Motherhood and Winemaking: The Tale of Two Amazing Women on La Route des vins

By Laurence-Michèle Dufour

As soon as each interview gets under way, it becomes quite clear that painting a portrait of these two passionate and engaged winemakers of the region can’t be complete without including their roles as mothers and without mentioning the unconditional support they’ve received from their life partners for both their projects. Stéphanie Thibodeau of  Vignoble L’Ardennais in Stanbridge East and Manon Rousseau of Vignoble Pigeon Hill in Saint-Armand: Strong, yet compassionate women who’ve chosen to pursue their dreams to the end.

Heading Out Into the Country

Manon and her husband, Kevin Shufelt, met while they were both working for the same accounting firm in Montréal. Kevin, the son of a farmer, soon found his way back to the land and brought his new love along with him. Having initially run a dairy farm, the couple took on a new challenge when Manon – who, by her own admission, is very fond of red wine – suggested that her husband might use his father’s land in Pigeon Hill for a completely different kind of project.

I couldn’t always afford to buy fine wines, so I said to my husband: ‘We’ve got 500 acres, we’ve got the most beautiful terroir here, why don’t we plant some vines?’ The idea kept running through our minds, and that’s how it all started!

– Manon Rousseau

They set out to find the grape variety that would appeal to Manon’s taste buds–the most challenging part of launching the project, in her view–and in 2008 they became the first to plant Marquette grapes in Québec. Their children, Trisha, Matthew and Thomas, were then respectively 11, 10 and 6 years old.

As for Stéphanie Thibodeau and Pier Cousineau, they met in the kitchens of a Tremblant restaurant.

We’re a couple that thrives on projects. We renovated houses, we ran a restaurant, and then we had children. I couldn’t see myself raising them with such irregular hours

Stéphanie Thibodeau

They then shifted to more traditional office jobs and an urban lifestyle in Montréal. But Stéphanie, for her part, continued to dream of wide-open spaces where she could garden. A classified ad listing a house for sale with a vineyard of some 5,000 vines in the Eastern Townships caught the eye of these Sunday cyclists, who had already fallen in love with the region.

The couple, who knew nothing about winemaking at the time, decided to embark on this new adventure “somewhat naively” in October 2016. Their children, Eliot and Charlotte, who were just entering their teenage years, did not share their passion for nature at the time and resented these mandatory weekly trips to the countryside. “I felt so guilty as a mom. The children went to school in Montréal, their friends were in Montréal, and then, on weekends, they were forced to come here.” Stéphanie therefore had to juggle her two jobs for several years and has only been working full-time at the vineyard since April 2024. Her greatest wish would be for her partner Pier to be able to do the same. 

These two women’s greatest source of pride, apart from their children, is, without a doubt, their estates’ ecosystems, which are at the heart of their endeavours. When they’re standing in their fields, they both find fulfilment and a sense of balance, while their spouses are busy in the winery. For Stéphanie and Manon, being a winegrower means, before all else, being a farmer. And living out their dreams this way would not be possible without the support of their better halves. 

In Pigeon Hill, Kevin also had to take on a couple of jobs in the early years just to make ends meet. Although the couple had the good fortune of having inherited some land from the family, it would still be a few years before the newly planted vines could yield the grapes needed for production. According to Manon, with a project like this, “it can easily take anywhere from eight to ten years before seeing even a small return on the initial investment.” Given this precarious situation, the couple continues to rely on diversification, also producing hay and soya, and keeping a few pigs and a flock of around sixty sheep. 

But despite all the hours of hard work in the vineyard, the accompanying stress, and the multitude of related tasks, when asked what they consider to be the biggest challenge of the profession, both reply without hesitation: marketing their wine. Beyond the province’s bureaucratic requirements, the unpredictability of the weather and the whims of Mother Nature, once the wine is bottled, it still needs to be sold. Carving out a place in a market saturated with options, and which still sometimes tends to snub Québec wines, is no easy feat. Manon and Stéphanie can now rely on the next generation to generate content and reach different target markets across the full spectrum of social media. 

The Apple Never Falls Far From the Tree

Trisha now holds a bachelor’s degree in sustainable agriculture, while her brother Matthew has a degree in business administration. The youngest of the Thomas family, meanwhile, is considering a course in agricultural business management. To date, they’re all employed at the family estate in Pigeon Hill. The children’s return to the vineyard has enabled the couple to think on a slightly larger scale. The 5,000 hybrid vines planted in 2008 have gradually been supplemented by 15,000 additional plants, including vinifera varieties, which are generally trellised closer to the ground. “I’d always said that, at my age, I wasn’t going to be the one planting vinifera and crawling around on all fours until I was 75!” exclaims Manon, adding that it was mainly the children who were keen to press ahead with this project. 

As for the vineyard of L’Ardennais, even though they don’t work there full-time, the children seem to admire their parents’ passion for the business and often come along to lend a hand. Eliot, who completed his sommelier course at the ITHQ, is currently a waiter at the Liverpool House restaurant in Montréal. Last autumn, he took advantage of a long leave to work at the vineyard, taking part in the entire harvest period as well as the winemaking process. His sister Charlotte, who has just completed her bachelor’s degree in communications while working as a hostess at Restaurant Montréal Plaza, runs the boutique every weekend, helps design the labels and manages the family business’s social media. Visits to the countryside are now synonymous with festive dinners and conversations revolving around wine.

Although both women consider themselves lucky to have such talented offspring, they would never force their children to follow in their footsteps in this profession, fraught with uncertainty. As for what we wish for them in the future, may the people of Québec continue to discover the treasures of our region, thereby making this challenging task a little easier for them!

Would you like to taste their wines? Manon, Stéphanie and their families look forward to welcoming you to the vineyard from June to September. Feel free to stop by!