Download Wine MBA Podcast 12.09 MB 14:10 Min

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For those of you considering a Master’s in Business Administration, consider this: An MBA in Wine. There’s a program through the Bordeaux Management School in Bordeaux, France, and it offers this unique experience: “It’s a very beautiful region in the Southwest of France. It’s world famous for its wine brewing which is one of its principal activities.” That’s Alyson Grant, Program Coordinator for the Wine MBA Program. The program starts in Bordeaux, France. “They spend two weeks in January in Bordeaux and two weeks in March. Then, in May, they go to Adelaide, Australia. In July, they’re in Santiago, Chile. In October, they’re in Davis, California. Then, they come back to Bordeaux the following March to present their dissertation. And then, there’s the graduation ceremony.”

The four regions give students a taste of both Europe’s Old World wine making and New World wineries in Australia, Chile and California. The program covers the largest wine markets in the world. This way, Grant says the students get a global vision of wine. “Wine is a global industry now. There are joint mergers. There are people moving all over the place. You have to get this global vision of what’s happening. And the fact that they move around these places, gives them this vision of the industry.”

That vision is more important now than it’s ever been. “The industry has changed a lot in the last 25 or 30 years.” Robert Smiley, Professor of Management and director of the Wine Program at the University of California Davis, Graduate School of Management: “The impact of imports—the other countries such as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, France, Italy, Spain are becoming more aggressive in marketing wine in the United States as well as in each other’s countries. So, it’s somewhat of a more competitive industry. The wine quality is better. Focus on the consumer is more intense. That is, we’re trying more often to try and figure out what consumers want, rather than what a piece of dirt we have might produce. So the focus and the intensity of consumer marketing are substantially greater, and the industry is becoming somewhat more concentrated. That is, there are a number of larger players that are making acquisitions around the world, so that the number of firms is smaller, at least at the very large-firm end.”

The Bordeaux Business School saw that these changes in the wine business called for more specialized knowledge. Alyson Grant says the program brings the world’s oldest industry into the 21st century. “We started this program in 2001, after about a year of market study—traveling around, speaking to industry people, finding out what was missing in education in the market—not talking about wine making, or oenology or viticulture, but about the running of a wine business or selling wine, marketing and branding. And we found that there was a very high demand for this kind of education.”

The Wine MBA Program runs from January to the following March. It’s roughly 15 months, but it’s a part-time program. Alyson Grant says students attend classes for only ten weeks. The rest of the time they work on their dissertation project from home. “It can be a business plan. It can be something that they’re asked to do within their company that could be beneficial for the company. Once they give us the objective or the title of their thesis, we allocate them a professor. Then, he’s in constant contact with this professor who aids him along the way with the preparation of his thesis. There are various guidelines, and they are aided all throughout the year. They have a date limit where they have to submit. We had a lady from Chile who wrote a thesis on planning success in the European market. We had a Canadian who wrote about the effect of brand region and price on the purchase decision of low and high-involvement wine consumers in Canada. We’ve had a Chilean guy working in the UK market that did his thesis on alternative closures for red wine—talking about other ways rather than the traditional cork closing of wines.”

The Wine MBA Program is open to just 20 people who are fluent in English and have at least 8 years of professional experience. And most of the applicants are already working in the wine business. Here’s one profile of an alumnus of Bordeaux’s Wine MBA Program: “My name is Bob Anderson. I’m currently the CEO of Supreme Cork LLC, a confector and manufacturer of synthetic corks for wine and spirits bottles. I am a 2003 Graduate of the Wine MBA Program. The student body of our class, which was the second Wine MBA class, was a diverse group of students from as far away as Asia to as close as Canada and South America. It was a small class, initially, of approximately nine people. All were working professionals in the wine industry or with a future goal of moving into the wine industry. So we actually had several multi-millionaires in the class looking for investments in the wine business, who thought that before they put their money in, they’d best take an advanced program and see if it was something they actually wanted to do. They were very smart for doing that. I became interested in the Wine MBA Program from being in the wine industry and working for a US-based company looking to expand sales, marketing and distribution throughout the world. The curriculum allowed me to enroll in the program and participate as an executive and also in the countries where I do a majority of my business. So, it was very convenient to be in those locations as well. What I learned was mostly things you cannot get out of a book, but you do tend to get through travel and time spent with people and other cultures in different countries. And that is always a better way to do something—not always your way or the American way. There are people who have been in this industry or other industries for many years. Their approaches may differ, but their results and effectiveness may be greater. And the opportunity to learn and listen to their stories and their experiences, I felt to be very enriching and very useful.”

For Bob Anderson, getting an MBA in Wine was professionally beneficial. But how favorably are Wine MBA’s looked upon in the business? Chris Fehrnstrom is Senior Vice-President of Marketing at Icon Estates. Some of the wineries in Icon’s portfolio include Robert Mondavi Winery, Estancia Estates, and Ravenswood Wineries in California as well as wineries in Italy, New Zealand, Australia and Chile.

Do many of the executives in the wine industries have MBA’s? “It’s actually a mix, in that you have a lot of larger organizations in the wine industry that have a higher percentage of the executive team that have MBA’s—but not entirely. You don’t usually see MBA’s on the sales side or the executive side. But many of the mid-size to small companies—you really don’t see a lot of MBA’s. It’s episodic or sporadic versus more consistent. Whereas, if you go to the Gallo or The Constellations of the World, you see more MBA’s at the executive level.”

Can you explain what has changed in the wine industry in the past 20 years or so, that’s made it important for executives to have a business degree? “I think the important thing to realize in the wine industry is that, ultimately, it is a business. I get a fair number of resumes sent to me from folks who have been involved with wine on a hobby level for a number of years, and have decided they’re going to make a career change, and they want to get in to the wine industry. So there’s a lot of romance that’s associated with the wine industry, but at the end of the day, it is a business. And if you’re not making money, you will not be in business. So, a business background is absolutely essential. And what’s really changed in the course of the last 20 years in our industry is, obviously, the global nature of the business has changed. What we’re doing here in the US absolutely has an impact in Europe as well as Canada and Australia. And what Australia and South America and Europe is doing, has an impact over here. So when we’re looking at people— a better understanding of the global, competitive economy that we live in— is absolutely a plus. Now, the other thing that has changed in our industry here in the US is a consolidation among the different tiers. So, because we’re a regulated industry, and you have three tiers basically operating in the US, you’ve had consolidation that’s occurred at the distributor tier, you’ve had consolidation that’s occurred at the winery tier, and you’ve also had consolidation that’s occurred at the retail tier. So, that’s created opportunities and necessitated a better understanding from the folks that are coming into the industry as to how to ensure they have the right analytical skills to be able to make decisions on a business that really has become quite sophisticated.”

How competitive is the hiring process in the wine industries? Are there a lot of positions available? “It ebbs and flows. But I would say in the last couple of years, because of the consolidation that’s been occurring at the supplier side, it’s become more challenging to find opportunities in the US market place. And I’m going to speak to the marketing side of the business, since I’m responsible for the marketing as well as all of our international business and all of our visitor-center business here. But when we’re looking for someone with a marketing slot that’s open, we’re looking for somebody, obviously, that’s smart—that can think creatively, can solve problems, and that has good analytical skills. But we’re looking for somebody that has some background in the wine industry. We don’t hire folks that have no background at all in the wine industry.”

Do these executives typically move around a lot, or do they stay at one winery for a long time? “You’ve seen, once again in the last ten years, a lot more movement among mid-management and executive level employees around the world. So, it’s not unusual at all to have somebody working here in the US and find a position in Australia. I have a friend of mine who has done that a couple of times. He was working in the US on the marketing side; then he went over to Australia for three years and was a general manager at a winery over there. Then he came back to the US, was involved in the wine industry, and now, is over in New Zealand. So there is a lot of movement depending on who you’re working for and, ultimately, what your interests are and what your background is.”

Do you generally hire someone for experience rather than having an MBA? “I’ll give you the way that I look at it. When I’m interviewing somebody, the first think I’m looking for is if they’re smart. What’s their level of intelligence? When I say intelligence I mean, once again, analytical background with the balance of being able to think creatively. Because I think when you’re solving problems, it’s not just the analytical side of your brain that’s going to help you; it’s also the ability to think creatively about a solution. So, that’s probably the most important factor—whether you have experience, whether you have an MBA—I’m specifically looking for that. The other two elements I’m looking for are what your leadership background is and what you’ve worked on that has shown you have leadership experience under your belt whether it’s project-based or team-based. That is very important to me—the ability to take initiative and follow projects forward. The last element I look for is team work. How well do you work with other people? Because no matter what business you are in, the ability to work across divisions and departments is absolutely essential to being successful. Then, obviously, the experience comes into play. So I would look to experience first before an MBA. An MBA to me—since I have my MBA—tells me that the person has a set foundational level of understanding across the different disciplines whether it’s strategy, finance, marketing, production, etc. So I know that base is there, and I know the person has been able to successfully complete a program that’s given them that foundation. But that, to me, is not enough. It’s the other four elements I mentioned as well as the fact that they have some experience. That, to me, is a big benefit.”

For close to $30,000 plus several thousand dollars in air fare, students travel the globe’s wine country and earn perhaps one of the most delightful degrees out there. But, of course, Bordeaux’s Wine MBA Program Coordinator, Alyson Grant says it’s not easy. “They have very long days. And at the same time, they’re in touch with their companies. They read their emails and they’re trying to work at the same time. It takes a lot of organization and a lot of application on their part. But, at the end when they’ve done it, they are so, so, so proud!”