Imagine tasting wine for work. If you like red, white, orange, rose, or all the above, this may sound dreamy. It’s what Jenny Lefcourt does, among many other critical tasks, as president, owner, and co-founder of Jenny & Francois Selections, a wine import company focusing on natural, organic, sustainable, and biodynamic wines. Wine importer sounds glamorous—and the fun photos on their Instagram of events like winemaker dinners, bar takeovers, and tastings galore back this up. But it’s more than that. Jenny, who has been swirling her wine glass around since 2000, has been witnessing firsthand for two decades exactly how global warming is impacting soil, grape growers, and the environment.
Tell Congress: Hold the Line on Progress to Cut Climate Pollution
While a majority of the wine Jenny & Francois Selections imports across the United States is from France, they also work with producers stateside as well as all over the world, in Australia, Spain, Slovakia, New Zealand, Italy, Hungary, Greece, Germany, Georgia, the Czech Republic, and Austria. In all these countries, the importance of regenerative farming that helps rather than harms the earth could not be clearer. We talked to Jenny, who is based in New York, about her work and how it intersects with the climate crisis. One big takeaway? For those of us already making the worthwhile effort to buy organic milk for our households, it’s high time to vote with our dollars and seek out similar wine. This is a treat, not a chore; it’s delicious.
How did you get this job—is there a degree for it?
I came to wine importing through a pretty random path. I studied French film and literature and got a PhD at Harvard University. I thought I was going to teach, but then when living in Paris, I got very into food and wine. I thought that I really didn’t want to move somewhere random where I might get a teaching job. I wanted to stay in France or come back to New York.
What’s your day-to-day like at work?
My general manager and I have a running joke where we say, “We aren’t bored!” because of the nonstop nature of the job. I do everything from sourcing wines and visiting wineries, greeting winemakers in the U.S., running team meetings where we taste and talk about wines, meetings with the office team, the sales team, meetings with our social media person, meetings with the accountant, solving problems with our warehouse… It’s hard to list all the things I might do in one day!
How does your job relate to and fight the climate crisis?
Changing the way we farm, across the world, is one of the most important ways to fight climate change. Certain types of farming cause harm to the environment, but regenerative farming fights climate change by “fixing” carbon in the soil. In viticulture, as in other forms of agriculture, building up the humus of the soil to capture carbon is really important.
If you walk around some famous wine regions, like Chablis, for example, you see hard soil that has seen so many years of herbicide and tractors that the rain doesn’t penetrate the soil, but runs down the hills, bringing all the nutrients with it. You can see with the eye the few wineries there working differently to create a healthy soil to promote biodiversity. The differences are astounding in every region. Grape growers can be huge polluters and part of the problem, or they can become part of the solution through working biodynamically and through regenerative viticulture.
Does everyone who has your job work on climate—how or how not?
There are not many wine importers focusing on natural, organic, and biodynamic wineries. We were one of the first, 25 years ago. There are more now, but most wineries in the world work with synthetic chemical pesticides and insecticides.
Is there a specific moment when you decided you wanted to have a climate job? What was it?
When I tasted natural wines and understood how different and delicious they are, while working without chemicals, I decided I wanted the U.S. to know about these wines. I would never have become an importer of conventional wines. I would have done a different job.
Of course, you might say my job causes pollution because we are shipping wine in containers across the world. This is true, but we are looking into sailboat containers, which are becoming available—a few companies recently launched. And presenting this wine in the U.S. has also encouraged U.S. viticulturalists to work naturally, organically, and with regenerative farming. It’s about education as well.
What are one or two actions you wish everyone would take right now to make a positive impact on climate change?
It is important that people understand how the wine they are drinking is made. There are a ton of misconceptions about wine and how it is made and how grapes are grown. I hope people will ask the shop where they are buying wine to recommend some natural wines that are farmed organically, biodynamically, or regeneratively. And if they don’t carry some, to encourage them to do so. It’s just as important as buying organic groceries.
Tell Congress: Hold the Line on Progress to Cut Climate Pollution