Domaine Pouillon and SBDC make a remarkable pairing

LYLE, Wash.–Lorena Lowell, a former business advisor with the Washington Small Business Development Center (SBDC), remembers stopping by the Domaine Pouillon winery and tasting room in rural Klickitat County one weekend in 2022 and thinking it was an incredible find. But with more than two decades of experience in small business development, she worried that it was perhaps a little too hard to find.

Lowell enjoyed her visit and left her business card, letting the owners know that if they ever wanted to talk over any challenges they were facing, or opportunities they were exploring, they should give her a call.

A few weeks later, Juliet Pouillon, owner of Domaine Pouillon with her husband, Alexis Pouillon, called. Their first meeting was eye-opening, Juliet said.

“The biggest surprise was the level of technical expertise that SBDC business advisors have,” Juliet said, “and it was all available to us for free.”

The Washington SBDC is a network of more than 40 business advisors and two international trade specialists working in communities across the state to help entrepreneurs and business owners who want to start, grow or buy/sell a business. The Washington SBDC is hosted by Washington State University, and technical assistance is completely confidential and provided at no cost to the business owner.

“We really dived into the resources of the SBDC,” she said. Along with meeting with their SBDC advisor, they took on-demand and in-person classes offered by the SBDC and the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA).

 As it turns out, the Pouillons had been thinking along the same lines as Lowell. Juliet had a  variety of issues she wanted to tackle, but a top priority for her and her husband was to open a tasting room and bistro in a business district where they would have significantly more visibility.

At their first meeting with Lowell, they talked about their plan for a new tasting room and discussed the pros and cons of making it part of the winery or setting it up as a separate business. They also made a list of other issues they wanted to tackle over the coming weeks and months: setting up business systems, creating a business plan, accessing capital, creating HR policies, and refining their marketing efforts.

When the Pouillons decided to go all-in on making high-quality, organic wine in the tradition of France’s Rhone Valley, at the top of their to-do list was finding property that was similar to that region in three aspects: elevation, wind and soil.

They found it in the Columbia Gorge, where, unlike in the Rhone Valley, they were able to buy property and break ground on the vineyard of their dreams. Over the next few years, they poured all of their time, talents and treasure into cultivating their grapes and building their winery. In 2005, their first harvest yielded 300 cases of wine. Over the next dozen years, they continued to increase production until they bumped up against their maximum capacity—about 3,000 cases annually.

They had become experts at every facet of producing high-quality wine, but creating a business of value that could thrive and prosper for generations to come, was still a work in progress.

For years they had focused on the wine, but now it was time to focus on the business.

With Lowell’s assistance, they found a place to lease, created a business plan and set up systems that would improve efficiency. The tasting room and bistro in downtown Lyle with a spectacular view of the Columbia River opened in early spring and has been a boon for business.

According to Juliet, the new tasting room in Lyle (population 518) is a great marketing tool for the vineyard, and vice versa. Participation in the Domaine Pouillon wine club is way up, and they’ve been booking more special events at the vineyard. They recently hired their 12^th employee.

“The business is growing in the way we hoped it would,” Juliet said, “and it some cases it is growing faster than we thought.”

In fact, managing growth is another area they worked on with Lowell. As sales continued to improve, she encouraged them to plan ahead. “Don’t wait until you have nothing to sell,” she said. With a two-year production cycle, they needed to be constantly monitoring sales so that production could keep pace with demand.

In late 2023 Lowell took a job with the Washington State Department of Commerce, but the transition to SBDC advisor Jerry Petrick was seamless, Juliet said.

While some business owners choose to meet with an SBDC advisor to make progress on one specific goal, others, like the Pouillons, look forward to checking back in with the SBDC advisor as new challenges arise.

“I can’t rave enough about having that support system available to us,” Juliet said.

“It’s such a gift and we absolutely love it.”

Hosted by Washington State University since 1980, the program is funded by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), WSU, other institutions of higher education, the Washington State Department of Commerce and business and civic organizations.

For more about Domaine Pouillon, click here.

For more about the Washington SBDC, click here.

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