North Bay Business Journal

John Meislahn has joined the business development team at Exchange Bank as vice president and SBA business development officer. … Mary Celestre and Judy Reynolds have each been promoted to vice president. … Minh Tran, who has been assistant county counsel for Napa County since July 2009, was named by the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday to the top attorney position. … KGO radio anchor and reporter Jeffrey Schaub moved to KCBS All News AM 740/FM 106.9. … Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage announced two additions to its Marin County management team: Joanne Zavlaris as assistant manager and Kevin Kearney as assistant manager. … VML Winery‘s Virginia Lambrix hired Alex Kanzler to direct quality control for the company’s wines made at the Russian River Valley winery in Healdsburg. … Mike Meneghelli joined Napa-based wine bottle supplier Global Package as sales representative. … Seghesio Family Vineyards has appointed Ned Neumiller as the winery’s head of grower relations.

HEALDSBURG — Napa-based Crimson Wine Group, a portfolio of several premium red wine brands owned by a New York investment company with $9.3 billion in assets, has acquired zinfandel-focused Seghesio Vineyards and most of the Seghesio family’s 300 acres of vines in Sonoma County’s Alexander Valley for an undisclosed sum.

Following are profiles of the top day-to-day leaders from the Business Journal’s lists of the largest independently owned wineries under 100,000 cases, published in March, and the largest wine companies, published in May.

Instead of the urban winery going rural, we see the economic development opportunity of the existing downtown vacant spaces supporting new urban wineries.

HEALDSBURG – The Seghesio winemaking family has found that an economic recession can be a good time to save money by spending money on construction that will make more money in wine sales.

What follows are brief introductions to the top leaders of independently owned wine companies from the Business Journal’s Independently Owned Wineries list, published in March, and the Wine Companies list, published in this issue.

CALIFORNIA – A workers’ compensation self-insurance pool of vintners has become the latest victim of the credit crisis.