Master Sommelier: Laura DePasquale's Journey in Wine Pt. 1-6

Forrest Kelly
00:00:01

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:00:01

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast with Forrest Kelly.

Forrest Kelly
00:00:06

We have a very special guest on a topic we've never broached before. This should be exciting.

Laura DePasquale
00:00:13

I figured I was like, how many? Like, rip this out in five minutes, see some editing involved.

Forrest Kelly
00:00:19

The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Laura DePasquale
00:00:22

Laura DePasquale. I'm the senior vice president for artisanal wines at Southern Wine and Spirits, and I'm also a Master Sommelier.

Forrest Kelly
00:00:31

Okay, Laura, before we get into Southern Glazer's, wine and spirits, and what they do, and your title is VP and the artisanal wine category, let's get a little background on you. So you're growing up in New York, and then how did you get to where you are now?

Laura DePasquale
00:00:48

Totally by accident, I thought that I would be a famous artist.

And so I went to undergrad school in DC, back to New York City for graduate school, working as a painter, and of course, having to actually make a living. I started working in some great restaurants and by accident, some really great restaurants, and started learning about wine.

And I wasn't really into wine, but I understood that as a server and as a manager, selling more wine, of course, meant that I would make more money.

And then I relocated to Miami, Miami beach, in the heyday of South beach, still not into wine and then, but still trying to make it as an artist and working in restaurants, you know, the best restaurants at the time in Miami. And by accident, I mean complete accident, I found the chorister sommeliers and took the intro class at Disney in Orlando.

A friend of mine was going to FIU for his master's degree in hospitality, and he came up to me and he said, there's this class. Will you go with me? You're the only person that I know that knows anything about mine, and I want to cheat off your paper.

So we went and we didn't even. We weren't even enrolled. We just showed up. And I was like, hi, can we take your class? Who are you?

And I was like, well, I work at, you know, Norman's with Norman Van Aiken. Good, award winning chef. And he was like, yeah, we'll let you guys in.

And then I, three master sommeliers talk about wine in a way that I had never heard before. And it's like I had this ginormous epiphany where everything I loved in the world collided.

Art, travel, culture, history, farming, geography, tales of lore. And I just looked at him and went, I'm gonna be a master psalm.

And so I back to Miami after having passed level one at that point, Norman decided that he needed a dedicated sommelier. So he made me this man the floor. And then I started interacting with people in the trade, in business.

So whether they were working for a distributor or they were working for Porter, everybody came to Norman's because it was the restaurant in Miami at the time, and I was the Somme. After a couple of years, I started looking at this, going, you know, I could do that. My art wasn't going anywhere.

I had my solo show in New York and my solo in Miami, in Philadelphia, and I'd won a bunch of grants, but I just couldn't make a living.

I was getting to a point in my life where I needed to make some adult decisions around things like health insurance, not working every holiday, not working every weekend. And so I decided to take the leap. And I was pursuing the Ms degree, and I went into the business side, working for an italian importer.

That's how the career started. So I've been in the wine business for over 20 years.

I spent years at that italian importer, working my way up to vice president of fine wine, and then left to join a distribution company. Fell in love with the distribution aspect, rather than what we call supply or by chain, which is what I have been doing working as an importer.

And then eight years ago, I brought a business to southern Glazer to establish a new boutique artisanal wine division across the footprint or across the country in the major markets. And so I travel extensively to the states, and then I also travel extensively through wine company.

France, Italy, Spain, Germany, South America, the United States, of course, working with our different wineries, recruiting different wineries, discovering new regions, new up and coming wines, and convincing them to be part of our distribution footprint and helping them build their brand.

Forrest Kelly
00:04:32

We'll get into the technical aspect later, but just how about a layman's overview of Southern Glacier's wine and spirits?

Laura DePasquale
00:04:39

So, Southern Glazer wine and spirits. I joined the company eight years ago, and they are the largest distributor of wines and spirits in the world.

So we distribute alcohol products in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean, representing everything from vodka to Cheval Blanc to Camus to Josh Sellers. And I'm senior vice president of artisanal Line. I've always been based in Miami, but I travel extensively.

Forrest Kelly
00:05:12

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:05:13

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast with Forrest Kelly.

Forrest Kelly
00:05:18

All right, let's dive deeper into our conversation with Laura de Pasquale.

Laura DePasquale
00:05:22

How am I ever gonna get ahead?

Forrest Kelly
00:05:24

And he said to me, The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Forrest Kelly
00:05:29

Being a female with 20 years of master psalm experience. Coming up on that. Is it difficult to not only get in the business, but to be taken seriously?

Laura DePasquale
00:05:38

Yes and no is my answer. I will say that over my 20 year career in the industry, it's gotten a lot better.

But I can tell you that the first ten years were extraordinarily difficult. I would be the only woman as an executive in the room at all times.

No matter what state I was in, whether I was in Omaha, Nebraska, or Los Angeles, California, meeting with the top executives, I would be the only woman in the room. And I will say that over the last ten years, and specifically the last five to six, it has gotten a lot better. We still have a long way to go.

It's a lot better. And I'll share a story with you. When I first entered the business, I was working as the Florida state italian wine specialist.

It's my first job in the industry, and I loved it. Loved it. I was like, oh, my God, I wish I had done this sooner. And I just absolutely loved it.

And so after, I don't know, maybe two, three months, I went to my boss, who was a gentleman, and he was a great boss, and I said to him, how am I ever going to get ahead in this business? And he said to me, well, what do you mean? And I said, look, I'm not going golfing. I'm not taking up golf. I don't like golf, right?

So I'm not doing business deals on the golf course. I'm not hanging out at night at the bar having cocktails. I don't like cocktails. And I want to go to sleep because I've got a busy day in the morning.

How am I ever going to get ahead? And he said to me, I really don't know what to tell you, but I think you'll figure it out. And that was extraordinary.

Like, how could your boss say that to you? I don't know what to tell you.

I did figure it out, but it was really, you know, articles that have been written about me over the course of the year have always labeled me as a groundbreaker, as someone who is connecting the dots and pushing the glass ceiling and being a pioneer, as well as after I, when I joined the industry, I was not a master of sommelier. I was pursuing the degree. It's a very difficult degree. There's only 30 women in the, in the whole world that achieved it.

I was pursuing it, and after I pursued it, so I joined the industry in 2001. In 2004, I passed and got my diploma in London. And my boss at the different boss now at the time, sat me down and said, you have a choice to make.

And I said, oh, what would that be?

And he said, and we'll support it either way you want to go, but you can either continue on your business track, because by that time, when I passed, I was now national sales director. So I had gotten two promotions. He said, you can continue on this business track, or you can become a personality, and we'll promote you.

Which one do you want to do? And I didn't hesitate. I was like, I want to be that groundbreaking person.

I want to be that woman in the business that carves a path and shows that it can be done for women that are up and coming in the industry. And he said, I knew you would say that, and I'm so happy you did. Let's go. And so we did.

And so within two years, I was promoted to vice president of that company. You know, had my first seat at the executive table.

Forrest Kelly
00:08:47

Can you attribute some of your success that you continue to have with your upbringing and your parental upbringing?

Laura DePasquale
00:08:54

Probably all of it. You know, I think I really didn't understand who I was when I entered and entered the business, and the business really helped.

And becoming a master sommelier, just that achievement helped me find my voice as a leader. I can't say that I've done everything correctly because it's trial and error sometimes.

And at the time, the industry was still pretty improvised in a lot of ways. And people were in seats that you just sort of looked at them and go, how did you get this job? Like, you're completely incompetent.

And it was for sure trial and error and a lot of coaching. That gentleman who sat me down was an extraordinary boss, and he was my boss for seven years.

At the time, there were no formal mentor mentees programs, but he was an incredible coach and mentor. And we would have a standing phone call no matter where I was in the world because I was traveling a lot. I've always traveled a lot.

730 Tuesday morning. No matter where I was, was our time.

And he would say to me, like, if I had done something that, you know, maybe I shouldn't have done out in some market or said something to somebody or something, something, he would say to me, okay, so a little dentist coaching, and I would be like, what did I do?

But he just had such a great way of encouraging me, promoting me, empowering me, making me feel valued, making me feel important, making me feel like I was making a difference, making me feel that I was doing a good job. And I've always been described as driven, headstrong, independent. I just knew that I really wanted to succeed.

And I think some of that is growing up at the time that I did in a very humble upbringing. And I think part of it is just my passion and drive and love for representing the wineries that I do.

This current role that I have at Southern Glazers is the dreamiest job I could ever imagine. I am empowered to create something that doesn't exist for a very powerful company. I have incredible resources and support.

And I feel like at this point in my career, not only am I helping to develop the next generation of leaders, but I'm also helping to sustain generational farming, generational wineries, traditional wineries, and providing new, innovative wineries. The opportunity to become commercially successful. So I just love what I do. I just love it.

Forrest Kelly
00:11:22

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:11:23

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast with Forrest Kelly.

Laura DePasquale
00:11:28

Southern Glaziers is a family owned company moving into its third generation. They've been very humble about who they are and what they've done for the industry and for the people that are employed there.

Forrest Kelly
00:11:43

This is one of the joys that I get from doing the podcast is finding out about companies that, of course, we all have to worry about the bottom line to pay the bills and et cetera.

But once you get past that point, what can you do as a company or an individual to make our environment and those around us in the environment better? So I'd love to hear about companies like Southern Glazier's wine and spirits doing great things.

Laura DePasquale
00:12:07

And so it's really more focused as well as charitable and community efforts. So the Chaplin family that owns Southern is incredibly philanthropic.

Forrest Kelly
00:12:18

Looking at the dictionary definition of artisanal, it means something is made by hand or using traditional methods by a skilled craftsperson or artisan. And so taking that, how does that translate into the wine category? I know I'm putting you on the spot, Laura.

Laura DePasquale
00:12:34

Yeah, that's a great question, but, you know, it's interesting.

So when I brought the concept to southern glazers, one of the things that had always really bothered me about the wine side of the distribution and importation business is that if up to ten different people with knowledge and ask them, what is fine wine? I'm going to get ten different answers. And all ten of those answers will be correct. All profoundly different.

And the industry has consistently tried to define fine wine by price.

But how do you tell somebody who's making 2000 cases of an extraordinary pinot Grigio that sells for $20 that they're not fine wine, because they're not, you know, $50 or $80 or $100 a bottle. It just doesn't make sense.

So, as the largest distributor, we have a lot of market control and market perception, not just from a dollar standpoint, but marketing perception. And so I. Part of the business plan that I presented is why are we not defining the categories of wine?

Big commercial brands that are looking to scale and get bigger. Fantastic. Great. Then there's fine wines that are of a certain production level that may or may not be looking to scale.

And then there's brands and wineries that will never scale, because wine is not like spirits. Spirits, you just turn on the still and make more. Essentially, wine's an agricultural product.

And in many parts of the world, especially Europe, you can't just plant more vineyards. It's not allowed. You can't extend your boundaries.

Either the law tells you you can't, or there is no more, or it's price to plant more vineyards or to expand the boundary of what your region is.

And then even if you can plant more vineyards, you're looking at seven years before you get a grape, a good grape, right, where you can really make some great wine. So we've had defined three different categories of wine, artisanal wine, fine wine and wine.

And we've defined it really based around production and or availability into the United States, because not every european wine in Italy or in France sells every single bottle that they make in the United States. They have multiple markets, whether it stays within their own country or they sell to Asia or South America or other european countries.

Forrest Kelly
00:15:02

So I imagine that you get a lot of satisfaction not only being senior vice president of commercial operations for artisanal wines at Southern Glazer's, wine and spirits. But in your role, you're actually being able to add some clarity and definition to the specific category, 100%.

Laura DePasquale
00:15:20

And that's really part of why I pursued becoming a master sommelier, was because sitting there watching these three people talk about wine in a way, as I said that I had never heard anybody speak about wine before, I also realized that no matter how much I knew, I'd always be learning something. Always, always, always. And so I've been a master psalm. I can't believe it. But it's almost 20 years. It'll be 20 years in November.

And I learn something new about wine every day.

Forrest Kelly
00:15:48

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:15:48

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast with Forrest Kelly.

Forrest Kelly
00:15:53

We continue our conversation with Laura de Pasquale of southern Glacier.

Laura DePasquale
00:15:59

Women of a certain age were, were told well, you're being too.

Forrest Kelly
00:16:05

We'll let Laura finish that statement in just a moment. But first, the mentorship programs at southern Glacier. Now, these have traditionally been male dominated sectors like supply chain or logistics.

But how do you ensure that women entering the wine business receive the tailored guidance that they need to thrive? Specifically, can you tell me about that?

Laura DePasquale
00:16:24

So specifically, we have multiple mentor and mentee ship programs within southern glaser. We have leadership development programs. Everything starting from new leaders to advanced leaders to senior leaders to executive leaders.

And these are really highly developed, extraordinary programs.

You either nominate your employees to go into one of these programs, with the exception of the Exceptional Leaders program, which is by application, and it's a very competitive program. And this is really like the bench for our next generation of senior leaders and executive leaders.

We also have something called next gen leaders, where we are by application, bringing in recent college graduates. They spend two years with us working in different departments.

I think what employees and people who are looking to get into the wine or spirits distribution side don't understand is all the extraordinary opportunities.

So while you might start as a sales consultant and work your way up through the commercial channel, right, area manager, district manager, sales director, maybe a sales vp, there's also other applications, right. Business intelligence, financial, pricing, marketing, logistics. Supply chain is huge, huge. Our b two b development.

So there's extraordinary opportunity.

And in this next gen program, these recent college graduates get to spend three months in very different departments or divisions so they can say, oh, wow, I thought I wanted to be on the marketing path or in the portfolio management path, but what I really love is supply chain and logistics after spending, you know, my time with them. So I'm going to go down a supply chain logistics path. So there's a lot of opportunities and a lot of different paths you can go down.

Forrest Kelly
00:18:23

It has to be a bit gratifying. But I imagine that over the course of your career, you've seen opportunities open up for women in leadership roles, correct?

Laura DePasquale
00:18:33

100%. You know, I'm no longer the only woman in the room. There's usually several, which is fantastic.

My boss is a woman, Cindy Leonard, and she's the executive vice president of wine. And so that's extraordinary. It's really changed.

In fact, I now have times where we're a group of women leaders together, not because we're the women's group, but because we're the leaders and we have happen to be women.

And so it's super gratifying as a woman who's been in the business for over 20 years and a woman that used to be the only woman in the room to sit in a room with all women putting together a strategy, a business plan, a brand launch, whatever it is that we're working on. It's a moment where I quietly, personally to myself, sit back and go, yeah, it's good now.

Forrest Kelly
00:19:27

And this is kind of a sensitive topic.

I want to put this delicately, but I always felt like there's a double standard between, for women in passion, differentiating between passion and emotion.

So can you coach or can you teach somehow to embrace their passion without it being misinterpreted as emotional and professional settings, especially when you're advocating for an important decision. How do you, how do you deal with that? Is that teachable?

Laura DePasquale
00:19:54

Yeah, I think that's. I think that that is, is one thing that is very important.

And I think women of a certain age were, were told, well, you're being too emotional in a business setting. And it always used to bother me when people said that, and it was like, oh, I've got to. Okay, I've got to, like, check that.

And then, you know, I came to a place with that where it's like, am I being emotional or am I being passionate?

Forrest Kelly
00:20:17

Yeah.

Laura DePasquale
00:20:17

And those are two different things. If I passionately believe in a, in a winery, right.

Or I passionately believe in a hire, for example, somebody is, there's a, there's a job opening, and I'm putting forward my case for why that person should be hired over this person, or why we should put our resources on this brand launch versus that brand launch, or why we should target these markets. And I personally believe it, and I have facts to back it up. It's not just, you know, well, I think so.

You know, I think that finding that balance is really key.

And what I sometimes see missing today, and when I'm mentoring a woman in particular whose career is on the rise, I will tell them, listen, don't be afraid of that word emotional. I mean, it's one thing to break down in tears. It's another thing to be passionate and firmly believe in what you want to get done.

Forrest Kelly
00:21:08

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:21:09

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast with Forrest Kelly.

Laura DePasquale
00:21:14

The other thing is, and this used to kill me 15 years ago, the main buyer of wine, the largest consumer.

Forrest Kelly
00:21:23

The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Forrest Kelly
00:21:26

Okay, Laura, going to take that multitasking talent you speak of, going to put it to the test here.

Now that you've seen the increased involvement of women in leadership roles within the wine and spirit industry, have you witnessed or seen a change in the way products are consumed and marketed.

Laura DePasquale
00:21:42

I think one of the things that women have brought to the industry that was much needed is the ability to think quickly and multitask. I'm making a huge generalization here, right. But women have a lot on their plate.

And I think with women in the business, we make decisions quickly, and we can handle a lot of things at once. And as business has become faster and faster and faster, and that's really because of things like technology.

You know, one of the things that has changed the industry is the ability for accounts to order products online. Nothing replaces the ability of a sales consultant to walk into an account and pull a cork and taste that customer online.

You can't taste a new wine or a new spirit online. You can't. You can read about it.

It, you can get the pricing, you can actually even order it, but you can't taste it, and you can't hear the story, and nothing will ever replace that. But I think with women in the industry, we've been able to really push further.

The other thing is, and this used to kill me 15 years ago, the main buyer of wine, the largest consumer, are women. So why are men telling us what we want to buy?

And so as more and more women have, have gotten seats at the table, have become general managers of wineries, you've really seen a shift in the way wine is marketed, the way spirits are marketed. It's about the social aspect, the coming together. You know, the big program happening in October is come over October.

So all of the wine and spirits companies are marketing this idea. And it's not about let's go out and get drunk. It's about let's be social.

Was the piece during COVID that we're still dealing with as an issue, our kids. Just being with my mom, who's a senior, you know, her biggest issue was isolation and loneliness, lack of social contact. It really changed her.

And so there's a social aspect to having a glass of wine with friends. I'm in a book club, and part of the book club, when we get together every month is not just about the book.

It's about where we going most of the time.

We go out to a restaurant, you know, and we've got our favorites that we go to, and we order a bottle of wine and we catch up with each other and what's happening with kids or grandkids or our jobs or whatever. And then, of course, the book.

Forrest Kelly
00:24:01

Speaking of storytelling.

Oh, I can see that storytelling definitely enhances the customer experience, especially when it comes to offering wines from small boutique wineries 100%.

Laura DePasquale
00:24:13

You'll often have customers, retailers and restaurateurs that specifically only want to work with small boutique wineries. They want to be the ones to come out and say, hey, you know, to be able to tell that story to their guest.

Right, sitting at the table to make that guest experience something special. So they'll specifically say, hey, you know, I've got this new wine, and it comes from this really tiny region in Sicily.

It's two brothers that took over the vineyards from the grandfather. The grandfather and the father used to just sell the grapes, and now these guys started making the wine like they want those stories.

So it's a very targeted market.

I think that there's, with the world being so big and the world being so complicated and business being so competitive, no matter what business that you're in to, in those points of difference, those personal stories, those connections are more important than ever for my division. We specifically target those customers and those accounts that are looking for those types of products.

And those tend to be the more Michelin star, trendy, hip, James Beard chef, award winning restaurants.

So, yes, when you're talking about a wine program in a restaurant that's very large, it's important that that restaurant has a program that appeals to everybody, so that the person that doesn't want to deal with a sommelier or a waiter that loves to drink Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon has Keymas Cabernet Sauvignon on the list, because that's a great wine.

But you've got the other customer walking into this restaurant that's had Caymus Cay Renee Sauvignon 25 times, and they want to try something different. And so they're looking to that restaurateur going, listen, I love this wine. It's a great wine. I drink it at home. But where do you have the new.

What's different? And so we're really targeting that clientele, which has become bigger and more important as the world has become flat and the world has become big.

People relate to that artisanal touch. So those stories really relate to people. It's not for every customer. It's not for every restaurant.

There is a large, growing contingent of restaurateurs that are specifically looking for that. To own a restaurant today, post Covid, is more difficult than ever, and the failure rate is higher than it's ever been.

And so for southern Glazer, being an established, stable, well financed, well run company, we're able to keep these small wineries alive. We pay our bills in time. We have the logistics to move their product. We're not struggling to do that.

And that is really important, especially in today's economy.

Forrest Kelly
00:26:54

Welcome.

Forrest Kelly
00:26:54

Welcome to The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Forrest Kelly
00:26:59

We close out our interview with Laura de Pasquale of senior vice president of commercial operations for artisanal wines at Southern Glaciers wine and spirits. Is there something, Laura, that we didn't cover that you would like to maybe highlight as we say goodbye?

Forrest Kelly
00:27:15

The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Laura DePasquale
00:27:18

Yeah. I think that one of the most important things to understand about our industry is that specifically for wine is that this is an agricultural product.

This is farming. This is especially when you're dealing with artisanal wineries and fine wineries.

They're farming correctly and they're doing what's great for the environment. And I think that this is incredibly extraordinarily important.

I think as well, what we do is, is really based on what the customer is telling us, you know, what the consumer is asking us for. If the consumer tells us that they love Pinot Noir, then we're going all in on Pinot noir. We're responding to what the consumer wants.

And I think the other thing to understand is about our industry is that there's so much, there's so many products, and it's an industry that's constantly evolving and creating opportunity for jobs here in the United States, where most of these companies are family owned, whether there are distributors. In fact, all the distributors are family owned except for one. And these are homegrown jobs and homegrown career paths.

And it's not necessarily an industry that people think about like, oh, I'm going to go get my business degree because I want to go into the spirit or fine wine business. But there's incredible opportunities, and we're always looking for super talented, innovative, smart people to join.

Forrest Kelly
00:28:47

If joining Southern Glazier's wine and spirits sounds like a possibility, well, head to the website. It's southern Glaziers with azglazers.com careers. Click the tab that says search jobs. Boom. There you go. 477 results. Give it a shot.

Laura DePasquale
00:29:07

The one thing I do want to emphasize is that the industry did have a, had a very sexist bias perception for a long time. And I just want to say that having spent a long time in the industry now, it is dramatically different. And it's a pleasure to be part of it.

Forrest Kelly
00:29:26

Can we tell Hollywood that, like the last three movies that I've watched, the only expert in the room when it came to pouring wine as everybody's gathered around for that warm, fuzzy talk, is the guy pouring the wine? It's like, I know. Yeah. Everybody else is idiots.

Laura DePasquale
00:29:41

Yeah, I know. It kills me. You know what else kills me? And of course, I noticed this is when somebody like, there's a scene, right?

And somebody's drinking a glass of wine, and the levels of the glass are different, right? Because of poor editing. It's like, how did you not notice that?

Forrest Kelly
00:29:58

That's funny. I'm gonna have to watch that now to see those little oddities. Wonderful. Oh, man, you've been great.

Laura DePasquale
00:30:05

Super. Thank you so much.

Forrest Kelly
00:30:07

You're welcome. Thank you, Laura.

Forrest Kelly
00:30:09

Okay, from solving your tomorrow, we look for adventure at wineries around the globe. The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast Please, like and follow.