About CellarHand

More soon.

Cornelis was born in Rotterdam and grew up above his parents’ restaurant, running around the floor and kitchen from an early age. There wasn’t a lot of wine around in his early days; Beaujolais Nouveau and Heineken were the norm. He lived across the road from the Feijenoord stadium, the best supported but most average football team in the Netherlands, which taught him humility from an early age.

He took up golf after picking up a hockey injury, and found he was pretty good at it. He represented the Netherlands at under 21s and played golf full-time around Europe for two years after high school. The abundance of other established and up-and-coming players made him think twice about the full-blown golf career, so he decided to blend in some education. He duly headed to Queensland. Golf quickly became secondary to university life and bar work. (He still plays off scratch at Woodlands Golf Club on the sandbelt, so don’t get any ideas.) During the final year of an undergraduate degree in Communications he met a girl and never left.

It wasn’t until 2010ish that Cornelis really got into wine. This was at Melbourne’s iconic Stokehouse restaurant, where Matt Skinner and Lincoln Riley were running an inspiring program. After the Stokehouse fire of 2014, he moved next door to Donovans where he bumped into George Mihaly of Paradigm Hill, who invited him to work harvest on the Mornington Peninsula in 2016.

That sowed the seed for a Graduate Diploma in Viticulture and Oenology at Adelaide University beginning in 2018. He’d already produced his first wine under his own Cor Ribbe label in 2017, and has since worked in Beaujolais, the Mâconnais and Adelaide Hills, as well as a string of harvests at Paradigm Hill. 

As well as his restaurant and winemaking experience, this consummate all-rounder also worked in retail at South Aussie institution East End Cellars prior to joining CellarHand in early 2020 as domestic purchasing manager.

Fittingly, his desert island wine is Riesling – any producer, any style. Why? Because it’s delicious, refreshing and so versatile, with the purest expression of soil and aspect in grapes and wine.

Nevada was born and raised close to wine, in the Adelaide foothills. Her somewhat cinematic name is derived from Sierra Nevada Jones, a character Barbara Stanwyck played alongside Ronald Regan in the 1954 movie The Cattle Queen of Montana. But it wasn’t to be a cowgirl’s life for her; instead she started out on an career path in forensic science, before deciding she preferred the company of the living. This meant a shift in study towards the world of marketing, particularly hospitality. When it seemed the front-of-house team were having all the fun, Nevada decided to get in amongst it. A planned six-month stint on the floor turned into six years of restaurant management in Adelaide.

Nevada’s love affair with wine was born from this experience, so she decided to take on the challenge of the Melbourne wine trade. Several years at Bress immersed her in everything from the vineyard to the final pour into a glass, and this experience was bolstered with other sales-focused roles with Echelon Wine Partners and Vinous. Following her heart to Sydney led her to cross paths with CellarHand – and here she is! Riesling and Chardonnay make her happy, but she finds nothing more therapeutic than something Piedmontese or Sicilian in her glass while rolling out freshly-made pasta dough for loved ones.

Harry’s journey into the world of wine is one of coincidence. After finishing at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand with a Criminology & Psychology degree, he flew one-way direct to Sydney where it all slowly fell into place. After some minor turbulence in trying to land a job, he managed to find something at Langton’s working as a casual, doing the dreaded job of telemarketing. The wine world was starting to take hold. After some quick successes, a Woolworths takeover and 200,000-odd phone calls, it was time to leave.

The world of wine repping seemed the logical next step. After a good stint selling South American and Spanish wines to the wonderful sommeliers of Sydney, then a small Australian and Italian distributor role, he found his place at CellarHand. Outside of wine, he plays football every season his Achilles tendons can take it, and is an avid spectator of most sports.

Born in Los Angeles, Lucy has a slight American twang which somehow stuck even though she left after a mere 3 months. She grew up in Hong Kong and got on the food train very early, leading her to a series of hospitality jobs growing up. She did her Bachelor’s Degree in Photo Media at Sydney College of the Arts, and worked at an art gallery for a number of years. But it was the hospo world that she kept coming back to! 

After uni, she moved to China to study Mandarin while also working as the Assistant Manager, and then Functions and Events Manager at Glam Bar [M on the Bund] in Shanghai. It was here where her love of wine started to really grow after hosting a number of wine events, taking charge of the wine list and meeting with different distributors to hear the stories behind the bottle. After our old friend Rona cut her 3 year stint in Shanghai short, she decided to delve in full throttle. A decision well received by her dad who runs ‘Nockie’s Palette’ in New Zealand. 

Luckily, that Photo Media degree came in handy and she utilised her photoshop skills as Digital Merchandiser, followed by Product Marketing Coordinator with online wine retailer Vinomofo in Melbourne. She then moved to London and worked as the Website Manager for natural wine store Noble Fine Liquor in East London. This, however, only lasted for a hot second before [very sadly] realising London was expensive and hard and who wants that really?

And then we get to today where Lucy has finally settled and joined the wonderful team at CellarHand (NSW edition, sorry VIC). Thankfully, she also loves a crisp Riesling and can [hopefully] fit straight in. She also would never say no to a sticky wine. In fact, you’d better hide yours from her if you were planning on having any. 

Brisbane born and bred, Ben started working in bottleshops back in 2006 to earn a bit of cash while studying to be a teacher. After graduating he had the choice of teaching up north, where it’s a bit harder to find a nice Riesling or to make a go of a career in the wine biz by taking an opportunity to work at Dan Murphys.

While working at Dan’s lots of good people nurtured his growing love for vinous things while also allowing him to get stuck into lots of different roles, from running fine wine departments to setting up new stores on the Sunny Coast. Another big turning point though was being sent by Dan’s on a Wine Australia Trade Immersion Program in 2016. After that he jumped into independent retail, as a Group Retail manager for pubs like the The Alliance, the Port Office Hotel and the Waterloo Bay Hotel in Wynnum while also consulting on winelists for some small bars and restaurants around Brisbane and pursuing a bit of wine judging on the side.

In 2019 Ben started with Cru Bar + Cellar in Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley where he was able to meet, learn from and grow with lots of incredible wine people, all while being exposed to some of the world’s greatest wines. In 2022 he was part of the team at the helm when the venue was awarded with Australia’s Winelist of the Year.

Any wine with searing, face ripping acid is a quick favourite of Ben’s, but really any drink shared with friends and family is the best.

Gabriel is the kind of wine lover who might have seemed competitive to those who mistook his ability for selling the stuff with his enormous thirst for sharing it. In fact, he might have considered himself to be disturbingly obsessed had he not landed among like-minded tragics at CellarHand.

Prior to landing a gig here, he spent 10 years at Dan Murphys, where he managed numerous fine wine departments including in the top-end stores of Prahran, Alphington and Glen Waverley. During a decade of unflagging pride in his work and unquenchable thirst for top vino, Gab trained staff, mentored teams, sat on the wine panel, spearheaded events and took the vinous experience of a host of private, corporate and industry customers to a whole new level.

He fell into wine because his dad’s an avid, and discerning, drinker who was always dragging him along to tastings. He’s since done vintage work in the Barossa and has travelled to every major grape-growing region of Australia, as well as to France, Italy and Spain.

Gab lives in Kensington with girlfriend Ebony and their cat, and together they eat and drink bloody well (the cat, too). Italian’s the cuisine of choice, while his favourite wine is Pinot. And Chardonnay. Plus Shiraz. Loves Grenache, too. And as for Champagne? You get the picture.

It was a strong desire to travel the world that initially spurred Meg to gain hospitality experience. She started out at Sydney’s internationally acclaimed Regent Hotel in the late ’80s. It was here that Meg was exposed to the world of wine and the broad horizons of restaurant lists.

Returning to Sydney after living overseas in the US, UK and Europe, Meg continued to work in hospitality while studying Business and Advertising. In 2001 she enjoyed a long weekend in Melbourne with friends, then returned to Sydney, packed up and moved. After a short stint in Melbourne restaurants, she gave up working nights and weekends to enter wine distribution on the sales and marketing side. She has completed a Bachelor’s in Wine Marketing at the University of South Australia and worked for some of the big and small names in distribution.

Always looking for a new challenge, Meg happily joined the team when CellarHand came knocking, knowing she had now reached the pinnacle of wine distribution in Australia. A lover of acid-driven wines and good Cabernet, when not working Meg can be found daydreaming with a book and a glass of bubbles, on a beach in southeast Asia.

Originally from New Zealand, Kane worked in Hospitality / Wine industry for most of his life.

The story begins in the early 2000’s when Kane used to manage a number of Auckland’s Viaduct venues and also was moonlighted as a brand ambassador for Bombay Sapphire and Absolute Vodka while hosting a number of events during the America’s Cup campaigns.  

In 2005, he moved to Australia from NZ– and started to work in Sydney Hospitality ( Pink Salt / Jamie’s Italian ) before accepting a role with Lion / Fine Wine Partners initially working in Customer Service then managing Key Retail accounts around Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs.

He finally moved to Melbourne in 2015  to manage Key on Premise accounts with Fine Wine Partners and then did 5 years with Oatley Wines before arriving to our team.

What are Kane’s interests ? In addition to navigate and sail the seas , he loves to keep  up with his two Rhodesian Ridgebacks.  

Originally from Launceston Tasmania Mark has been fully immersed in the hospitality industry from a young age, moving from specialty coffee into restaurants in various roles and honed his skills with great front of house and chefs alike.

Making the move to Melbourne in 2010 Mark started working at the hatted Cumulus Inc. where it was really the ‘it’ thing in that point of time. Working his way up under guidance of Melbourne industry legends Andrew Joy and Jayden Ong Mark quickly found himself in charge of the lists at Cumulus inc. Helping open Cumulus up and creating an offsite cellar to store hidden gems domestic and international for that rainy day are some of his highlights from his time there.  In 2016 Mark oversaw the Builders arms beverage program as well Cumulus Inc which as a deeper dive into people management and running multiple lists with differing personalities.

 A short hiatus from Working with the Traderhouse group saw him come back into the fold at Meatsmith in 2020 right as the old covid was fully kicking off. This gave Mark a valuable insight into the world of retail.

Mark loves nothing more than to rip the top on a good local drop, cook some food for friends and family and have a good old laugh.

More soon.

Auckland-born Jude Chapman spent most of her younger years hanging out at the sports club managed by her dad. She served as assistant glass clearer, sneaking as a perk a cheeky beer or two (locally known as “jungle juice”, as what came out of the taps would be excessively flattered by the term “beer”). She grew up playing cricket, briefly representing her local division, and had always been an avid netballer until the pile-up of injuries forced her recent retirement. She still enjoys sport, though, as well as travelling, walks, wine with friends and a good Netflix binge.

She moved to Melbourne in 2012 and landed a sales administration job in the wine industry shortly after. In 2020 she was fortunate to travel overseas. Highlights included a wine tour of Stellenbosch in South Africa on a tram, some shark cage diving, Table Mountain climbing and copious consumption of delicious Chardonnay. CellarHand was lucky to snap up Jude in April 2021, and the pay-off access to more Chardonnay and the odd bottle of bubbly rosé, to which she’s also partial.

Growing up on the Mornington Peninsula vineyards were the backdrop of her childhood. Later on, the venue for her first steps into the hospitality world. 

Briefly left for the Gold Coast for four years working at the Sofitel Hotel. Still seeking the homely Peninsula wines and minimal risk of heat stroke, came back home.

Stayed in the hospitality life through her twenties (because why wouldn’t you), then found herself in a completely different world of antiques auctions. From food and wine came jewelry, chiffoniers, and ornaments. Got consumed by the fast pace and interesting finds of auctions but got sidetracked by a little baby. Seeking to find her way to drink wine and work at the same time, she found us.  

In the non-work life, you would likely find her on the sideline cheering on her partner Logan in local rugby union, Melbourne Storm in NRL or when her kid doesn’t eat something she is not meant to.