Scholarship Endowment Created in Memory of George Minutaglio Jr. Carrabba's Italian Grill® and FIU Partner to provide assistance to first-generation students TAMPA, Fla., May 31, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Carrabba's Italian Grill announced a scholarship endowment in honor of George Minutaglio, Jr., former Vice President of Operations who passed away at the age of 48 in January. The George Minutaglio Jr. Carrabba's Italian Grill First Generation Scholarship Endowment will help cover tuition for students who are the first in their families to attend college. "During his 25-year career in the restaurant industry... Read full release. To learn more about George, the scholarship, and to donate in his memory, click here.

How an FIU Alum became a wine seller in China By Elizabeth Wesner, Assistant Dean, Marriott Tianjin China Program At a busy, crowded booth in the National Exhibition and Convention Center in Hongqiao Shanghai, Emilio Guerra negotiates with potential distributors and retailers using English and a Chinese translator, while conversing with his work colleagues in Spanish. As he stands ready to raise the bar for the wine industry in China, he recounts the path that lead him to this moment. “I would not be here today, if it weren’t for FIU.” When Emilio Guerra finished his MBA through FIU’s College of Business in 1985, he had no idea he would someday end up as CEO of his own wine import business in China.  “After graduating, I became the director of sales and marketing for a major banana producer for about fifteen years,” he said, “but my passion has always been wine.  My wife said, ‘Why don’t you make your hobby your job?’”  Having kept wine as a hobby since he was twenty-one, Emilio finally began taking wine classes in 2001 at FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism Management to do just that.  It was through Professor Chip Cassidy’s Mastery of Wine class that Emilio was introduced to Southern Wine and Spirits, where he began working in the fine wines division in April 2002. So, how did Emilio find himself standing at a booth this week in the 2018 SuperWine Shanghai International Food and Spirits Exhibition representing his new enterprise, Noble House Trading Co.?  Emilio points behind him to another man, “Fernando.”  Fernando Taboada, Emilio’s best friend and now President of Noble House Trading, had travelled to China about twenty times over the course of fifteen [...]