Christal Lalla, a certified sommelier from USA, specializing in Italian wines, has been working in various parts of the world such as Italy (focus Tuscany), Germany, France, Spain, China and USA since 2012 and has built up a fast developing professional network with experts around wine, wine services and wine education. In the context of her work, she took responsible roles in wine rating & evaluation juries and in diverse wineries including coverage of cellar and vineyard management, customer relationship management and marketing. Because of her experience in the Brunello region, she is one of the best specialists in Sangiovese Grosse, the famous Brunello grape.

Christal is, from many people’s perspective, one of those rare people with ‘absolute tasting skills’, not only in the wine context but also in its combination with all sorts of food. She follows a holistic approach, which understands wine as a holistic experience and event for all the senses including music, the winemaker’s philosophy, inner drivers and approach, the visual and haptic sensations of the vineyards and the cellars with their barrels, the taste of the wine combined with different sorts of food etc. .

Additionally Christal frequently runs regional wine and cellar tours in Tuscany and tasting capability trainings for wine but also food and beverages in general.

Based on her intensive travels around the world, Christal has developed a broad understanding for the cultural but also economic specialties of the different parts of the world, their understanding and interpretation of wine making and their wines.

Christal also does some professional writing, her latest longer article entitled ‘Global Wine And Global Leadership – A Striking Analogy’ was published by by KoganPage in the book ‘Leading International Projects’ in October 2016. The article is available as an extra print in English and Italian.

Christal provides all facets of the wine expertise for VinAuthority.

Before her career as a sommelier, Christal worked as an artist in diverse parts of the music and entertainment industry in USA.

Peter Wollmann is a senior executive manager with special expertise in strategy development and execution, finance management, process design, program and project management with a focus on the finance industry. Because of his love of wine and the whole wine industry and based on his connection to Christal Lalla, a great American sommelier, he founded VinAuthority in 2013 together with Christal and took on, in the start-up phase, the responsibility for strategy, organization, innovation, finance and, from a regional aspect, sales and event management in Germany and Switzerland.

Additionally he founded and owns a consultancy and acts as an executive consultant following his retirement from Zurich Insurance Company (ZIC) as an employee at the end of 2016. Until to end of 2016 he was the responsible global director of a complex global program of ZIC since 2013, located at its headquarters in Zurich but with frequent trips to Sao Paulo, Hong Kong, Sydney, London, Barcelona and Milan. In parallel, he was in charge of Strategic Change Management at the German business unit and also other headquarters projects. Prior to this, he worked within Zurich as the German Head of Project Portfolio Management and Strategic Business Development from 2005 on, having worked as head of Strategic Planning and Controlling in Zurich’s German business unit from the 1990s.

Pre Zurich, Peter built up and later took the lead as senior executive vice president at the department Strategy, Planning and Controlling of the Insurance Group of Deutsche Bank. This also included the development and implementation of a specific strategic planning concept and of project and project portfolio management for Deutsche Bank Insurance Group and, additionally, the lead of diverse large change and transition programs.

Peter has a degree in mathematics and physics from the well-known University of Bonn. Peter is an author and publisher of several books and articles dealing with strategy, leadership and project and project portfolio management, the latest one being "Leading International Projects", KoganPage, October 2016.