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Case Study: Hiring a General Manager for a Family-Owned English Winery

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This English winery had been founded by a successful entrepreneur from outside the drinks industry. The owner invested heavily in viticulture and winemaking while continuing to run other businesses. The winery was still at an early stage of development. Strong production quality, well-priced wines and a good local reputation with growing cellar door sales. Tours, tastings & cheese-and-wine experiences were increasing customer traction.

The team reflected the profile often found in founder-led wine businesses. Several employees had joined early in their careers because they lived locally, loved wine and the project. Over time, they had become capable generalists, handling everything from cellar door and operations through to logistics and administration.

Commercially, the winery remained weighted towards direct-to-consumer sales and local reputation. However the goal was to expand distribution across London and the South of England and to develop a presence in the export markets.

The Initial Brief

To recruit a General Manager capable of taking the winery to its next stage of growth. Someone who could professionalise the operation while building stronger commercial and trade capability. There was a clear ambition to expand distribution, develop relationships across London and the South and develop export growth. At the same time within the winery this person would run the operational and hospitality evolution of the estate and manage the existing team.

The Real Assignment

The deeper mandate was not simply commercial growth, in fact the owner ultimately wanted to step back. After years of being fully immersed in the winery, they wanted more freedom to focus on special projects potentially developing other products. Certainly no longer dealing with the day to day challenges.

With founder-centric businesses like this the culture and decision-making all revolve around the owner. The brief for the successful candidate was actually more than operationally running a winery and creating more commercial opportunities. They would need to grow the business professionally without losing the culture, expand trade sales and gain the trust of both the founder and the existing team. In reality, this was less a standard GM hire and more a succession and transition challenge.

Internal Candidate Dynamics

One more level of nuance came from the existing team. Two long-standing employees both believed they should be considered for the GM role. Both were highly capable and valued by the owner and to lose them in this transition would be careless: they carried so much of the winery’s accumulated operational knowledge. Neither had national trade exposure, experience building distributor relationships as they had joined the business as juniors and learning everything on the job. The business needed to move past its “lets learn as we go along” ethos.

The Structural Hiring Challenge

No hybrid working, 5 days a week at the winery. This setup does not map with commercial functions in the wine industry that have been structured in a hybrid/remote fashion since well before covid. The talent pool therefore became narrow and very locally based.

Key Search Considerations

The success of the search depended on both finding a commercial match as well someone who could manage the emotional and organisational dynamics. In order to do this we created some priorities:

1. The Founder Transition Had To Be Explicit

Any incoming GM needed operating autonomy, but this could only happen if the owner clearly defined: which decisions remained theirs, which decisions transferred to the GM, how visible and involved they intended to remain day-to-day, how disagreements would be handled.

2. Internal Team Members Needed A Future

The 2 team members were put into the process for the role but framed as career development. We met with them and carefully explained what the role required and why their experience could not map successfully at this point. These were actually lovely conversations – what they both wanted was an understanding of the path to take in order that in 5 years time they would be ready to step into a GM-type role.

3. Cultural Fit Mattered As Much As Capability

This was not a corporate environment but yet the founder wanted someone who brought an element of that alongside enough entrepreneurial flair to work within an evolving business.

Conclusion

What seemed like a straightforward GM search for an English was in fact a leadership transition exercise involving founder succession, organisational professionalisation, cultural preservation, internal talent management, and commercial scaling.
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Case Study: Hiring a General Manager for a Family-Owned English Winery