Interesting essay by Brian Croser about Tom Selfridge. I had no idea that he was descended from the Del Monte founders. Rather I had heard about some connection to a department store in London.
The pictures of winemakers presenting their wines at the original KJ winery is mis labelled. The original winery was in Lake County.
Stories of corporate insanity at Beaulieu are legendary and fill books. I am glad Tom survived.
Thank you, Mel, for the correction; correction made!
The picture was probably taken at Stonestreet winery in Sonoma County. Knowing the people pictured and what they did, I don’t think it was taken in Lake County. Lake county is hard to get to so for years there was only one stop light in the whole county. Now there are three.
I have asked Dave Guffy. He got to work with Tom at Hess too.
Ack! Will hold off naming place until we get this figured out. Thank you once again!
Here’s how Tom Selfridge identified that location in an email to me back in November:
‘The location looks like the main KJ winery, Vinwood, outside of Healdsburg, and I would guess that this was a wine tasting and presentation for a major distributor sales force.’
One of the questions I have is, Why do some wineries succeed and others fail?
Sometimes the answers are easy and sometimes not so obvious. That’s why I wish people like Tom Selfridge would write tell-all books.