So I'm sitting here late at night straining to find the words to express to you all how I feel. For you see over the past month and a half I've become overwhelmed with satisfaction at how much fun and exccitement I've had planning our new wine list. As you may or may not know, recently I'd been promoted to wine/bar director at my work here in Vancouver. When first given this title by my boss I initially thought it was stupid and pretentious as I find titles limiting and unnecessary. Yet for the purpose of this article I'm going with it as said title gives weight to the current process. This promotion brought me into the fold of the business end of hospitality and all that it brings with it. I'd previously experienced this world before in various managerial capacities yet even with this prior knowledge I've come to recently learn that the process of building even a simple wine list has it challenges and lessons. Many have been learned and today I'd like to share my thoughts.
After the news of my promotion, I with the aid of Chill Winston's Owner Sonia Bozzi, it's General Manager Dan Mitchell and my fellow barman Dan Meyers began the labourous process of developing a new wine menu. As the summer patio season approached we became knee deep in meetings with wine reps from various companies as they all clamoured to impress us. Why? It's simple, our 200 seat patio overlooks sunny gastown in the heart of vancouver. We have location, sun and booze, nuff said.
Setting up these tastings with various wine reps hadn't been the challenge, yet choosing from the myriad levels of differing wines had as it's showed to me how interesting wine can be from a business perspective. How tasting a bottle of cheap Pentage Rose can differ from a bottle of Le Vieux Pin Rose, not just in taste but in marketability. How arguing (and there'd been much of that) over which Riesling to pick when one side (Dan and Sonia) wanted a crisp and floral riesling to GM Dan and I wanting a more sweet and acidic version.
I understand that you may be thinking, okay so what, you argued about wine, big deal. True. But here me out, for you see the process is what I want to express. It's this love and admiration for tasting, smelling, learning, talking and reveling in all there is wine that's brought me here for you now. It's how you find yourself sitting there listening to a random rep spew crap about a particular wine that's $12.99 as you try to decipher if he's "selling" you or really being honest about his product. You find yourself asking "hmm, what's more important?", a wine that tastes great for $24.00 or a wine that tastes meh good for $15.00. Do I want a list of all impecable wines that nobody will buy because each glass will be $12.00 or do I want a list of some decent and some great that everyone will enjoy. In essence what's more important, ego or sales?
This stuff came about so often and even though I would voice my opinions and concerns, the reality of the situation was at the end of the day Sonia would do what Sonia wants and that would be that as it is her business. Yet it's this process of selecting, deciding, refining then finding out if you can actually get allocation that gets me. The process of building a great wine list made me think about so much business end stuff of which I'd rarely found myself pondering before that I now fully understand how one can become exhausted.
Yet throughout it all as I was tasting and meeting so many great like minded people, it dawned on me how much I love this business. How I can wake up, go to work and taste great wines, then sell them to others with passion has shown me how lucky I am to love what I do.
In the end, "the process" I was referring for you all today was about me and my growth within the business and how I've come to understand the relationships, the decision making and the overall savy one needs to thrive in the restaurant industry. No longer can one just buy a building, throw a kitchen in, add a bar, some tables and chairs and hope for things to work out. To succeed and rise above the rest one needs to see that work, effort and tireless passion must be involved. Even when it comes to things such a picking a simple wine list. It's the process, a never ending circle I'll definitely be making again and again and again.
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