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Wine Industry Executive Profile: Shawn Loggins

GEYSERVILLE – From expansive vineyards on the floor of Sonoma County’s Alexander Valley, Trentadue Winery’s new president, Shawn Loggins, can see national and global markets where the wine should be.

In the three months since founders Leo and Evelyn Trentadue turned over the helm of the 30,000-case-a-year winery to him, Mr. Loggins, 46, has charted a course toward better recognition for the 39-year-old brand by streamlining the portfolio of wines and revamping the brand image.

The Trentadues’ son Victor has stepped into the role of brand ambassador and public relations, providing consumers with a connection to family history.

Mr. Loggins’ plans are based on a promise he made to the elder Trentadues that the winery will not only survive current market conditions now pressing on wineries of that size, but also thrive. He said that will require better connection with consumers by allocating existing production to the most popular wines,

targeting new retail venues such as club and convenience stores, building more of a presence in restaurants and banquet

venues, and updating packaging.

“We’re still a small, family-owned company, but we’re implementing big-company standards,” Mr. Loggins said.

He brings to Trentadue national and global experience in marketing imported wines from around the world. Aggressive marketing of imported wines has resulted in its grabbing more than 30 percent of sales, according to recent scan data from The Nielsen Co.

For the last few years, Mr. Loggins has been consulting with Australian Wines on U.S. sales strategy and with Cavino Italian Wines on setting up a U.S. sales headquarters and distribution.

However, his career in wine marketing stretches back to his days in undergraduate business courses at Cal Poly Pomona. He wanted to get into pharmaceutical sales, but all the

positions he sought wanted sales experience. The last day of classes in 1989 he saw an advertisement on the computer lab wall for jobs for those seeking a career in sales.

That turned out to be a job in sales with alcoholic beverage distributor Young’s Market in Los Angeles. Within a few years he rose to district sales manager, then manager of the region stretching from San Diego to Santa Barbara. Toward the end of his time there, he was offered a position with spirits and wine conglomerate Hublein, now part of Diageo Chateau & Estates, as a liaison to Young’s Market for California grocery chain accounts.

In 1994, when Hublein wanted to integrate the Glen Ellen brand acquired from Sonoma Valley’s Benziger Vineyards with its Beaulieu Vineyards brand in Napa Valley, the company tapped Mr. Loggins as head of western region sales. During that time he earned his master’s degree in business administration with an emphasis on international marketing.

In 1997, he started a several-year stint with Australian wine producers Rosemount Estate and Southcorp, both of which were acquired by Australian beer and wine giant Foster’s Group. At Rosemount as director of communications and marketing, he set out to discover as much as he could about then-competing wines from Southcorp. That knowledge paid off when the two merged, and he was made vice president of marketing.

What he has gleaned marketing imports and exports that will help Trentadue is that California wineries shouldn’t reduce prices to compete with imports. Globetrotting wine-makers from California have raised wine standards around the world.

“If you have quality product at a fair price, you will have repeat consumers,” he said.

The weakness of the dollar against the euro has created an export opportunity in Germany, France and the U.K., in addition to current Trentadue exports to China.

The major difference between wines from other countries and those from California is the others have to get known by U.S. consumers, according to Mr. Loggins. When he started at Rosemount, imported wines had little presence on U.S. store shelves.

“We have the advantage of having a tasting room, to get face time in front of consumers,” he said about Trentadue.

Other venues for “face time” include the La Storia Reserve Room, a hospitality center that hosts 70 weddings a year, four tiers of wine clubs and planned charitable cause-related events.

Resorts in South America are another export opportunity. In fact, Trentadue will be allo-cating more of its annual production to its La Storia on-premise-focused brand, which retails for $28 to $32 a bottle, by phasing out grape sales of estate-grown grapes.

Also ramping up will be the popular $14-a-bottle Old Patch Red screwcap-finished wine blend. Greater production of that brand will come from discontinuing some lesser-selling single-variety wines.

“You’d think the last thing I’d want to do is get on the radar of all the big wine and spirits companies, but I believe we can do some things better than the big boys,” Mr. Loggins said. “It’s the entrepreneurial spirit.”

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