Lessons from Local Leaders:

Colleen Brooks

All Aboard: How Colleen Brooks Is Turning Virginia Wine Country Into an Experience You’ll Never Forget

She spent years in corporate digital marketing, watching other brands come to life from a distance. Then she built one of her own — rooted in the Virginia countryside she’s loved since college, and in the simple belief that people deserve a day that feels like a different world.

There’s a review that Colleen Brooks keeps close. Five stars. A seasoned wine traveler, self-described foodie, extremely particular about what they taste and where they go. They came to All Aboard Virginia with two kids in tow and a long list of requirements. And they left writing things like “one of the best charcuterie boards I’ve ever had” and “the experience felt both luxurious and effortless — which is the ultimate compliment.”

That last line is worth sitting with: luxurious and effortless. It is, in fact, the hardest combination to pull off. And it’s exactly what Colleen and her husband Jim have been quietly building since they launched All Aboard Virginia in late October of last year.

A Love Story That Started at UVA

The origin of All Aboard Virginia isn’t a business plan — it’s a Saturday afternoon. Colleen and Jim, both University of Virginia alumni, used to drive out to the Virginia countryside once a year, bring their own cheese and crackers, find a winery, and just sit. No agenda. No rushing. Just the vineyards and each other and a glass of something good.

“It was always so relaxing and beautiful,” Colleen says. “And after doing that for many years, we started to think — wow, this would be fun to introduce to other people. This magic of Virginia.”

That thought sat with her while she built a career in senior digital marketing leadership in the corporate world. Mentors kept telling her the same thing: never be afraid to take a chance on something you love. And eventually, the moment felt right.

She and Jim started building All Aboard Virginia in January of last year — navigating commercial kitchen approvals from the Board of Health, food safety certification, a license for hire to legally transport tourists, and tourism ambassador credentials for Loudoun County. Then they launched.

“Five months in,” Colleen says, “so far, so good.”

The Only Business in Virginia Doing This

When Colleen was going through the certification process with the state of Virginia to legally deliver charcuterie, she struck up a relationship with the person handling applications. That person told her something that stopped her in her tracks: All Aboard Virginia is the only business in the state pairing charcuterie with winery tours.

It’s a gap that makes intuitive sense once you understand the landscape. Virginia’s wine industry has exploded — 300 wineries now, triple the number from 2000, with much of the growth concentrated in the last five years. The direction of that growth has been toward experience and destination, not just wine. But wineries themselves have their hands full with the vineyards and tasting rooms. Getting certified as a food establishment is a lengthy, involved process most of them reasonably choose not to undertake.

That leaves an opening. And Colleen walked through it.

“Charcuterie just seems like a natural fit — a natural add-on to the experience,” she says. “And it’s something we’ve personally been doing for years. Bringing our own to wineries. It works. People like it. It adds to the beauty of it all.”

The result is a touring experience that covers everything: a curated route through Virginia wine country, transportation handled, thoughtfully assembled charcuterie boards that pair with each stop, and the kind of unhurried pace that lets people actually exhale for an afternoon. The only thing guests have to do is show up.

Frank, the Illustrations, and the Brand That Almost Didn’t Exist

One of the more delightful corners of the All Aboard Virginia story is how much care went into making the brand feel like itself.

Colleen came from digital marketing, so she understood branding in theory. But building a brand from scratch — her own, with her own name on it — turned out to be something different entirely. She spent a lot of time thinking about how she wanted to show up: warm, welcoming, a little whimsical, rooted in the Virginia countryside.

She found an artist on Etsy — Hera with Carda Moon Papery, based in California — who took Colleen’s ideas and ran with them. The result was a series of hand-drawn illustrations that now live on the website, the business cards, and the van they use for tours. Every illustration hides a small character named Franc — a funny little sommelier-looking figure, named after the Cabernet Franc grape that Virginia wine country is known for.

“The artist thought that was funny,” Colleen says, smiling. “You can find him almost like a Where’s Waldo in the illustrations.”

It’s a small detail. But it captures something real about what Colleen is building — a business that takes quality seriously while never forgetting that the whole point is for people to enjoy themselves.

When the Last-Minute Call Comes In

Part of what keeps Colleen going isn’t the big reviews or the sold-out tours. It’s the smaller moments — the frantic call from someone who needs a charcuterie board and didn’t know where to turn.

“It sounds funny to be desperate for a charcuterie board,” she says, laughing. “But sometimes people are in situations where they just need that help. And they’re so grateful. It makes me so happy to be in this place where I can offer that.”

The feedback from those moments — that what she delivered was better than anything they could have thrown together themselves, that their guests were impressed — fills her in a way that corporate metrics never quite did.

“Coming from the corporate world, you see the fruits of your efforts but you don’t always feel what the customer feels,” she says. “In this case, everything is real. I know this is my goal. And I actually start to see the vision come to life.”

A Community That Lifts Her Up

All Aboard Virginia is five months old, and its early growth has come almost entirely through a network of women-owned businesses in the Northern Virginia area. Two gift shops — Covet and the Urban Farmhouse in Arlington — found All Aboard Virginia early and immediately became champions. They hire Colleen for charcuterie at their open house events, they lift her on social media, their followers became her followers. The kind of organic, generous support that is hard to manufacture and impossible to buy.

“Women-owned businesses have been a huge motivator for me,” Colleen says. “They’ve been mostly responsible for my company’s growth. I feel like I owe them. But it’s just so amazing to be part of that community — we’re all trying to deliver something better for the client, and it’s a win for everyone.”

She’s channeling that spirit into a promotion running through International Women’s Month — any customer who places an order can nominate their favorite women-owned business, receive $20 off their next order, and see their nomination highlighted on All Aboard Virginia’s social channels.

What’s Coming Next

The pipeline for All Aboard Virginia is busier than Colleen expected at this stage, and she says it without any attempt to hide how good that feels.

A collaboration with Screw Top, a beloved wine bar in Arlington, sold out within four hours of announcement — a tour that begins and ends at the bar, giving guests the full day experience. Two more of those events are now booked for June and July, with the first round launching in late April.

A Mother’s Day event is in the works with Covet and the Urban Farmhouse — a post-Mother’s Day tour where anyone who books can bring their mom for free, starting with a shopping stop at both gift shops before heading out into wine country for the afternoon.

And beyond the specific events, Colleen is keeping her eyes open. The Virginia wine industry is still early in its growth story. Three hundred wineries and counting, boutique operations most of which only sell their wine on-site, owners and winemakers who pour with genuine passion and knowledge for anyone who walks through the door.

“You can see them come alive when they’re talking about their craft,” she says. “It’s pretty incredible.”

For a business built on the idea that people deserve a day that feels like a different world, Virginia wine country turns out to be the perfect backdrop. And All Aboard Virginia is just getting started.

Colleen Brooks is the co-founder of All Aboard Virginia, offering curated winery tours and custom charcuterie boards throughout Virginia wine country. Find her on Instagram and Facebook at @AllAboardVA, book online at allaboardva.com, or reach out directly — she typically responds within a few hours.

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