52:41,614
it work to your advantage. But they see two parents that are working hard,
858
00:52:41,654 --> 00:52:45,324
and I don't think there's any greater lesson than that for
859
00:52:45,404 --> 00:52:49,148
particularly in today's generations that are growing up digitally
860
00:52:49,196 --> 00:52:53,036
with information at their fingertips and services at
861
00:52:53,060 --> 00:52:56,064
their fingertips that we never had, you know, and
862
00:52:56,844 --> 00:53:00,308
for them to have a work ethic, because that's what's gonna
863
00:53:00,436 --> 00:53:04,244
prevail when it's all said and done. Like, my kids are very
864
00:53:04,284 --> 00:53:07,796
hard working. They're millennials. They act like it. They're pain in the
865
00:53:07,820 --> 00:53:11,602
ass. But it's from you, and it's from your parents. Right.
866
00:53:11,738 --> 00:53:15,378
And Sandra and her parents, just like it is my
867
00:53:15,426 --> 00:53:19,242
parents and my grandparents who are still alive. My grandma's 89 and my
868
00:53:19,258 --> 00:53:22,834
grandfather's 90. And I
869
00:53:22,954 --> 00:53:26,770
saw how hard they work, and I saw how hard my parents worked
870
00:53:26,882 --> 00:53:30,586
and struggled at times in the beginning. And I
871
00:53:30,610 --> 00:53:34,274
learned at a very young age that if you wanted something, you had to work
872
00:53:34,314 --> 00:53:38,106
for it. And so with the kids now, it's hard because they are
873
00:53:38,130 --> 00:53:41,770
so. They're privileged. I mean, they have everything at their
874
00:53:41,802 --> 00:53:45,410
fingertips, and it's. I'm working on right now,
875
00:53:45,442 --> 00:53:49,050
just teaching them that, you know, it's not so
876
00:53:49,082 --> 00:53:52,698
easy for everybody. No. And you have to work hard and.
877
00:53:52,826 --> 00:53:56,254
And respect the things that you have and be grateful
878
00:53:56,594 --> 00:54:00,282
for everything that you have, you know, gratitude. Even
879
00:54:00,338 --> 00:54:03,410
better lesson. Yeah. And so
880
00:54:03,602 --> 00:54:05,614
triplets. Yes. I mean.
881
00:54:08,354 --> 00:54:10,094
That'S a whole nother story.
882
00:54:12,314 --> 00:54:15,946
That's. Yeah. It's really, really
883
00:54:16,050 --> 00:54:19,586
exciting to watch. I've been very honored to be part
884
00:54:19,610 --> 00:54:23,362
of your career. Oh, thank you. And watch. And you
885
00:54:23,378 --> 00:54:25,854
always had ideas. We're almost on an hour already.
886
00:54:26,914 --> 00:54:30,570
But you always came up with new ideas. You're the person you gotta
887
00:54:30,602 --> 00:54:34,304
call this. Person to take care of. I'm like, Julie, I got, you know. No,
888
00:54:34,424 --> 00:54:37,968
but you gotta call her. She's. Any think tanks out there,
889
00:54:38,056 --> 00:54:41,864
give me a call. I will solve that problem for
890
00:54:41,904 --> 00:54:45,672
you. There is a wine think tank called Adoni Global. It's out of
891
00:54:45,688 --> 00:54:49,168
France, in London, and they think
892
00:54:49,216 --> 00:54:52,696
tank through the industry of fine wine, wines
893
00:54:52,760 --> 00:54:56,584
of caliber, that, you know, the history. Not the history,
894
00:54:56,624 --> 00:54:59,944
but the future of it, because consumerism has changed so
895
00:54:59,984 --> 00:55:03,682
much. And you got out at the right time. Yeah, you
896
00:55:03,698 --> 00:55:06,762
really did. And I feel. I feel extraordinarily
897
00:55:06,818 --> 00:55:10,546
fortunate to have gotten out with a deal like this.
898
00:55:10,570 --> 00:55:14,186
So. Yeah, no, it's very exciting. I'm happy for you. And,
899
00:55:14,290 --> 00:55:17,014
yeah, you're lucky that after. What was it,
900
00:55:17,794 --> 00:55:21,506
day after Christmas? The Stanley cup. Did you see all the, like, feed where
901
00:55:21,530 --> 00:55:25,314
the kids were getting Stanley cups for Christmas? It
902
00:55:25,314 --> 00:55:29,052
was like the hot gift. I would
903
00:55:29,068 --> 00:55:32,676
have been in here that Monday going, all right, we're going to put together a
904
00:55:32,700 --> 00:55:34,784
pouch that fits in the Stanley cup.
905
00:55:38,004 --> 00:55:41,580
So thank goodness, thank goodness, thank goodness.
906
00:55:41,692 --> 00:55:45,100
It's really, really great to see you. It's really great to hear the stories. And
907
00:55:45,172 --> 00:55:48,924
I think we have more to talk about. Maybe in the future as
908
00:55:49,084 --> 00:55:52,636
things settle. Down home and we have dinner together coming up
909
00:55:52,660 --> 00:55:56,396
sometime. Who knows when that is? Yes, we need to do that. And
910
00:55:56,420 --> 00:55:59,900
just thanks for coming in. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Cheers.
911
00:56:00,012 --> 00:56:00,744
Cheers.
912
00:56:09,564 --> 00:56:12,900
Thank you for listening to wine talks with Paul Callum, Cary. And don't forget to
913
00:56:12,932 --> 00:56:16,084
subscribe because there's more great interviews on their way.
914
00:56:16,244 --> 00:56:19,564
Folks, have a great time out there in the wine world. Cheers.
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