Amie Fields is a co-founder and Director of Sales and Brand Development at Botanist and Barrel Winery & Cidery in central North Carolina. After a lifelong career in wine, sourcing, importing and distributing, Amie realized that the winemakers have all the fun. She wanted to make the type of wild and raw ciders that she and her husband enjoyed drinking and couldn’t find in the US, so she teamed up with her husband Lyndon Smith and sister-in-law Kether Smith in 2017 and Botanist and Barrel Cidery and Winery was born. Amie is also certified through the Court of Master Sommeliers, has judged at the Great Lakes International Wine and Perry Competition, the Virginia Governor’s Cup and has been a panelist speaker at CiderCon®. Amie’s expertise in tasting, evaluating and finding balance is invaluable in creating new and exciting ciders and wines. At Botanist and Barrel, she loves focusing on minimal intervention winemaking in order to showcase a living product’s terroir.

Adam Chinchiolo is the founder of the Far West Cider Company located in Richmond, California. Far West makes both traditional and unexpected adult beverages based on the output of the Chinchiolo family’s 100 year old organic farm located in San Joaquin County, California. Since starting in his garage in 2016 Far West has become one of the largest and most awarded farm-based cideries in California. Adam lives with his wife, children, and a whole menagerie of animals in San Francisco. When not in the cellar Adam likes cooking, running, and playing with his kids.

Dan Rinke began his career in the beverage industry in the mid 90’s working in beverage retail and restaurants, then moving into wholesale wine and beer sales. This quickly inspired him to obtain a B.S. in Viticulture and minor in Plant Science from Fresno State University. Dan found himself working in vineyards and wineries across California and in 2007 he was named Winegrower (vineyard manager/winemaker) at Johan Vineyards in the Willamette Valley. In 2020 he left this position to focus on Art+Science. In 2011, Dan and his wife Kim Hamblin started Art+Science on their property, Roshambo ArtFarm, a 50-acre farm that has hay fields, pastures, tasting room, a music venue and 15 acres of a mixed culture, no-till, Biodynamic, dry farmed, regenerative orchard. In 2021 Dan started Art+Science Agronomy and consults for vineyards, orchards, wineries and cideries looking for help converting to Organic or Biodynamic Regenerative Farming and low intervention wine/cider making.

Katie Selbee is a cidermaker and organic grower on S,DÁYES, Pender Island, a rural Gulf Island in the Pacific Northwest. She co-founded Twin Island Cider in 2016, a small land-based cidery/winery that caretakes and harvests many of the 120-year-old settler orchards still remaining on the Southern Gulf Islands. With a deep interest in traditional wine and cider techniques, Katie and her partner Matthew have been at the forefront of bringing natural fermentation and natural bubble production to the British Columbia cider scene. Her latest endeavour has been making clay vessels/amphorae from hand-dug Gulf Islands clay to use for fermenting and aging cider.

Tim Powers is a cider enthusiast and educator who works at Commonwealth Wine School in Cambridge,
Massachusetts. He has always had a passion for cider, and when he learned of the American Cider Association and the Certified Pommelier™ certification he knew it was a path he had to pursue. Cider is a reflection of a place, a climate, a soil, a history, and a people, and Tim’s goal is to share the stories of incredible ciders and cideries with the world. Tim is a Certified Pommelier™ through the American Cider Association, and holds the Level 3 Advanced Certificate in Wine with Merit and the Level 3 Advanced Certificate in Spirits with Distinction from WSET. Additionally, he is a Provisional Cider Judge through the BJCP, has a Master’s Degree in Music from Arizona State, and a Bachelor’s in Music from Ithaca College.

Greg is a world-renowned atmospheric scientist and wine climatologist, having held research and teaching positions at the University of Virginia, Southern Oregon University, Linfield University, and as an adjunct professor at the University of Adelaide. For over twenty-five years his research has firmly linked weather and climate with grapevine growth, fruit chemistry, and wine characteristics in regions all around the globe. His work was also one of the first to tie climate change to fundamental biological phenomena in vines and the resulting influences on productivity and quality, informing and influencing the wine industry worldwide. Greg has served on the editorial advisory boards of multiple international and national scientific journals and organizations and serves as a Director on the Oregon Wine Board and the boards of the Erath Family Foundation, the Society for International Terroir Experts, the Porto Protocol, the Sustainable Wine Roundtable, and the Umpqua Valley Winegrowers Association. Dr. Jones also has lifelong ties to the Oregon wine community, most closely with his family winery and vineyards at Abacela where Greg was appointed CEO in 2021.

Andrew Byers trained as a culinary botanist and has many years of experience in kitchens and orchards. As head cidermaker at Finnriver Farm and Cidery in Chimacum, WA for the last 10 years he has focused on a network of small scale, organic sources of fruit and botanicals in the PNW. He also currently serves on the board of the NWCA.

Colin Schilling is the CEO and Co-Founder of Schilling Cider. He has a passion for food and beverage broadly and has created and consulted on brands in the non-alcoholic, coffee, energy, and cannabis spaces. He has an MBA focused in entrepreneurship and business sustainability and worked in tech consulting prior to founding the cider company. In addition to the wholesale business, Schilling Cider operates two retail locations in Seattle and Portland which are the largest cider taprooms in the world by draft cider offerings! Colin strongly believes business is a force for good and change and has integrated numerous sustainable practices into the core business. He is also an industry thought leader on people-first company culture and works to deliver a best-in-class employment experience for every employee.

John Bunker has been tracking down, identifying and preserving apples for fifty years using a combination of field work, historical records, identification keys and now DNA technology. John collaborates with historians, orchardists, scientists and cider makers from throughout North America and beyond. He is a member of the Historic Fruit Working Group of North America as well as the founder of Fedco Trees and The Maine Heritage Orchard. He lives among extensive gardens and hundreds of fruit trees with Cammy Watts on Super Chilly Farm in central Maine.

Ben Williams is the National Key Accounts Director at 2 Towns Ciderhouse. He began his career in the Grocery Industry at 15 years old bagging groceries at a local Thriftway. Since then, he has either worked in a Grocery Store or sold to a Grocery Store/Chain with stops at local AB InBev Distributors and Pelican Brewing Company along the way. In 2016 Ben joined the 2 Towns Ciderhouse Family and has been leading the National Accounts Team ever since.