From Bubbles to Boardrooms: Meet CEO and Author Michaela K. Rodeno

Lifestyle Series

5:00 - 7:00 pm  •  Grant Thornton, 101 California Street, San Francisco, CA 94111

Michaela Rodeno will reflect on her long, successful career in the wine business and the boardroom, touching on company culture, career development, entrepreneurism, women in business, obstacles and opportunities…all illustrated with stories from her engaging book From Bubbles to Boardrooms. She will also talk about “so-called” retirement, which she says is great fun.

Michaela Rodeno is the retired CEO of St. Supery winery and one of the rare female CEO’s in the wine business, with a four-decade career in the Napa Valley. She’ll share life and leadership lessons from her wine career, and how she learned to become an effective corporate board member. Ms. Rodeno will be available to autograph books after the presentation. Books will be available for purchase at the event, or you may order your copy here: From Bubbles to Boardrooms, 2015 edition.

Michaela is bringing her own Villa Ragazzi wine for us to taste, as well as others from the wineries she helped build: St. Supery and Domaine Chandon. Light appetizers will be served.

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Speaker Bio

Michaela Rodeno
Villa Ragazzi, Owner

Michaela Rodeno is an experienced corporate director and recently retired CEO with extensive experience in building startup, premium consumer products companies. Her 40 year career in the wine business spans the development of two prominent French-owned Napa Valley wineries, Domaine Chandon (1973-1988) and St. Supery (1988-2009), from inception to financial success. Among her career achievements as VP/Marketing at Domaine Chandon was the creation of the first relationship-marketing program in the premium wine industry, the Chandon Club, in 1983. In 1988, Rodeno brought her consumer focus to St. Supéry, where she again built a strong database of direct customers who ultimately accounted for 50% of the company’s net income on only 17% of total sales volume.

As one of few female CEO’s in the U.S. wine industry, she was a natural choice when Silicon Valley Bank Financial Group sought a director to represent its fast-growing premium wine practice in 2001. After 10 years on the board of SVB, she joined the board of Bank of Marin in 2012. She serves on the advisory boards of two tech startups (the first part of Bubbles to Boardrooms is entitled “Startups Are Such Fun.”)

The Rodeno family also grows, bottles and markets a small amount of Napa Valley Sangiovese under their Villa Ragazzi label, which Ms. Rodeno single handedly relaunched in 2011 after a decade-long hiatus. Ms. Rodeno earned an M.A. (1970) and B.A. (1968) in French literature from UC, Davis and an M.B.A. (1980) from the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley. In 2010, she was named to the Haas Hall Of Fame, and to the Women For WineSense Hall of Fame.

Other hobbies or Interests: Ms. Rodeno remains active in wine industry leadership, serving on two trade association boards: Visit Napa Valley and the Wine Market Council. She also loves playing tennis.

Members, earn free admission by volunteering to do an event writeup and include photographs. Contact Sandra Camacho for further information.

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