Bi!! wrote:
> Good point Mark. Additionally if you don't charge for the tasting you
> will be increasing an already burdensome overhead. I think that these
> plans always sound good on paper but when it's your capital at risk it
> gets harder and harder to justify the expense of opening even $25
> bottles just for the casual taster. The reality is that high end wine
> sales have been relegated to the few old time retailers around the
> country with the track record, cash flow and sales to garner a supply
> of high end wines since most of them are now extremely allocated and
> come with very large strings attatched to boatloads of plonk. The
> business model for many of the US winemakers is to only allow
> distribution to restaurants forcing the consumer to purchase wines
> directly from the winery. The harsh reality is that wine is a
> comodity no different from widgets, gadgets or any other consumer
> product and when you stop thinking about it as such and start getting
> esoteric and artsy about it, you will probably end up very unhappy
> (and possibly broke) with the wine business. It's about volume and
> velocity and relationships and those are all hard things to control at
> times.
It's really the same as in book or electronics retailing: you can't
compete on volume or profit margin, or the big operations will drive
your business into the ground. Instead, you have to focus on the items
the big guys won't stock because they aren't made in large enough
quantity. My favorite wine stores have just a token stock of "trophy"
wines and instead focus on $10-$30 bottles from smaller, artisanal
producers. Returning to the original topic, the model I love is that of
Solano Cellars in Berkeley, which has a small wine bar in the back where
they pour a weekly selection of their inventory (6 red, 6 white) for
$3-6 per pour and sell small plates of food. It sounds like the Terroir
Wine Bar in San Francisco is built along similar lines.
Mark Lipton
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