Day 3- MB

Day 3- April 20

 

Mission Bell

 

Mission Bell was the only warehouse we went to on Wednesday. I was amazed on the size of the property. I believe Mark Nichols said the property is 90 acres in total. This facility also had the most security than any other we visited. This facility also has 3 forms of revenue, the winery, polyphenolic (grape seeds), and concentrate.

 

Before our tour we had a quick little meet and greet in the admin building. In the meeting was Mark, Erik stopped by to say hi, Erica, Roz, Rosa, Kris, and Jamie. Justin gave a quick At- Risk presentation. After I went around and quickly touched on information I had for the team and what I needed from them. I later followed up with Roz (on the tour) and Kris and Jamie in the lab.

 

The tall metal tube is a distillery, it really isn't used anymore. Next to it is the original winery, at the top is a bell. They still ring the bell once the harvest/ crush season is over.

 

The photo below are metal tanks that contain grape seeds for Polyphenolics. I was amazed that we had had that many grape seeds to fill up all those containers.

 

If you look closely at the photo below you can see the reflection of the tanks. This is actually a fire pond. Mark said this pond creates more issues with water than it does fire. What I took away from this is that Mission Bell has a pool haha.

 

These train tracks go right into the production building. There is a glass production site right next door which MB does receive glass from. The glass is brought over on a little train/ trolley.

 

This was one of the production lines. At MB they have different safety levels and because the girls had nail polish on we couldn't go into that part.

 

After we looked through the window of the "wet" side of production (where the wine is filled in bottles) we walked through QC. Here is where I meet Maribel, Kris and Jamie. It was nice to meet all of them. It was quick, but I still have Maribel give me a quick 101 on what she does. Seeing where they sat helped me understand their rolls better and what goes into entering product on hold and updating the memo lot 2 dates.

 

This is the machine they use to decant/ destroy the bad wine, but still collects the juice.

 

Black box wine- viewed from the dry side of production. Dry side refers to the product once it is already packaged and filled.

 

The below photo is the cooks line:

 

After viewing the lines we drove around the warehouse, it was so large in there it felt like a little city.

 

Roz drove Justin and I around in a golf cart for the tour and stopped at the mail room quick where Rex the Rooster is there to greet incomers.

After the tour I went with Roz to the distribution office to meet Theresa, Let and Pat. It was really nice to put a face to a name and see where they sat. We all just talked about out roles and how we interact.

After Mission Bell we head out and drove to San Fran.