Thursday, September 11, 2008
by: Isabel Bauer

Pamela Personette combined two passions, wine and education, when launching a business almost two years ago.

Taking Chances
During the technology boom of the 1990s many educators left academia to enter the corporate world. Not Personette. She did it the other way around. "I wanted to do something that was more rewarding. I always wanted to be a teacher and I thought why not do it now?" For 14 years she had worked in New York City for companies, such as ABC and Revlon, Inc., then moved to San Francisco and attended Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, California a few years later.
At a Cross Roads
Before her move Personette had visited the San Francisco Bay Area often. She had fallen in love with the City by the Bay's beauty, people and culture, but was still in love with Manhattan. "Eventually, the slower pace of San Francisco became more appealing and I decided to give it a try. I could always move back, if I didn't like it." She has now been in California for almost 18 years.

Educator
Working at KCBS Radio during the day, Personette took classes in the evening, earning a master's degree in education. "It was always wonderful to see a child master a task," she says of her years as a Montessori teacher. "There is nothing better than seeing the joy a child gets when he puts together the sounds 'c,' 'a,' 't' and can read 'cat.' "

Finding Her Niche
During the summers Personette worked in the tasting rooms of Sonoma Valley wineries and she took classes to learn more about using one's senses to evaluate wine, the characteristics of different varietals and wine growing regions. She also noticed that wine customers are often intimidated when they walk into a tasting room, so she thought "why not combine my corporate experience, my teaching experience and my tasting room experience into a service that would benefit winery tasting rooms?" She began giving workshops to tasting room employees teaching them how to put customers at ease, make wine tasting easy, and sell wine in the process. And so, Illumination Hospitality Group was born.

Making the Connection
But how does her experience as a teacher relate to tasting room hospitality? Personette incorporated Montessori ideas — creating a welcoming environment, grace and courtesy, self-discovery, use of observation skills, and making the customer feel special — into her workshops. "These principles translate beautifully to our interaction with customers in the tasting room." The tasting room, like the classroom, should be non-competitive and a place where people discover wine at their own pace.

Art History
Her Seton Hall experience may have influenced her success and happiness. "The art and music department, one of Seton Hall's gems, was a great place for me." She still likes to think back to the encouraging and safe atmosphere of the carriage house (arts center) and the accessibility of her professors, such as Petra Chu. Never shy to discover the world, she spent a semester at Richmond College in London. While overseas, she visited many of London's museums and galleries and traveled through Europe.

Marching to Her Own Beat
"At Seton Hall," she says, "I gained knowledge, confidence and a sense of pride. I learned that if I set my mind to something, I can do it." Yes she can. Besides photography and doing outdoor sports Personette plays the congas, a pair of tall, narrow, single-headed Cubandrums of African origin.

For more information on Illumination Hospitality Group please visit www.illuminationhospitality.com. Pamela Personette conducts her workshops directly in the winery tasting rooms, at Napa Valley College, Santa Rosa Junior College and Sonoma State University.

For more information please contact:
Joette Rosato
(973) 378-9827
rosatojo@shu.edu