CEO/ Former Actress Turns Sour Grapes into Successful Wine-Cabinet Business

When enjoying the seas of well-earned lives, there will be times when the waters are calm and you can put the ship on cruise control. You will be enveloped in sunshine as you navigate all that life has to offer. But, when the waves start crashing down and everyone is counting on you to step up as the captain of the boat, will you be able to bring your ship to shore like India Hynes, a woman who has shown the world that she can keep her head above water during even the most uncertain of storms?

Hynes began her adult life with smooth sailing. After having grown up in Los Angeles, she graduated from Cal State Northridge University. Though she got her degree in communications, she decided to dip her toe in the Hollywood pool and became an actress. At first, the water was fine.

She never made it to the top of the industry, but achieved success as an actress who enjoyed what she did. She starred in several commercials and television shows, including a role on The Young and The Restless. The parties, the access, and the western dream were all at her fingertips. She would go clubbing and indulge in many of the excesses that came with the Hollywood lifestyle. But, when all the twinkling lights turned off and the curtain calls were all finished, Hynes was left feeling empty. “At 25, I said to myself, ‘at 35, I’m not going to wake up and be in the same position.’”

She had decided to leave the applause and paparazzi behind her, and started working for a media-leverage firm, proving that her degree in communications wasn’t for naught. But she disliked working under a boss and decided to set out into the world and see if she could make it in business, like her father. He had lived in Casablanca before joining the French Legion, and was captured and held as a prisoner of war until he escaped. He then fled on a boat to Ellis Island, where he stayed for a while after forging a document that said he was from the Bronx. He then fought in World War II for the U.S. before moving to California, where he created one of the first mail-order companies in America. He since became part of several business ventures, including owning one of the first retail computer stores selling Apple, Texas Instruments, Atari, and HP products in the 70’s and 80’s.

Hynes started her own gift-basket store, which was almost immediately a success. As the baskets went flying off the shelves, she started to have to work harder and put in more time to keep up with the demand. It soon became obvious that she would somehow have to expand her business plan. So she swallowed her pride and asked her dad to use his company to ship the baskets. In return, she would help out at his current business venture, a wine-cabinet company called Vinotemp, which India’s father started in 1985.

But, while Hynes thought that she had braved the twister in her life, she had really just been rowing in the eye of the storm. With little warning, her father passed away, a devastation that turned her world upside down. She went from an employee with her dad as boss to a CEO with little direction and no previous experience at the helm of a company. People were now relying on her so that they could go home and feed their families; the pressure was immense. “When I started taking over it was just so overwhelming, between my father passing and managing a company.”

Though it seemed an overwhelming task, she did not drop anchor and hope for the best, or hand the ship’s wheel over to someone else. She took control of the company and forged a path that would have impressed even her father. India proudly states, “What I’m most proud of is that our brand has become a household name within the industry, everyone knows who Vinotemp is and what we do.”

Today, Vinotemp sells its wine cabinets to store chains like Home Depot and Target, while also making custom cabinets for prestigious clients like the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. In dealing with large retailers, India has found there is tremendous importance in terms of payments and pricing products correctly as retailers at times will provide unauthorized credits to customers leaving suppliers with a large bill to foot. Though they often have to fight tooth-and-claw for their consumers’ attention because of cheaper companies, Hynes says that she knows her company will stay afloat because of the top-notch quality standards her company keeps. “You just don’t get that guarantee from China.” India recommends to fellow entrepreneurs, “if you are going to have products made overseas make sure you have quality control, quality control, quality control.”

Now a wife and mother, Hynes has scaled back the company’s growth to focus more on her personal life. Though she could have quit and “just lunched with the ladies and shop all day,” she admits that her voyage in the world of business has not yet reached shore.

“I wouldn’t know how to not do anything.”