As President & Founder, Ms. Hayward is the driving force behind The Perfect Purée of Napa Valley. Following in the footsteps of her entrepreneurial father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, Hayward, whose business acumen is self-taught, founded The Perfect Purée in 1988. Hayward nurtured her love of culinary arts at La Varenne Ecole de Cuisine in Paris, France. While completing the orientation course, Hayward became familiar with purees as an essential cooking ingredient which led to her decision to start the first U.S. based company producing quality purees for chefs. Her willingness to test her limitations led her to sell her home, providing her with the necessary startup capital. The first 18 months involved using a back bedroom in her parents’ home as an office while doing the intensive preliminary work crucial to a successful business launch. Today, The Perfect Purée is the leading U.S. producer of premium fruit and vegetable purees, with nearly thirty exceptional flavors, ranging from staples like raspberry, strawberry and banana to exotics such as lychee, passion fruit and tamarind.

Ms. Hayward’s responsibilities as President for the past 20 years have focused on guiding the business development of the company, having established a core team to manage the business needs at the Napa corporate office in all areas, including production, finance, and sales and marketing of the specialty gourmet product line. Ms. Hayward is now focusing her efforts and time to leading research and development.

In addition to her certificate from La Varenne, Ms. Hayward holds a bachelor’s degree in public relations from the University of Southern California. Although her time is at a premium, she makes a point of giving to charitable causes. With her husband, José Osuch, she established the Casa del Niño Charitable Foundation, U.S.A., to support their shared interest and desire to improve educational opportunities for disadvantaged children. In 2005 they launched an after school English program and in 2007 added a computer school and administrative offices at an orphanage in Unquillo, Argentina.

Ms. Hayward enjoys current events, learning about early world history, hiking in the Sierras, opera, gourmet cooking, gardening, and ballroom dancing--which is how she met her husband (a dance enthusiast himself), at an Argentine Tango dance workshop.