At Marimar Estate there’s a changing of the guard

Marimar Estate looks like a Catalan farmhouse and while it may seem serene, there's plenty stirring behind its Spanish arched doors.

A changing of the guard is underway at this Sebastopol winery with the promotion of Cristina Torres to general manager, setting in motion a yearlong transition that will give the 34-year-old millennial full managerial control by 2024.

What makes this passing of the baton between 77-year-old founder Marimar Torres and her daughter unique is that it veers from the tradition Marimar grew up with in Spain.

Marimar's family has been growing grapes there since the 17th century, and the business — Familia Torres — has been handed down from father to son since 1870.

“Running a business was considered a man’s job in Spain,” Marimar said. “In Spain, winemaking was not meant for women.”

The winery Marimar is passing on is one she created on her own terms. She said she was 29 when she started to dream about having a vineyard and later about having a winery. She convinced her family to back her in creating a winery in California. In America, she said, she knew she wouldn’t be stymied by tradition.

“I’ve always said we have dreams because we’re supposed to make them come true,” Marimar said.

Torres planted her vineyard in 1986, studied at UC Davis in 1988 and built her winery in 1992.

Passing the winery on to her daughter has always been a hope and a dream, Marimar said.

“I love my work and the challenge in it, but I never thought Cristina would want to follow in my footsteps because I have always worked such long hours,” she said. “I was delighted when she proved me wrong.”

The promotion, Cristina said, is sentimental on so many levels, but most of all because she wants to carry on her mother’s dream.

“I’ve never had any doubt in my mind,” Cristina said. “I’ve always been proud and excited to continue her story and carry on her legacy in California.”

Setting Cristina up for success

“You always want your children to have what you didn’t get, and in my case it was a proper education to run a business,” Marimar said. “Frankly, Cristina’s preparation is extraordinary.”

Cristina has a degree in economics from Princeton University and she earned a Master’s in Business Administration from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania in 2017. Before graduate school, Cristina worked for John E. Fells, a wine importer in the UK from 2012 to 2015. After graduate school she worked at Jackson Family Wines in California from 2017 to 2019.

Cristina is also fluent in Spanish, Catalan and French.

“Cristina has the experience I consider ideal to run a business,” Marimar said. “Plus she gets along famously with everyone in our Spanish family.”

Cristina joined the family business in 2020 and served as director of sales for the past three years. In her new post, she’ll oversee finance first, and production — vineyard and cellar — will be under her umbrella next year.

She will be overseeing about 25 employees at a winery that produces up to 10,000 cases a year from roughly 80 acres of chardonnay, pinot noir and three Spanish varietals — albariño, tempranillo and godello.

“In the past three years there have certainly been plenty of ups and downs, not to mention the extra exciting elements of COVID and the fires,” Cristina said. “My mom is and will still be very active with us working closely with us on strategic decisions, while I lead business on a day-to-day basis.”

Cristina said she agrees with wine business analyst Rob McMillan of Silicon Valley Bank, who said the wine industry needs to do a better job of embracing millennials in his recent State of the Industry Report.

While she didn’t share specific strategies, Cristina said attracting young drinkers something she plans to tackle.

As she sets out to lead the winery, she said she’s keeping this touchstone in mind from when she worked for John E. Fells, a wine importer in the UK.

“My sales manager at the time shared with me that ‘people buy from people,’” she said. “It was an epiphany for me. In sales and in life, right? Sales are about relationships. I have to say I enjoy building relationships with people.

“As you can tell,” Cristina said, “the best lessons learned in life, aren’t always learned in school.”

The duo

The petite Marimar with striking blue eyes and her tall red-haired daughter have an endearing camaraderie.

They often host tastings together at the winery and they’re particularly fond of pairing tapas with their Spanish varietals to give wine-lovers a taste of their Spanish roots.

Outside the winery, the two love to ski together and travel to exotic spots like Patagonia.

Raised by her mother, a single parent, Cristina said, they’ve always had a deep bond.

“We’ve always been close,” she said. “It has always been the two of us and the dogs, with the rest of the family in Spain.”

Marimar said that when Cristina was young, she often took her with her on trips and business events.

“Since Cristina was extremely easy to have around, if I were at a press lunch in London, she would take her book to read or color to entertain herself after she had finished eating,” Marimar said. “And if it lasted too long, she would just take a nap in the corner. Since she was born when I was 43 and I had given up on having children, it was an incredible stroke of luck, and I set myself up for enjoying her as much as possible. And I did.”

The superhuman role model

From the time she was a little girl, Cristina said, she watched her mom’s heroics in running the winery, from the vineyard to cellar. It turns out, she said, her mom has always been her best teacher.

“My mother taught me to have faith in myself and that challenges, setbacks and failures are an important part of the process and perhaps what you can grow the most from,” she said.

Her mother’s perseverance in founding a winery on foreign soil, Cristina said, has always impressed her. She also takes pride in the fact that her mother is fluent in six languages — English, German, Italian, Spanish, Catalan and French.

“She does not take ‘No’ for an answer,” she said. “Her tenacity and drive are honestly pretty superhuman.”

Trust yourself, Cristina said, has been my mother’s mantra.

“My mom has shown me and proven to me that, as we say in Spanish, ‘El no ya lo tienes,’ Spanish for ‘You already have the no,’” Cristina said. “I grew up always being mindful of structure. I was a rule follower, drawing inside the lines. My mom has shown me the importance of not limiting your expectations for what you can achieve.”

You can reach Wine Writer Peg Melnik at peg.melnik@pressdemocrat.com or 707-521-5310.