{"id":4836,"date":"2013-07-19T01:26:27","date_gmt":"2013-07-19T05:26:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planfoundations.com\/?p=3509"},"modified":"2013-07-19T01:26:27","modified_gmt":"2013-07-19T05:26:27","slug":"toasting-a-man-his-wine-and-pink-bunny-slippers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/toasting-a-man-his-wine-and-pink-bunny-slippers\/","title":{"rendered":"Toasting a Man, His Wine and Pink Bunny Slippers"},"content":{"rendered":"
The wine business in California is no place for whiners, as the CEO of Winery Exchange has learned. <\/span><\/div>\n
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\"ScreenHunter_143<\/div>\n
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Peter Byck<\/b> and I were classmates in Wharton\u2019s MBA Class of 1990. When I think about Peter, I don\u2019t think about wine or his success. I vividly remember the huge pink bunny slippers he wore while we studied or watched the Final Four basketball tournament. I can still hear his feet drag across the hardwood floor in his apartment in those goofy things.<\/span><\/p>\n

I had to ask, \u201cWhat ever happened to those oversized, fluffy, pink bunny slippers? Did you give them to your daughter?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He belly-laughed and said, \u201cHeck John, I don\u2019t know. I forgot that I even wore them until now.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou used to scare the hell out of me wearing those. I thought that you should know that,\u201d I replied.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pete intrigued me during our time at Wharton. He has the confidence, intellect, upbringing and street credibility of a dozen Wharton MBAs\u2014which is almost as scary as those bunny slippers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pete now is CEO of Winery Exchange; however, his success in the wine industry has not come easily.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"ScreenHunter_143<\/p>\n

Born in Holland, Pete\u2019s mother constantly encouraged him to \u201cbe your own boss\u201d and be philanthropic. Red and white wine flow through his veins from when his family acquired a ranch and converted it into Paradise Ridge Winery in Sonoma. His brother and sister run the winery today. Pete was the vineyard manager back in the day. He talked about planting the vines, hoeing the vineyard rows, and pounding stakes into the ground as he yearned for a bigger role in the wine industry.<\/span><\/p>\n

After graduating from Wharton, he moved to Australia to work for LEK, an international consulting firm with a major wine client. He developed a strategy enabling that client to ultimately become South Corp., the largest winery in Australia.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 1999, he co-founded Winery Exchange in California with the intent of bringing technology, best practices and innovative thinking to winemakers and retailers worldwide. It was challenging. According to Pete, the biggest obstacle that he overcame to build this successful business model happened when one of its major focuses, auctions, didn\u2019t work.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAlso my largest customer got acquired and went away.\u00a0 I had multiple layoffs and had to regroup,\u201d he recounts.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pete talked at length with me about information technology in the wine industry. After 12 years, his IT business unit has taken off, thanks in part to Pete\u2019s hire of Scott Diehl, WG\u201990<\/b>, to run its sales. It was exciting for this Class of 1990 graduate to learn that classmates Scott Hammond, Dale Pistilli<\/b> and Diehl had helped Pete with the initial Series A seed money to fund Winery Exchange.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pete took the Winery Exchange from startup in 1999 to north of $100 million in revenue today. For most of us entrepreneurs, that performance might take multiple generations of time. Initially, the Winery Exchange traded grapes and wine supplies and then pivoted to a private label wine company and completely refocused its business model. Formulaically, the business model can be expressed as:<\/span><\/p>\n

Technology + Entrepreneurship + Wine = Winery Exchange<\/span><\/p>\n

Put that into your HP12c.<\/span><\/p>\n

I asked, \u201cAs a father of four children and with a spouse who has developed a serious illness, do you have any advice for us entrepreneurial fathers and spouses out there?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

After pausing and sighing, he replied, \u201cStay in the present moment, compartmentalize your business and personal tasks, and focus. Otherwise, it overwhelms you. Let\u2019s face it; you\u2019ve got to work really hard. I\u2019ve been very open with my company about my family. They come first.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s note:\u00a0<\/em>To learn more about Peter Byck and the Winery Exchange, visit www.wineryexchange.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/i>To submit your own Wharton success story for possible inclusion in John\u2019s future blogs, email the author at\u00a0john@pioneerbusinessventures.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

– See more at: http:\/\/whartonmagazine.com\/blogs\/toasting-a-man-his-wine-and-pink-bunny-slippers\/#sthash.qtdNAldo.dpuf<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The wine business in California is no place for whiners, as the CEO of Winery Exchange has learned. \u00a0 Peter Byck and I were classmates in Wharton\u2019s MBA Class of 1990. When I think about Peter, I don\u2019t think about wine or his success. I vividly remember the huge pink bunny slippers he wore while […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3498,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[16],"class_list":["post-4836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-john-j-mcadam-blog","tag-anecdote"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4836\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pioneerbusinessventures.com\/nsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}