It's not your father's wine bar. But it might be your mother's, sister's or wife's. Courting urban females is one of several new wrinkles for the operators of today's trendy new wine bars, which are portraying wine as an "experience" rather than a mere beverage. Some such bars see themselves as Starbucks-like "third places" for social interaction beyond home and work. Hallmarks of the new guard include self-serve pouring systems, lots of tasting flights, retail bottle sales and wine lists with easy-to-understand flavor descriptions.
"Most of our customers are women coming in with friends," said Marty Thallman, president of The Grape Franchise Group LLC, an Atlanta-based company that franchises The Grape, a chain of 20 hybrid wine bar-retail wine shop concepts in the Southeast. "We have wine exclusively, no beer or spirits. There are no hassles like there might be at an ordinary bar."
"We're great for girls' night out," said Patrick Colombo, president and chief executive of Restaurant Works Inc., a Dallas-based company that operates Cru, A Wine Bar, in the Texas cities of Dallas, Austin, The Woodlands and Plano, as well as in Denver.
In urban settings across the country, wine bars are flourishing. "They're very, very hip," said Clay Sheff, a New York City-based importer of wine dispensers.
The Grape hopes to ride its twofold business model — on-premise wine bar sales and off-premise bottle sales — to 100 stores within the next three to five years and to an eventual national presence, according to Thallman. It features 120 boutique wines, available by the glass or bottle, or in "Grapes by the Bunch" tasting flights. What people taste in the wine bar ideally stimulates take-home bottle sales in the Wine Seller retail area of the operation, Thallman said.
All of The Grape's wines are classified into 10 numbered taste categories. For example, No. 1 is described as "light body white wines with a just-picked fruity flavor," like Zolo Sauvignon Blanc from Argentina — priced at $4 for a flight; $7 for a glass; and $28 for a bottle. In contrast, No. 6 comprises "full body red wines of prominent seductive aromas," like Australia's Mount Langi Cliff Edge Shiraz ($7/flight; $13/glass; $52/bottle).
Wine amounts to about 70 percent of sales, with about 20 percent to 30 percent of that, in turn, from the Wine Seller area. The remaining 30 percent of total sales comes from food. Thallman declined to reveal The Grape's average volume, citing franchise regulations. But he pointed out that the operation performs well in the "trophy" sites, like upscale shopping malls and luxury mixed-use developments, which it favors for locations. "National retail developers want us in all of their projects," Thallman said.
Cru offers 300 wines, including 80 by the glass and 15 in flights. In a nod to savvy wine drinkers, the wines are stored in three temperature-controlled storage compartments at appropriate temperatures for the style of wine. In addition, they're served in crystal stemware shaped to complement the varietal. The frequently changing wine list roams across California, Washington and Oregon, as well as the rest of the wine world. Flights sport whimsical monikers like Spectacular Sauvignon Blancs ($11), Patio Weather Wines ($11) and Sexy Reds ($15).
One of the role models of today's growth-minded wine bars is the coffee colossus, with an outlet on every corner. For its part, Cru has studied Starbucks for clues on increasing customer frequency. "We saw that some people come back [to Starbucks] five to eight times per week," said Colombo. "In the restaurant business, if you see someone four times a year, they're a good customer."
"We've had people call us the Starbucks of wine," said Thallman. "We take it as a compliment."
Emerging as an alternative business model is an idea from Europe: the self-service wine bar. It allows guests to taste at their own pace via a dispensing machine. It's in use at Vinum Populi, a wine bar in Culver City, Calif., with 48 wines on an Italian-made Enomatic cabinet dispensing system. A customer gets a pour by inserting a stored-value card into a slot on the cabinet that displays the price of wine by the 1-ounce taste and shows the value remaining on the card. Customers hold their glass under a spigot and press a button once for a taste or several times for a glassful. Thus customers can taste a splash of the Feudi 2005 Ognisole Primitivo, for example, for just $2.43 before deciding whether to buy a glass or bottle.
"It's very interactive," said owner Miguel Garza. "The nice thing is that people meet and start recommending wines to each other. Try this one; try that one."
Added Garza, "The only complication we've had is in changing empty bottles. It's challenging because we're so busy."