Meet Your Crestline Wine Team!
Our wine team is ready and available to consult and assist you with all your wine needs. Talk with us today, and we will help you build an outstanding collection. Meet Your Piggly Wiggly Crestline Wine and Beer Team! (From left to right) Taylor, Foster, Scott, Jerome and Thomas. See You At The Pig!
Taylor Dye: I got my start in the wine industry while waiting tables at the restaurant Acre in Auburn. There I really fell in love with hospitality and the relationship between food and wine. I moved to Birmingham in 2015 to continue working in restaurants and started studying wine more in depth, passing my introductory Sommelier exam that fall. I began working for the Crestline Pig in May of 2016 when the store opened and have very much enjoyed forming relationships with our customers and learning from colleagues in the industry. This past summer I passed the next level within the Court of Master Sommeliers- a three part exam on theory, service, and blind tasting, and am now a ‘Certified Sommelier.’
Jerome Crawford is a Wine Consultant with over 35 years of experience. After college, Morris Brown College in Atlanta, he was hired and tutored by Atlanta’s Dean of Wine Merchants, Jim Sanders. After his two year tutelage with Sanders, he then began work with local Wine Wholesalers and Retailers over the next ten years. In 1991, Jerome was recruited to Birmingham by Alabama’s leading Fine Wine Distributor, International Wines, Inc. After twelve years with IWI, an opportunity was presented to open a small Boutique Wine Distribution company. In October of 2003, Jerome and his partners opened Grassroots Wines, LLC. After six years with Grassroots, Jerome left the company to pursue an interest in helping the elderly. Since 2010, Jerome returned to his passion for wine by joining one of the most progressive retailers in state, Western Markets at the Mountain Brook Location. With the announced closing of Western Markets, a great opportunity to continue to serve the community was presented by The Piggly Wiggly Co.
W. Scott Atkinson started in the wine business at the ripe old age of seventeen by working in a wine warehouse after school. Attending Auburn University, and graduating with a major in Cultural Geography (think of it as Social Studies for big kids), didn’t stop him from working in that warehouse during his breaks from school. The wholesale side was fun, but he much prefers being on the retail side of things. This year marks his 23rd in the business, and he loves it. He’s been fortunate enough to travel to quite a few wine producing regions and counts Oregon, Italy, and France among his favorites. South Africa will always hold a place in his heart, however. If he’s not doing something wine related, odds are he is enjoying time with his dog Levon and/or wife Gia (who knows more about wine than he does) or doing something soccer, baseball (Cubs), or football related.
Piggly Wiggly Craft Beer Manager
Thomas Warren has long had a passion for craft beer, but it was his time working at boutique bottle shops that developed his love for fine wine. Today, Thomas brings that same enthusiasm to Crestline Village’s Piggly Wiggly, where he is excited to continue to make it the best place to shop for wine and beer in Birmingham!