Bring Life to Your Career

Speaker 2: hi I'm Melanie bar welcome to the she builted experience with Melanie you're here because you want to experience the life and business that you crave join me as I talk to women who have successfully built it a career and business that they love we dive into the topic of how they built it and talk about everything from

Speaker 2: when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy so let's dive in Gina leam is managing director and brand Warrior for Revel shine wine and outdoor intrinsics she is a marketing leader with a history of working in the consumer goods industry Gina has been creating and bringing stories to life for as long as she can remember with an insatiable appetite for the theater and a Theater Arts degree from Cal State Long Beach she approaches branding no different than directing a play her unconventional process brings a dimension to branding that drives emotion and experience and allows consumers to connect on a personal level her approach to Consumer products like characters have a story to be told we are looking forward to hearing more of your story today Gina thank you so much

Speaker 3: for joining us oh thank you so much for

Speaker 2: having me please tell us about your early career experiences and how they LED you to become the managing director

Speaker 3: of Rebel shine wine yeah it's not a straight line I think with most women you graduate college or if you decide that you're going into a vocation is that you always think you're going to just take this straight line and then life happens and kind of Loops you around and brings you into places that you never imagined I was a theater degree from Long Beach State I was part of a co-founding team uh at a theater that was one of the longest nonprofit theaters in Los Angeles and that was phenomenal I lived in La at the time I had a lovely career working for MV Griffin Productions which I was really excited about because it brought the theater part to my life and I could make some money and I didn't have to eat Top Ramen and then I had a younger brother who's 18 years younger and he really needed some big sister love and I moved down south to Orange County and I got a job out of necessity because I left my whole life in Los Angeles it was for an appliance company and here I had been working and really surrounded myself with passionate people in the theater working in the production side and then working for MV Griffin and I found myself surrounded by stainless steel boxes and I didn't know how to click with something that was just so plug it in or power it up and that's all it is so my challenge was for my own sanity is how do I bring life into my career and that's where it kind of all started that if we can create life into stainless steel boxes and have people relate to a kitchen appliance then I should be doing

Speaker 2: that no matter where I go no matter what product it is so I worked for Fisher imp pel an amazing Company New Zealand based and that was phenomenal I never thought again that I could love a stainless steel box as much as I did when I left it's so amazing because just your description just brought it to life right you feel for it you fall in love with it those appliances became almost like I guess you want to say the cornerstones of a stage because everything you do in a kitchen with appliances is a moment and I'm really passionate about moments because we're so fast-tracked that none of us stop and pause which is really a great segue into Revel shine but everything in the kitchen it's about bringing family together it's about sharing recipes I used to make lasagna with my grandmother so that was my Challenge and I became really passionate about those stainless steel boxes and then I left my career and moved up to Sonoma County to work with a really great friend of mine Jake bilbro on the glass bottle wine that he has limmer Lane he challenged us to bring to life what he had been thinking about for two years and that was Revel shine wines which is premium wine in an aluminum bottle and that was amazing because how do you bring stainless steel to life you can't see through it it's not glass and so here I sit today I guess the only spine I can say that's pulled me through is my passion for telling stories and moments and I've tried the wine it is lovely and the packaging is is beautiful and it speaks to the outdoor Adventurer yeah it wasn't easy it was really one of those challenges of you only have a finite space on a bottle and trying to take something that is community as Revel shine how do you tell that story and touch all seasons of the year and all environments where Rebel shine can be enjoyed and at the same time work with a very very strong Visionary like Jake bbro can

Speaker 1: you tell us who Revel shine was made for

Speaker 2: Revel shine was made for wine drinkers and people that experience wine at the premium level it's been intentionally grown for people that appreciate really good wine and it's also been created for everyone that wants to enjoy wine and moments outside of a ceiling we're the only ceiling that that you can be under is the sky the stars the moon the forest trees there's nothing above you besides the environment and if you love outdoors and you're love sharing those moments it's really solving the glass problem because people like wine they can't bring glass in those environments such a beautiful picture

Speaker 1: you mentioned working for MV Griffin how has your early career experiences influenced you as a business leader in what you're doing today

Speaker 2: wow that's a really great question working for MV Griffin and his family of companies was really about every voice matters at the table and being able to not see it only one way that you have to be open to see it always and I worked on the production side for the event side and movie

Speaker 1: premieres and concerts and Muhammad Ali anniversary things in theater you get a really great idea and you're the director and it's kind of your idea and you get to take a script and then you get to bringing it to life and it's kind of that's how it is but when I worked for the team at MV Griffin with with Mike and Tim um you come to a round table and you really get to hear other people's idea and it just catapults you passionately into thinking differently so sometimes you show up at a table and then you leave with something totally new and I think that's a really important thought especially today there's so much out there to be inspired by music and social media and some of the great art pieces up in somoma county and right now pianos are on every corner 30 Corners up here and they're being painted by locals and it's so inspiring

Speaker 2: because that's great yeah love that I saw people doing butterflies on one on my way down to Wiki up last week and I was so inspired I pulled over and I stopped and I just watched her paint I was thinking that's a moment that's Revel shine everything that's important right now is telling stories and have having I guess a breath you bring up such a good point of collective ideas it's so important to bring ideas together and I love how you see deeper into telling a story about a product or

Speaker 1: about a company yeah I can't say I always did that that's hard you know it's hard not to have it your way especially when you think you're so creative and then I realize that collectively my ideas are even phenomenal when I pair them with somebody else's really great ideas it's kind of again back to Revel shine wines it was really a a concept that Jake had had forever he challenged us with how do you take rivers oceans and mountains and put that on a bottle and we had all kinds of ideas of what that would look like and then we collaborated into that doodle I call it the doodle the front of that bottle is actually a doodle that I have on a piece of paper that was inspired to me by this don't you love that when you see an idea and it comes to together and it crystallizes and it becomes something my good friend's daughter made this during the fires that we had up here in Soma it's a beautiful picture of the sunset there's a beautiful grassy Hill and then the water and then some sand and so when I hit the wall on Revel shine to find something more creative I looked at this painting that this girl made me and I was like that's it sometimes you got to stop looking for things and you've got to start creating them and just look around

Speaker 2: your own own environment so true and what a beautiful memory of Hope and the future after the fires and I sent that to her when I sent her parents I didn't send her I sent her parents the very first Revel shine bottles and I just wanted them to know that Cadence had inspired me to work with Jake to create that bottle and such a good story such a good story yeah I love that has there been a particular life or business experience that is memorable to you that

Speaker 1: you carry with you into today I can't say that it's as positively passionate I love living a very fulfilled Life as a mom and as a career woman and as a brand maker and a managing director but when I look back at what's really shaped me for today it's really granular it's a mistake I made and I'll never do it again but it defines everything that I do now I was working in the fitness industry and we were sending this amazing new product down to QVC and I thought I had it I had you know all the product I had all the packaging the merch for the onset stuff and it's in Florida and it's at 500 a.m.

Speaker 1: I shipped all the product I neglected to take the tracking numbers and it was also the time of a storm and everything got caught in tennessy and we went live

Speaker 2: on QVC without product oh no oh no I

Speaker 1: live that now because it's really shaped details details details everything that we do even outside of careers as as parents and as partners they say the devil is in the details and it's check it over think of every single thing you've got to really make sure you're paying attention

Speaker 2: thank you for sharing that story because we're all human we all make mistakes it happens but it's so interesting to learn from right to think okay I probably wouldn't do that again I didn't lose my job but I certainly I had to eat a lot of humble pie for a really long time but I remember it like it was yesterday right I shipped n cases of of Revel shine today to Chicago and I made sure they're there three days early big fan of details myself I hear you what gave you the courage to make the leap to become the managing director

Speaker 1: of Rebel shine wine you just gave me chills asking me that question I didn't know I was being courageous at the time my story is complex I think I had hit a wall after 22 years working with Fisher and Pele and the pace in southern Orange County was really affecting my aura I call it the stop lights you know I had spent an hour driving to and from work which is only 17 miles in a myriad of stoplights where it's like it shouldn't be this hard to do things I pretty much honestly I collapsed mentally spiritually emotionally I just knew I couldn't keep going the same direction I was going so I took a Hiatus to really wrap my head around what was important to me and obviously yes my family that's always a given right my family was really important to me but I think for the first time in my life a couple years ago I realized that I hadn't made myself important to me I was the least important person in my life and I remember somebody said what brings you Joy and I couldn't answer the question and that's really difficult to admit when I'm surrounded by so much Beauty and so much that I'm passionate about but sometimes have passion and joy for other things and other people and I I neglected to have joy for myself so when I made the decision to come up here I had to do it like a Band-Aid we were lucky enough to sell our house very very fast and I was up here five weeks later know part of a really great Community working with Jake and Alexis Bilbo and the team at Li Lane at the time who are still part of the Revel shine family they brought me joy the environment brought me joy that there's a different pace and that's when the inspiration came back I felt like I was always inspired in my career at Fisher imp P which was glorious and I didn't realize what I didn't know until I got away from it and inspiration came flooding back like somebody had turned on the faucet or knocked over a fire hydrant because then it was happening faster than I could create and I was like oh my god I've been dead thank you

Speaker 2: so much for sharing that story and being vulnerable because we've all all had those moments we've all had those moments and it's amazing when you slow down sometimes you do speed up yes and and looking at you now and hearing you talk about Revel shine and what you do now you seem like you found your joy and that element and the right place for you

Speaker 1: to live yeah I mean it's beautiful and I think stopping you know Revel shine says take a moment of pause when I was at Fisher and P it was about moments with family um I really took my own advice sometimes we don't do that it's kind of like the airplane I was helping a lot of other things I just wasn't helping myself and I've been lucky enough to be inspired and there's bad days Melanie it's not all Revel shine moments it's not fun but it doesn't break me right you know it doesn't make me yell at my kids because they wanted grape juice after I asked them five times and now I put everything away right right where you're like grape juice we've been there've all been there really we've just done all this I gave you orange juice and you said you didn't want it's like now you want grape juice right so I'm I'm a little bit more even keeled and I'm not sweating the small stuff which is somebody used to tell me that all the time and I was like I don't even know what that means I totally know

Speaker 2: what it means now right you talked about details and the devil being in the details and lists what is your strategy for management for staying on task to accomplish what you set out to do as well as motivating your teams and those

Speaker 1: around you oh this is a great question because I'm honestly struggling with this right now because I'm a little bit all things to all people Revel shine um we're lucky enough to be working with amazing people all type A entrepreneurs co-founders and amazing people in their own Arenas but as I was talking to you earlier before this call if an order comes in right now because we just launched this week I've got to make sure that it transfers through that the money's getting to the bank that the order is dropping that somebody can ship it and I'm doing all of that because it's what you do when you are owning and starting a company and you don't mind doing it right it's a business baby it's the business baby as a Founder that's what you do so that 10 years from now you have empathy and sympathy for those that are doing it later in life and you know how long it takes truthfully and youve put together the processes and you've put all those things in place which takes time so the successful part of that is making sure that you're moving the ball down the field you've got to go forward don't go lateral you're never going to get anywhere so finish finish one thing like today 300 bottles of wines went out they're done tonight I will work on this and I will finish it and motivating my team is really about making sure that collectively we know where we're going we know the vision and don't be afraid to fail you know this is wines we're not saving lives we are not rescuing we are not surgeons and thank God that we really respect and love people who do things that are so Monumental I can't even complain about a bad day so true keep it in perspective it doesn't all have to be done on one day right and also making sure people and teams are doing the things that they love to do right and I've just started to go through my day and think okay who could help me do this that would say take a task that maybe I find a bit tedious and say hey this is something I love to do to get that piece off of our plates or to make your day flowy that's the truth of it I think people work more passionately and more attentively and more intentionally when they're working on things that excites them and it gets done more timely more efficiently and you can tell when people don't Jake said the other day as we're continuing to expand and we've got great people on the team now that I don't have to be all things to all people and he's like which parts of this do you want and I was like oh my gosh I've never been asked that because question in the past year and a half it's only been me my wonderful wonderful friend Caitlyn who has towed the line for Jake and I but nobody's I haven't been asked that question for all of Revel shine so it's a hard question now because I don't want to let things go but I know I should I love it all but do I you know it's like pros and cons list my dad used to say make a pro and con list and I used to like go oh that drives me crazy but it works so true and when you're in your Zone you wake up in your just motivated to do it you know and the the beautiful thing is we all like doing different things yeah as humans we all have an interest in different things putting those people in the places to do those things and putting you in the position where you get up every day and do what you love and you're able to focus on that is only going to make the company grow faster yeah and I love learning

Speaker 2: from people that have specializations how has your business shifted over the last year and don't know when exactly you l but I know it wasn't that long ago and what obstacles have you been able to overcome and what successes have you had we were set and

Speaker 1: ready to launch Revel shine in a big way in the spring of 2020 we were just getting ready to turn the website on and then my kids got sent home from school on March 13th because of this two weeks flat in the curve so we paused and then we paused and then it seemed insensitive and then the fires happened again up here in somoma county and it would be really insensitive and we really had to say we've got a shift Co has created unfortunately they've grounded everybody in in their homes and this is an outdoor brand and we're fearful so we can't be shipping consumables because people were fearful of what has come in the mail and what can transmit through the mail and we're a DTC brand so we pause and we waited for that little window in the summer there was a little window in June or July that they kind of lifted some of the restrictions in which we turned on the website made some quick easy announcements and you know watched it Go and the feedback from the consumers who were purchasing which is really a blessing we were able to get really great feedback with one-on ones and surveys and asking people what they thought of the wines and what they would do different and was this important so it helped us pivot do some beta testing and then at the same time um it allowed us to in increase our team and really honed in on who our outdoor adult consumer was so that we you know when we launch now which is actually this week we're up to 8,000 cases from 640 cases last year to 8,000 right now so great yeah we're being asked to be in all kinds of channels that we kind of knew would wanted we just didn't know it would be received so well so Hospitality

Speaker 1: Co has given us another opportunity to kind of again you have to be able to redefine you know you don't lose your vision but you have to be able to Pivot so it's really helped us say Okay um this was a huge obstacle how do we make the best of it we have to listen because we don't know at all right so we listened during the 2020 year and we made the right decisions so that when we launched this Year we We were a little bit more surefooted but I feel like Revel shine wines and what we're doing right now is going to be far more successful because of covid than what we would have done in March of

Speaker 2: 2020 so interesting because when you think about a launch sometimes it's like oh there's never a right time but for you and for Revel shine you had to wait for that right time and with everyone going out and buying RVs and traveling I could see that as also so another Avenue take wine on your trips cuz all of my friends went out and bought them to

Speaker 1: travel around the country yes part of that again there's never a great time to launch with wine you get a period wine like Revel shine is not meant to be stored it's not a library wine Ravel shine is about the moments you're about to have there's like eight of us and a 30 Acre Farm so it was like well we can't we all

Speaker 2: can't drink 640 cases of wine maybe we could have during Co I know maybe I did right maybe we all did so we had to go it was kind of like we got to go and thank God we did um and yeah the every industry right now like I said we're really lucky these Tre packages there's some really great boutique hotels around that you know especially the west side west of the Rockies that really do these pack in packout trips that they want to be able to get people on mountain bikes and it's like a three-day thing and they have Revel shine as the wines for their dinners around the the campfire and I mean it just exploded with ideas really

Speaker 1: great yeah love that magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy as we've talked about a lot today what is one tip that you can leave with us about how you

Speaker 2: find and live your joy I think Joy is everywhere when I was asked that question I mentioned earlier what brings you Joy my state of mind at that moment was it's something that I'm not doing right there's got to be something don't knit I don't surf there's something I'm not doing so that's why I don't have joy that's a reframe right the reframe is there's joy in everything just open your eyes to see it and pause I make homemade dog food for my dog because she's a princess it was a task it was an arduous task to do boil all this and do the rice and cut up the meat and do the cray roots and I was just like H I should just feed you normal dog food and let you itch all over it's fun I put on really great singer songwriter music and I find joy in making dog food it's not a task it's a frame of mind you know I love that there's joy in everything you just have to find it you do and be be willing to accept it when I was in a different life 300 miles south of where I live right now I couldn't have accepted it I was sitting at red lights I was going 5et in stopping and 5 feet and stopping I was so caught up at holding my hands at 10 and two trying to go somewhere that I had to loosen up on the wheel and just say you know what I'll get there when I get there because what I didn't realize if I look to the right there's something I hadn't seen before off the 55 or somewhere sometimes it's right there you just got to let go and look for

Speaker 1: it so true yeah so true thank you for sharing your story with us today

Speaker 2: absolutely thank you can you please

Speaker 1: share with us how and where we can find

Speaker 2: you you can find me living a lovely life up in Windsor California I'm a mom and I have two boys three pets you can find me uh on Instagram at g870 and I'm on LinkedIn more importantly wherever you find Revel shine wines you will find me and Instagram and Facebook for Revel shine pretty spectacular the moments we're creating is at Revel Shine for both Facebook and Instagram and I am looking forward to anybody and everybody that's having a moment whether it's with Rebel shine are just a moment because we can all use a little joy as a community

Speaker 1: share together thank you Melanie for having me I mean it's always great to talk to you if you are new to Sheil it we'd love for you to join us we offer Community memberships masterminds Innovative virtual events and meaningful connections to entrepreneurs and corporate leaders please also check out our she built it shop curated products from women-owned businesses who put their heart and soul into their beautiful and Innovative product we offer Sheil it business Consulting and the Sheil tip blog thank you to everyone around the world who joined today thank you to my editor Rich stalino please download And subscribe wherever you get your podcast and until next time together let's let nothing stop us from experiencing the life that We crave