Our
People

Bill’s passion for beverages began at an early age. During his high school and college years his summers were spent working in the warehouse and driving a delivery truck for his family’s beer distributorships. He grew to love the beverage industry for many reasons – its dynamic culture, its well-branded and innovative products and most of all its entrepreneurial and committed people. His love of the industry led him in 2005 to found First | Bev, a private equity firm focused solely on the beverage industry.

Bill is also the Executive Chairman and CEO of Topa Equities, Ltd., a diversified holding company based in Los Angeles. Topa includes over 25 businesses in four divisions: beer distribution, auto dealerships, insurance and real estate. His responsibilities at Topa have included over 75 middle-market acquisitions. Before joining Topa, he was an attorney with O’Melveny & Myers in Los Angeles and a legislative assistant to US Senator George J. Mitchell (D-Maine).

Bill sits on the Boards of Directors of First | Bev and Topa Equities, Ltd. and on the Advisory Board (Executive Committee) of the UCLA Anderson School of Management. He is a former Board member of the New Belgium Brewing Company as well as the former Chairman of the Board of the Weingart Center, one of the nation’s largest facilities for the homeless. He is now Chairman of the Board of Experience Camps, a national nonprofit organization that provides free one-week camps for children who have experienced the death of a parent, sibling or primary caregiver.

He received a BA from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine and a JD from the UCLA School of Law. Bill has two sons and lives in Los Angeles. He is an avid traveler and enjoys golf, yoga, hiking and cycling.

Originally from New York and now living in Southern California, and having traveled extensively both domestically and abroad, Kyle has an appreciation for the diverse, creative and exciting opportunities in the beverage industry globally.

Kyle joined First | Bev with a background in private equity and leads all investment activities of the firm. He began his investment career in New York where he was a Principal at a joint family office investment firm established by the Fisher family and the de Gunzburg family, a branch of the Bronfman family, founders of the Seagram Company. Previously, Kyle was a member of the mergers & acquisitions, restructuring advisory and merchant banking groups at Gleacher Partners, an advisory and investment firm founded by Eric Gleacher, who previously headed global M&A at Morgan Stanley.

Prior to joining First | Bev, Kyle served as President of Gores Holdings, Inc., a publicly traded acquisition vehicle listed on the NASDAQ which acquired Hostess Brands in partnership with a private investor group. Prior to Gores Holdings, Kyle was responsible for leading the negotiation and execution of acquisitions and divestitures at The Gores Group, a private equity investment firm.

Kyle holds a BA in Economics and Political Science from Colgate University, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.

In addition to all types of family activities, his interests include skiing, golf, hockey and music, as well as community involvement focused on improving the lives of at-risk children.

Chris developed an appreciation of craft beers and the entrepreneurs behind them while attending school in Boulder, CO. Over time, that early interest in craft beer developed into a broader appreciation for the dynamic nature of the beverage industry as a whole.

Chris most recently served as the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Compliance Officer of Newstone Capital Partners LLC, an SEC registered investment adviser. Newstone has approximately $2.5 billion in committed capital across multiple investment vehicles from leading institutional and high net worth investors. The firm focuses on investments in U.S. based middle-market companies involved in leveraged buyouts, recapitalizations and later-stage growth financings. During his tenure at Newstone Capital Partners, Chris was responsible for treasury management, strategic planning, corporate and fund accounting, SEC compliance, portfolio valuation and investor relations.

Prior to that, Chris spent seven years as the Treasurer of Wesco Financial Corporation, a publicly traded, diversified financial corporation that was acquired by Berkshire Hathaway in 2011. In addition to managing a multi-billion dollar portfolio of publicly traded fixed income and equity securities, Wesco has operations in insurance, furniture rental, steel warehousing and real estate. Chris was responsible for SEC and financial reporting, accounting, internal audit and strategic planning. During this time, Chris also served as a member of the Board of Directors of Blue Chip Stamps, a wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., which held 80.1% of the outstanding stock of Wesco Financial Corporation until the complete merger in 2011. Before that, he was with Pricewaterhouse Coopers in Los Angeles.

Chris is a Certified Public Accountant, licensed in the State of California, and holds a BS in Business Administration from the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Chris grew up in Los Angeles and currently lives in Pasadena with his wife, Anneke and two children, Abigail and John. He enjoys skiing, hiking, fishing and hunting.

Bob has spent nearly 20 years in the beverage industry but didn’t truly find his passion for it until 2010, when he moved to southern CA to help PepsiCo form an emerging brands team that was initially tasked with nurturing the company’s young premium nutrition brands. It was there that he became fully exposed to the vast world of beverage innovation and entrepreneurs seeking to capture the country’s growing obsession with health & wellness in a beverage format. Bob has a healthy thirst for experimenting in this segment and has developed a reputation amongst his family and friends for getting them to try new beverages – especially ones in which he has a vested interest.

Bob joined First | Bev after a two-year run at KeVita, where he helped accelerate the company’s already steep growth trajectory, culminating in the successful sale of the company to PepsiCo at a significant premium to revenue and over $100MM in retail sales. As the senior vice president of sales, he led the team responsible for gaining distribution in the nation’s largest conventional retailers while maintaining thought leadership with the brand’s early adopters in the natural channel. Prior to KeVita, he spent 17 years at PepsiCo in leadership positions across business development, customer development, strategic planning and product commercialization and developed a strong track record for architecting and staffing teams for growth as well as leading them to above-plan results. Naked Juice revenue nearly tripled over his five-year tenure with the business during which he designed and implemented an emerging brands development team that had a unique focus on strategic markets and channels of distribution for PepsiCo’s stable of emerging brands – Naked, IZZE and O.N.E. Coconut Water.

He holds a BA in political science from Denison University, where he also was a four-year varsity letter winner for the men’s soccer team and ran his own student discount card business.

Bob lives in South Pasadena with his wife, Kelly, and their two daughters, Penelope and Holland. He sits on the Board of Trustees of the Mayfield Junior School in Pasadena and enjoys coaching youth soccer and playing in Pasadena’s adult ice hockey leagues.

Following his passion for beverages and the unique opportunity to help entrepreneurs in the space fund and grow their businesses, Joe joined First | Bev in 2015. As changing consumer preferences continue to drive innovation, he is excited to work with and learn from the many beverage entrepreneurs that have built the industry into what it is today.

Joe is involved with deal origination and execution across alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverage transactions for the private equity team at First | Bev. Prior to joining the private equity team in 2017, he spent two years working on the First | Bev investment banking team, where he was involved in mergers and acquisitions in the craft beer, spirits and non-alcoholic beverage sectors, and worked on several transactions including the sales of both Hop Valley Brewing Company and Terrapin Brewing Company to MillerCoors/Tenth and Blake, Brooklyn Brewery in its minority investment from Kirin Holdings, 21st Amendment Brewery in its minority investment from Brooklyn Brewery and Avery Brewing Company in its minority investment from Mahou San Miguel. Prior to joining First | Bev, Joe worked as an Associate at Eastdil Secured, a commercial real estate investment bank in Los Angeles, where he helped underwrite and market over 1,300 properties totaling over 100 million square feet.

Joe graduated cum laude from Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business with a BS in Business Administration, double majoring in Finance and International Business.

He is a native of Los Angeles, an alumni of Loyola High School, and enjoys surfing, skiing, fishing and hunting.

Growing up in the Napa Valley, Kristen doesn’t recall a time when family, friends, good beverages and business were not completely intertwined. Today she’s fascinated by evolving consumer preferences that have created an explosion of unique, creative beverages in completely new categories.

Kristen is a corporate development executive. She most recently served as the Vice President of Corporate Development for The Charmer Sunbelt Group, one of the nation’s leading distributors of spirits, fine wines, and beer. In addition to leading profit-enhancing initiatives across the 13 state enterprise as a member of the executive team, Kristen advised the team on growth and acquisition strategies during a period in which the group acquired partner interests in five companies, and executed an industry-changing merger resulting in the second largest wine & spirits distributor in the country, Breakthru Beverage Group. During her tenure at The Charmer Sunbelt Group, Kristen also served as an elected board member of the Wine & Spirits Wholesalers of America’s Council for Leadership Development.   Prior to joining The Charmer Sunbelt Group in 2001, Kristen managed cross functional teams for two marquee accounts at Hal Riney & Partners.

She is a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles, where she received both a BA in Political Science/International Relations and an MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

Kristen lives in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, where she has served as both coop Board President and Treasurer for the past eight years – helping lead the coop to financial stability following a fire and flood, as well as four major capital improvement projects. She enjoys skiing, cycling, and travelling, particularly to places with great “café culture!”

Alessia is involved with the accounting, financial reporting and information systems functions at First | Bev. She’s invaluable to maintaining relationships with vendors, customers, tax professionals and auditors. Alessia always strives to improve and optimize workflows and to provide useful and meaningful information to our numerous stakeholders.

Having joined First | Bev in 2016, Alessia brings over seven years of accounting and business experience from various industries including real estate, non-profit and public accounting.

She is a Certified Public Accountant, licensed in the State of California and holds BS degrees in Accountancy and Information Systems from California State University, Northridge. Alessia has been a professional swimmer and is an avid surfer who loves to travels the world with her husband JC, exploring different surf destinations and conditions.

Charlotte has been with First |Bev for over a decade. In addition to assisting the CEO, she manages special projects and is a key member of the team that produces [BLUE BOX], First | Bev’s beverage industry conference.  Although she was new to the beverage world when she joined First | Bev, over the last 10 years she’s seen well over a thousand beverage product samples and is constantly amazed at the endless innovation in this exciting industry.

Before joining First | Bev, Charlotte was the Assistant to the Directors of the American Musical and Dramatic Academy, a performing arts college in Hollywood. Prior to that she was a Quality Administrator with Raytheon, a national defense contractor. She has a BS in Hospitality Management and an MBA from the University of Central Florida.

Charlotte lives in Los Angeles with her husband, James, and a cat that the two of them dote on way too much. She loves doing anything that involves being out in nature, watching period dramas on Netflix, puttering around the house doing home improvement projects, and exploring the USA …so far she’s visited 33 states with just 17 left to see!