Karen MacNeil

Author

Karen MacNeil is the only American to have won every major wine award given in the English language. These include the James Beard award for Wine and Spirits Professional of the Year, the Louis Roederer award for Best Consumer Wine Writing, and the International Wine and Spirits award as the Global Wine Communicator of the Year. In a full-page profile on her, TIME Magazine called Karen “America’s Missionary of the Vine.” In 2018, Karen was named one of the “100 Most Influential People in Wine.”

But deep global wine knowledge is only part of the story. Karen is considered America’s foremost wine presenter–a speaker who can enchant audiences from 5 to 500, and from wine novices to wine collectors alike. Her customized TED-like talks are accompanied by extraordinary wines which she personally selects for the event.

Karen is also the author of the award-winning book, THE WINE BIBLE, the single best-selling wine book in the United States, praised as “The most informative and entertaining book I’ve ever seen on the subject” (Danny Meyer), “Astounding” (Thomas Keller), and “A masterpiece of wine writing…the single best wine book written in years…” (Kevin Zraly).

The former wine correspondent for the Today Show, Karen was the host of the PBS series Wine, Food and Friends with Karen MacNeil, for which she won an Emmy. Karen is the creator and editor of WineSpeed, the leading digital “e-letter” in the U.S. for fast, authoritative information about wine. Her articles on wine and food have been published in more than 50 newspapers and magazines including The New York Times, Town & Country, Elle, and Worth. She was the first Food and Wine Editor of USA Today. Karen currently hosts #SipWithKaren, the leading Twitter tasting in the global wine sphere, which each month reaches 20+ million timelines from Indiana to India.

Karen’s firm, Karen MacNeil & Company, creates customized corporate events and wine tours around the world for companies and individual groups. Among Karen’s corporate clients are Lexus, Merrill Lynch, Disney, General Electric, UBS, and Singapore Airlines, as well as numerous law and biotech firms.

Karen is the creator and Chairman Emeritus of the Rudd Center for Professional Wine Studies at the Culinary Institute of America in the Napa Valley, which has been called “the Harvard of wine education.”

Andy Erickson

Vintner and Winemaker, FAVIA

I met Annie shortly after arriving in Napa Valley in 1994; we connected immediately through a shared passion for where we lived, what we did, and what we could do. We loved (and continue to love) growing things, creating, building, cooking, fermenting, preserving, and of course the results of all that activity. Growing grapes and making wine has become the center of our daily work lives, bringing us to many incredible places and helping us forge great and meaningful friendships. With our wine business, what started literally as a garage project has since bloomed into something sustainable, attracting a small but formidable team that has further strengthened our ability to grow and improve.

Though our development continues, I’m happy it still feels like a family business... just with a growing family.
As a winemaker, my goal is to highlight the character of each of the unique vineyard sites with which I work, whether at my clients' estate vineyards, or the vineyards that produce our own Favia wines. Experiences gained from a summer in France during university, and many subsequent trips to winegrowing regions in Europe, have fueled my enthusiasm for the concept of "terroir" as well as for wines made from special places.

While I am fortunate enough to travel and work with wineries in other parts of the world, I feel incredibly lucky to call Napa Valley my home and am constantly marveled by the diversity of soils and microclimates in this small but diverse valley.

Jessica Koga

Winemaker, Davies Vineyards & Schramsberg

Jessica’s first experience with Schramsberg Vineyards goes back to her working as the company’s lab intern in 2003. She soon joined the winemaking team full-time, as the enologist, following graduation from the University of California, Davis with a BS degree in Viticulture and Enology. Over the following three years, she was responsible for overseeing the winery’s lab trials, maintaining the company’s wine database and managing the records from each harvest.

In 2007, Jessica moved to New Zealand and then New York, working the harvests at Cloudy Bay Vineyards and Bedell Cellars. In 2008 Jessica found herself back in California, hired at Gundlach Bundschu Winery where she quickly earned the position of associate winemaker. At Gundlach Bundschu and sister winery Bartholomew Park, she worked on the production of over a dozen different varietals and gained the in-depth knowledge of crafting quality wine from start to finish.

In 2013, she took on the role of Assistant Winemaker at Vineyard 29 in St. Helena. There she handled the day-to-day management of staff and quality control for the estate Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc programs, as well as multiple on-site custom clients’ production, under the direction of Director of Winemaking, Keith Emerson, and Consulting Winemaker, Philippe Melka.

Jessica has now rejoined our winemaking team as a seasoned veteran. With the gained experience from so many quality wine producers, Jessica has the necessary skills to not only maintain, but grow the wine quality of the Schramsberg and Davies Vineyards brands.

Jessica lives in Napa and spends her free time cooking for harvest interns, reading and tackling scenic hikes when she isn’t visiting her family in Hawaii.

Weston Eidson

Owner and Winemaker, Silver Ghost

Silver Ghost founder Weston Eidson is a north Texas native whose interest in wine was formed at a young age. It continued to grow after college with trips to wine regions around the world culminating in working Napa harvest with Jason Moore of Modus Operandi Cellars in 2012. From here Weston founded Silver Ghost and Montagu Wines and continues to source some of the best fruit in the valley for his limited production wines.

Marla Carroll

Winemaker, Antinori - Antica Estate

After more than a decade of working for other iconic Napa Valley wineries, Marla Carroll has been named winemaker for Antica Napa Valley, an ideal position and location for her winemaking expertise, strong scientific background and lifelong love of the outdoors and nature.

A California native, Marla grew up in the Tehachapi Mountains, which separate the Southern California High Desert and the rich agricultural lands of the Central Valley. It was growing up here, hiking, camping, backpacking, that lay the foundation for her future interest in viticulture, and the environmental factors of the vineyard that ultimately shape its expression in the wine.

Marla obtained a degree in Biotechnology from the University of California at Davis with a concentration in Microbiology & Fermentation Science. While a few key courses at UC Davis introduced Marla to the world of wine, it was a position during harvest at Charles Krug Winery that sparked her interest in winemaking. She remained there for two years, then spent seven years at Franciscan Estate, moving up in a series of roles, including enologist and assistant winemaker. After some time off with her family, Marla returned to Franciscan Estate as winemaker, spending five years there before taking on the mountain estate at Antica Napa Valley, and all the rewards and challenges that it offers.

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