Shawn Lutwak has seemingly devoted his life and professional career to the wine business.  He would not claim that wine was part of his original plan nor was his path traditional. Born 1971 in Chicago USA, his original dream was to be a professional athlete.  His secondary plan was to practice law as he finalized is legal studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago. At the age of 21 in the summer of 1993, he was asked by a family friend who recently purchased a small winery in Napa Valley, California to move to there for a summer. He began working in the vineyards and then the cellar prior to sales and education so he could learn the business from seed to bottle. His passion for the industry was so clear that the winery encouraged him to stay in Napa Valley, forfeit his plans to practice law and assist and establish the winery brand around the United States. When he began as Vice President of Sales for Cosentino Winery at the age of 25, it was family owned and the production was only 3,000 cases annually.  At his departure 14 years later, it was nearly 100,000 cases and a publicly traded company. 

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After being part of the corporate world, Shawn decided to return to his roots and seek a family owned winery within Napa Valley winery who focused on quality estate grown limited production wines. In May of 2007, the Palmaz Family and Shawn met and he immediately took over as Director of Sales for Palmaz Vineyards. While his initial goal was to create and manage a distribution around the country and export, his real focus is to share the vision of the unique facility that the Palmaz Family has created and represent the honor of family name. 

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The winery that the Palmaz Family created is truly one of a kind. It is 18 stories underground, built into the side of a mountain, not only gravity fed but also gravity finished. Since there is no other winery in the world that approaches wine making in a similar manner combined with such limited production of these world class wines; it may be best to state his role is better described as educator and global ambassador.

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Shawn married his solemate Teresa who has also been in the food and wine business for more than 20 years and even grew up on a small vineyard in California.  With his 24 years of experience, only two wineries and the same women since 1998; perhaps his strongest qualities are passion and loyalty. Shawn and Teresa enjoy food, wine travel and their dogs.