Originally published on January 26, 2008.
Well, more like my history, since the store opened just over a month ago and doesn’t have much of a history beyond my own….
Prior to opening this little shop (and it is tiny), I spent about 7 years working for a wine and spirits company which at various points during that time was known as Schieffelin & Somerset (a joint venture between Diageo and Moet Hennessy), then Schiefflin (just the MH part of the joint venture), then finally, Moet Hennessy USA (the grand union of the Schieffelin, Veuve Clicquot, and Millenium — all owned by LVMH.) Sometimes you needed a score card just to keep track of the brands the company sold. At certain points, business cards changed on almost a monthly basis. Brands included Moet, Hennessy, Clicquot, Belvedere, Chopin, Dom Perignon, Ruinart, Krug, Glenmorangie, Ardbeg, 10 Cane Rum and a small portfoio of wines. Tres impressive, non?
During my time there, I worked on a major distributor realignment project, ran the US business for some small single malt Scotch brands, ran part of the massive Hennessy Cognac business, led development of the US launch plan for 10 Cane Rum, and then managed the business for the company’s Down Under wine portfolio (Cloudy Bay, Green Point, Cape Mentelle). Lots of fabulous meals, big nights out, great wines on the table all time time – very glamorous. Traveled to Scotland, France, Australia, New Zealand, and across the United States and into more wine retail accounts and restaurants than I care to count. And somewhere in there, I had 2 babies. Got to the point where I couldn’t stand the thought of doing another 5-year forecast, developing an annual brand plan, or boarding another airplane (even if I did get to sit in business class most of the time – go frequent flier miles!!)
So I decided to do what any reasonably insane person would do – escape the glories of corporate life by opening a wine store. Took a lease on a tiny little space around the corner from home, started the licencing process, worked at a similarly-sized shop in Brooklyn over the summer to 1) fine tune my retail skills and 2) make sure I really wanted to do this and wouldn’t be better off begging for my old job back, and less than 6 months later, I’m now the owner of an actual store with actual wine on the shelves (and an actual credit card machine, cash registers, garbage removal service, security gate, and alarm system.)
And that’s it for today’s history lesson.