The Wine Industry Equity Pledge (WINE Pledge)
The Vinguard is a founder, contributor, and signatory of The Wine Industry Equity Pledge. To read the full Pledge, please go to www.winepledge.com. You can sign the Pledge below.
As individual wine professionals or business signatories, we commit to:
Promoting zero tolerance for discrimination or harassment of any kind. The commitments and definitions herein promote the creation and strengthening of workspaces that uphold equitable treatment for all people – regardless of their various identities and positionalities. This includes race, gender identity, sexual orientation and identity, age, ability, ethnicity, culture, immigration status, class position and economic background, past incarceration, and religious beliefs in all wine business workplaces. The Pledge further promotes but is not limited to ending the resulting inequities in pay, hiring practices, incidents of sexual harassment, and bullying.
Acknowledging that the history of working individuals in the wine industry has included discrimination and behaviors most of us would condemn and that this has impacted careers, making the path to success more difficult for some than for others in its creation of consistent barriers to employment, business opportunities, and belonging. Acknowledging that, on the whole, our industry’s history has been grounded in structural white supremacy, colonialism, and heterosexism.
Calling for individuals to understand their privilege and to commit, as wine professionals, to sharing privilege-derived assets with those not favored by the systems that shaped our industry. To work to create lasting changes across the wine industry’s institutions, practices, policies, and attitudes that will make it a safer and more equitable space for all.
Marking the beginning of a new way of doing business that prioritizes workers’ rights, uplifts marginalized communities, addresses intersectional oppression, supports regenerative and progressive environmental policies, and most of all, equity. This is a movement to dismantle white, hetero-patriarchal structures within the wine industry.
All who sign this Pledge agree to do our part in creating equitable, anti-racist, and brave spaces in our work lives. Signing this Pledge is just a first step, making you part of a community where we will hold each other accountable in a safe and respectful manner, where we contribute to and learn from one another. As individuals and as a community, our work will always be ongoing. We are working towards an industry that reflects our values and lays the groundwork for future generations of wine professionals to encounter and uphold equity, justice, and belonging.
Become a signatory here.