Jon Foster went from earning a marketing degree in Arizona to living on his mum’s couch in Australia. That’s when he saw a job ad for a major dairy company that offered a company car, computer and a phone. “At the time I needed a car, a computer and a phone, so it sounded good to me,” he says.

And that’s how the guy growing our wine brands in Australia landed in sales. In less than two years, the business across the ditch has gone from 15 wines to more than 50 with top names like Robert Mondavi and Prisoner Wines. It’s now the third-largest market globally for Kim Crawford, which has grown to $14 million and is fast-approaching our goal of 100,000 cases by the end of next year.

Jon is responsible for the grocery business of Coles and Woolworths, where 70 per cent of all alcohol in the country is sold. But the bottom-line growth isn’t all Jon has been doing.

He’s also been an office manager and worked with our logistics team to get our Australian business up and running. He joined Constellation Brands New Zealand as our first employee in Australia in November 2015.

As the New Zealand business was preparing to take over our own distribution in Australia in March 2016, Jon had a four-month handover from our then-distributors. “I started to meet key customers, educating them about the transition, and tried to maximise what I could over the holiday selling season.”

Since then, our Australia team continues to grow from our Sydney office and Kim Crawford continues to climb in sales.