In July 2020 Wine Enthusiast Companies embarked on an update of practices supporting diversity and inclusion within our company. In June, we recruited an entirely new Human Resources team, including our first ever Manager of Diversity and Culture, to spearhead internal evolution. Over the summer of 2020, this included staff inclusion workshops and facilitated discussions by a professional diversity and inclusion specialist to better understand our challenges. We created a new process for workplace complaints that includes anonymous email boxes and a guaranteed safe space for all employee feedback.

A companywide anonymous Diversity and Inclusion survey was conducted in August 2020. In August, the HR division began conducting outreach to key members of the BIPOC wine community to establish better ongoing channels for broadcasting employment opportunities to a more diverse employee pool; that division is currently setting goals for 2021 and beyond that will diversify our full-time staff, especially in our Magazine/Media divisions.

Our entire staff will complete racial bias training in October 2020, and senior management will receive additional bias training before EOY 2020. We are also enlisting a third-party firm to explore pay equity throughout our company in October 2020. Ongoing Diversity and Inclusion training for the entire staff will be implemented via workshops, lectures and reading lists provided as part of our Wellness program, launched in August 2020.

Wine Enthusiast Companies is currently finalizing partnerships with major industry leaders and organizations that benefit diversity and inclusion efforts via webinars, donations, education, internship programs, mentorship programs and more, with announcements to begin in October 2020.