Working wine retail on Thanksgiving was an insane time, more wine was sold on Thanksgiving Eve than Christmas Eve. The build up was slow the weekend before and then boom! Tuesday and Wednesday were as busy as it got. Salesman flying in and out, special orders filled in a panic. Will the check clear? Dollars and merchandise had to be flipped.
Last night with the Beaujolais Nouveau always brings back memories of Thanksgiving pressure. A lot of change went to buy that wine, and it had to go by Christmas or it would sit months into the new year.
There were good years here in Columbus, and very bad years. There was success at the Holiday. The owner would always go to Ray Johnson’s for shrimp and the horse radish sauce. We’d open up a few bottles of good champagne to go with it. Times were almost happy. At the Grandview Avenue spot, not so much. The owner screwed up purchasing again, completely ignored the lower priced wine and homebrewers, and saying no to customers became tiring to the point of depression.
After I quit, for years after I would have this adrenaline rush around the holidays. I’d been in retail for 13 years and then I was out. The pressure working for Barnes and Noble was nowhere close to the energy I’d get out of selling wine that I had a hand in purchasing or knew about. That urge finally left a few years ago.
I still do not know how I did it, because at the end of the last run I was broken. My marriage was broken and it took a long time to return to something close to intact.
Showing posts with label wine business. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wine business. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 27, 2019
Saturday, February 9, 2019
Fine dining is not dead
“Are you a musician?” The server asked me. “You look like someone I’ve seen before but I can’t place you.” After quizzing each other with various people and places we may have met, it turned out in the nineties we both worked at local wine shops and may have crossed paths at industry tastings. Maybe I’d recognize him clearer if he shaved his beard, but probably not.
It was the first time I’d been in The Refectory, one of the finest restaurants in the city, in my entire time here, and the moment I entered the main dining room I regretted missing out on those lost decades. It’s a beautiful space in an old church. The decor was fresh, there was nothing tired about the place.
And we were there now. Finally met the sommelier after following him on social media for a few years. He poured us a couple of amuse bouche samples of obscure Italian wines to start the show.
We had very good wine. She had antelope, I had the four course chef’s menu. The sous vide beef shoulder was outstanding. Nothing was rushed. The staff on the floor were all working together with a learned precision that was not pretentious, but natural. Our dinner a few years back at the Ubiquitous Chip in Glasgow was outstanding in quality and service, but last night went past that. The Refectory is a skilled team from front of house to back.
There was no way I could afford to go in there until now. Even when I was in the wine business in the nineties it could not be done.
As we ate I was thought about a quote a local chef recently said in an article about her. She said that fine dining was dead. This is the same chef who passively/aggressively insulted my wife in front of a dining room full of people. The same chef who partnered with a local brewery owner who is now accused of sexual assault by multiple women. Fine dining is not dead, it’s the lazy, uncreative and harmful attitudes of those who control the narrative that should be. On our way out we walked past one of the former food critics from the Dispatch, who had just finished his dinner. I was never fond of his writing style, it turned into a template the last few years of his reign. Yet when a place gets outstanding reviews for over thirty years, innovates with the times to provide a superior dining experience, you keep going back. As will we, sooner than later. It’s worth it.
It was the first time I’d been in The Refectory, one of the finest restaurants in the city, in my entire time here, and the moment I entered the main dining room I regretted missing out on those lost decades. It’s a beautiful space in an old church. The decor was fresh, there was nothing tired about the place.
And we were there now. Finally met the sommelier after following him on social media for a few years. He poured us a couple of amuse bouche samples of obscure Italian wines to start the show.
We had very good wine. She had antelope, I had the four course chef’s menu. The sous vide beef shoulder was outstanding. Nothing was rushed. The staff on the floor were all working together with a learned precision that was not pretentious, but natural. Our dinner a few years back at the Ubiquitous Chip in Glasgow was outstanding in quality and service, but last night went past that. The Refectory is a skilled team from front of house to back.
There was no way I could afford to go in there until now. Even when I was in the wine business in the nineties it could not be done.
As we ate I was thought about a quote a local chef recently said in an article about her. She said that fine dining was dead. This is the same chef who passively/aggressively insulted my wife in front of a dining room full of people. The same chef who partnered with a local brewery owner who is now accused of sexual assault by multiple women. Fine dining is not dead, it’s the lazy, uncreative and harmful attitudes of those who control the narrative that should be. On our way out we walked past one of the former food critics from the Dispatch, who had just finished his dinner. I was never fond of his writing style, it turned into a template the last few years of his reign. Yet when a place gets outstanding reviews for over thirty years, innovates with the times to provide a superior dining experience, you keep going back. As will we, sooner than later. It’s worth it.
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