{"id":14248,"date":"2016-07-19T08:00:30","date_gmt":"2016-07-19T15:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/?p=14248"},"modified":"2018-04-17T11:37:23","modified_gmt":"2018-04-17T18:37:23","slug":"qa-jill-davidson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/2016\/07\/19\/qa-jill-davidson\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A: Jill Davidson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"jill_cropped\"<\/a>Western Regional Sales Manager, Pizza Port & President, San Diego Brewers Guild<\/em><\/p>\n

Former San Diego Brewers Guild <\/strong><\/a>president Mike Sardina<\/strong> (formerly of Kearny Mesa’s Societe Brewing Company<\/strong><\/a>) is headed to Vermont to take a job at cult-fave brewery Hill Farmstead Brewery<\/strong><\/a>. This left a sudden and significant vacancy to be expeditiously filled by the Guild. Fortunately, an able-bodied and passionate industry professional known for her seemingly unlimited energy and outgoing compatriotism in and beyond San Diego County has stepped up. Meet Jill Davidson<\/strong>, the western regional sales manager for Pizza Port <\/strong><\/a>and new president of the San Diego Brewers Guild.<\/p>\n

How did you get into the industry and what led you to where you are today?<\/strong>
\nWhen I was 18, I walked into Iron Hill Brewery and Restaurant<\/strong><\/a> in Newark, Delaware, and got a hostess job. I worked there all four years of college, became a server and went through their beer education. When I moved to San Diego in fall of 2006, there weren\u2019t a whole lot of beer jobs around, so I did bartending and restaurant management. When Pizza Port Ocean Beach opened in 2010, I started there as bartender, and when the Bressi Ranch production brewery was built in 2013, I realized I wanted to get more serious about my position and recognize the growth potential. It was exciting to be part of the expansion of an old-school pioneer of San Diego craft-beer. I became a sales and brand ambassador and ran a brewery-tour program, which pretty much entailed me calling on accounts and being their only point-of-contact. It was pretty overwhelming but now we have a great sales team and I\u2019m the regional manager.<\/p>\n

What inspired you to get in line for the Guild presidency?<\/strong>
\nMike called me and said there was a vice-president officer seat opening up on the Guild Board. He thought I would be great in that role and that we could do a lot of great things for the San Diego beer community.<\/p>\n

How does the president role fit in with the rest of the components of the Guild?<\/strong>
\nThe Board is really the Guild\u2019s governing body and it is spearheaded by executive director Paige McWey Acers<\/strong>. She is a permanent fixture that keeps the fish afloat and steering in the right direction. The Board is then divided into committees that cover lots of different issues\u2014planning, San Diego Beer Week<\/strong><\/a>, membership, bylaws. The work of the Guild is divided amongst members of the Board who in turn incorporate members at-large to be part of these committees. Officers change regularly, every year you get different personalities and different breweries represented\u2014everybody has something different to bring to the table. As president, I\u2019m more the face and voice of the Guild and its members. It\u2019s definitely a team effort. We have a strong Board and it\u2019s amazing to be surrounded with people who have so much experience and insight into what\u2019s important.<\/p>\n

What are some initiatives you are excited to introduce and work on?<\/strong>
\nTechnically I\u2019m in an interim position [until next year when I will start the term I would have served if Mike had stayed], so I\u2019m mostly following up on his initiatives\u2014development of committees so the Guild can be more efficient with time and energy in getting things accomplished. Also, our relationship with the San Diego Tourism and Marketing District, San Diego Tourism Authority, and San Diego Hotel and Motel Association; getting our seat at the table as an important part of local economy. Those are things that are very important to me, as well as establishing an Outreach Committee to be in contact with new breweries as they are developed. A lot of what the Guild does is legislative, so making sure those breweries-in-progress are in tune with ABC laws and being a resource for questions will be helpful.<\/p>\n

What are some opportunities for success for local brewers that the Guild can help with?<\/strong>
\nNetworking and resources are such a huge thing that [brewery business-owners and brewers] don\u2019t realize they have. If they have a question about a beer-recipe, they can phone-a-friend. If they don\u2019t have contact info, we\u2019ll put people in touch. We\u2019ll guide through what they need with legislative questions, and the stronger the Guild\u2019s relationship gets with the aforementioned associations, the more our members will benefit. And of course there\u2019s our maps [showing where every member-brewery is located throughout San Diego County]. There are 90,000 of those in circulation throughout the year. Then there\u2019s San Diego Beer Week, which provides an international platform now. \u201cSan Diego-style\u201d beer is a real thing now and, as San Diego beer grows, our members will grow with it.<\/p>\n

What are some of the biggest problems currently plaguing San Diego brewers?<\/strong>
\nQuality is always a concern, especially with breweries growing and having different processes than when they were smaller operations. As we develop the \u201cSan Diego Beer\u201d brand as a whole, quality is more important than ever. Each sip represents all of San Diego beer, not just the individual breweries. Luckily, there are a lot of resources to connect people in order to elevate the quality of everyone\u2019s beer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Western Regional Sales Manager, Pizza Port & President, San Diego Brewers Guild Former San Diego Brewers Guild president Mike Sardina (formerly of Kearny Mesa’s Societe Brewing Company) is headed to Vermont to take a job at cult-fave brewery Hill Farmstead Brewery. This left a sudden and significant vacancy to be expeditiously filled by the Guild. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":14260,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[368,4905,1],"tags":[1353,376,442,1562,391,2483,2937,1230,2936,1375,2938,296,1439,1011,909,2156,276,1637],"class_list":{"0":"post-14248","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-beer-news","8":"category-craft-qa","9":"category-san-diego-beer-beverage-news","10":"tag-sdbeer","11":"tag-beer","12":"tag-brandon-hernandez","13":"tag-brewers-guild","14":"tag-craftbeer","15":"tag-indiebeer","16":"tag-iron-hill","17":"tag-jill-davidson","18":"tag-jillian-davidson","19":"tag-mike-sardina","20":"tag-paige-mcwey","21":"tag-pizza-port","22":"tag-san-diego","23":"tag-san-diego-beer","24":"tag-san-diego-beer-week","25":"tag-sdbg","26":"tag-societe","27":"tag-west-coaster","28":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/jill_cropped.jpg?fit=700%2C686&ssl=1","wps_subtitle":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pdtr4y-3HO","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archives.csusm.edu\/westcoastersd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}