Job Description

Job Description:

Small Vines is a highly respected, family-owned winery looking for a meticulous, and detail-oriented person to join our tightly knit team as our new Assistant Winemaker. Dive into authentic, low-input winemaking, regenerative, organic viticulture and impeccable hospitality along with this Sonoma County Family. Create wines of distinction that you can feel good about and will fall in love with! Craft mostly Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Rosé and Sparkling wine-alongside our winemaker and consulting winemaker- as well as crush wines and varieties from all over the state for our fabulous clients in our small custom crush facility.

This role is focused mostly on cellar and wine work for Small Vines and their client’s custom crush wines. As a very small, tightly knit team- this position allows for great exposure to all aspects of the wine business with the flexibility of supporting your teammates in the field, sales, hospitality and fulfilment. Come join the fun on this beautiful property in Western Sebastopol!

This integral role should be extremely comfortable in the cellar, bring high levels of detail to managing the excellence of the world-class wine programs, and leadership of cellar team as well as the appearance, and functionality of the cellar. This team player should be flexible enough to support the winemaker and other team members wherever they are needed. While the day-to-day tasks for this position vary based on seasonality as well as the operation of other departments, primary tasks include but are not limited to:
•  Working closely with winemaker to plan and schedule winemaking actions, set vintage goals,
•  Tasting and reaching blending decisions with winemaker and consultant
•  Receiving, responding to, and scheduling all Custom Crush work-order requests
•  Forecasting as well as communicating and scheduling periods of major work (topping, racking, fining, filtering, bottling) to CC clients
•  Planning day-to-day operations of the facility, communicating instructions clearly to cellar team, and overseeing and performing tasks and wine work.
•  Ensuring facility is operational by managing, participating in, and/or ordering maintenance of equipment discuss winemaking experiments, continually improve crafted wines.
•  Ensuring facility has all required materials to operate (sanitizing agents, gasses, liquid and gaseous SO2, propane for forklifts)
•  Booking bottling dates for brand as well as for grouped client bottlings/filtrations.
•  Planning and ordering all bottling supplies for brand after discussing with winemaker
•  Organizing and performing quarterly barrel steaming
•  Forklifting barrels, fruit, and wine
•  Strategizing with winemaker needs for seasonal interns
•  Hiring and training intern team for harvest
•  Prepare facility for harvest season:
•  Managing overall facility cleanliness, sanitation protocols and functionality
•  Quarterly bulk gallon inventory report
•  Service and maintain winery equipment
•  Harvest duties include:
o Forecasting fruit arrival, Planning tank availability
o Planning intern schedule
o Overseeing daily worksheets, ensuring all brix and temp are logged, and all treatments and additions performed correctly.
•  Assisting sales department and fulfillment deportment when necessary
Any interested individual would need to:
•  Have an education relating to winemaking.
•  Have worked at least four harvests.
•  Have a passion for high end, low input wine and winemaking.
•  Be a highly detail-oriented person.
•  Be able to communicate well and be a leader.
•  Have a high degree of flexibility.
•  Be open minded to new ideas and methods as well as willing to share their ideas.
•  Be able to perform under stressful/fast paced conditions.
•  Be available to work on weekends during given times (harvest, bottling, filtration, etc.)
•  Be able to be trained to operate a forklift.
•  Be able to lift 60 lbs. and stand for long periods of time.

Ideally the person who fills the role could also have:
•  Basic Spanish / English conversational skills
•  Be handy, have repair skills, or be willing to become handy.
•  Have a willingness to learn.
•  Fit well into a small friendly group.
•  Enjoy playing with our Winery dog.
•  Be a fan of Champagne.
•  Likes to make work fun and have fun at work.

If you feel that you are able to fill the above requirements, please send your resume and a cover letter telling us what you can bring to our small team.

66,000-76,000 Salary DOE

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Job Tags

Full time, Temporary work, Internship, Seasonal work, Flexible hours, Weekend work,

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