About Us
— meet the team —
FOUNDER, OWNER, WINEMAKER
Alice Warnecke Sutro is an artist, winemaker and grapegrower. She founded the wine label SUTRO in 2012 and manages all aspects of the business. She is also proud to work in agriculture for her family business: Warnecke Ranch & Vineyard, the inspiration for her wine label and where she sources Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Sauvignon Blanc. When she wears that hat (and boots) she is assisting her aunt, Margo Warnecke Merck, to manage the family’s 80-acre vineyard growing premium grapes for winery clients. She is deeply interested in the long-term potential of her local agricultural community and in 2019 joined the Alexander Valley Winegrowers Association Board and is now Vice President. Despite being a busy wine entrepreneur, contributing to her family business and raising two kids, Alice continues to pursue drawing and writing. She holds a BA in Art History from Stanford University and an MFA in Painting and Drawing from California College of the Arts. She draws large scale live portraits for community projects and exhibits her drawings locally (www.alicesutro.com).
CHIEF OF OPERATIONS AND CLUB MANAGER
Kaitlin Childers manages office operations and direct to consumer sales for SUTRO. She has been with us since 2017 and under her guidance we’ve “grown up”. Kaitlin streamlined our e-commerce and fulfillment and made our data beautiful and accessible. She loves spreadsheets but even more so, she loves the humans that populate them. She is mother hen to all our customers, facilitating everything from wine club allocations, special gifting and annual vintage releases. Kaitlin has worked on farms and keeps a garden and chickens with her winemaker husband and two boys on Fitch Mountain in Healdsburg. But mostly she has worked for wineries in all types of administrative capacities, most recently Gustafson Family Vineyard, and previous to that in Central Otago, NZ. She has some secret weapons: yoga and Japanese, which rarely come in handy for wine sales, but when they do, THEY SURE DO. She has a Macgyver capacity for getting by with any type of resources and a strong sense of family. Both of which are invaluable to running the type of business that we have, on a small budget but with a big heart and a sense of family. She has recently launched a small-lot wine label called Camp Rose Cellars.
WINEMAKING ADVISOR
Lisa Bishop Forbes is an award-winning, creative winemaker. She joined SUTRO as consulting winemaker in 2020. We were captivated by her breadth of knowledge, deep understanding of our specific region. As someone with kindness always in their eyes and thoughtfulness in their words, we knew she would be a great fit to balance the many factors at play being a small production wine label dedicated to family land. With a Bachelor of Science degree in Enology from Fresno State in her back pocket, she started her star spangled career: enologist at Joseph Phelps Vineyards, assistant winemaker at Chalk Hill Estate, then off to Dry Creek Vineyard where she was promoted to winemaker, then back to Chalk Hill Estate as Director of Winemaking for 5 years, and finally now Ektimo Vineyards and Ross Road Custom Crush winemaker. That is almost 15 years making wine within 1 mile of us! We’re honored to work with her to grow our wine program with the consistency of her great palate vintage over vintage. Lisa lives with her husband and son in Windsor and has served on the board of Women in WineSense and is still an active member. Lisa offers guidance and mentorship, supporting Alice’s role as winemaker with experience and enological knowledge.
