Services

Food and wine profiles establish a consistency most overlook. Just as  consistency is applied to wine tasting, it can be applied to food types enabling the best alignment with inventoried wines. It also exposes wines that are aging out, or just not a good match. It's unrealistic to expect everyone to taste everything, and people have different tastes and reactions to taste anyway, but there are consistencies. They are a great foundation to ensure the best experience.

Fill in the Gaps

This approach is a little different than looking for numbers to cut. This is about capturing missed opportunity that's already there and paid for... From the distributor to the person sitting at the table there are gaps at key moments that could be turned into assets. Although an over-generalization, these challenges carry:

• Distributor motivation is sales driven with a focus on the wine's details and story.
• Managers do their best, but are kind of on an island between distributors and servers.
• Servers might be interested, but most will not.

Our goal is to bridge those gaps by analyzing the menu and the wine inventory, and taking steps to optimize the transfer of knowledge, and the ability to use it. It's a cleaner hand off, and more aligned. The menu is king, because food impacts the wine experience more than wine impacting food... and food should be the driving factor of a restaurant. Once the menu is categorized according to their flavor profiles, we match with wines in the inventory that are most appropriate.  It also allows us to tap into wines that are in inventory and possibly overlooked (maybe use for a seasonal dish, or a special). 

From there we have three directions to refine:

1) Gap with distributors: Everyone will sell you their wine and say it fits, but our system allows you to present your distributor with a flavor profile before they even come. These are our foods, and this is what we are looking for in a wine that's going to be on our list. Why take on an 8th match to your biggest seller and ignore a dish that doesn't have a match? 

2) Gap with staff: Most staff don't attend tastings, so it's all book and word of mouth. Our system gives a cheat sheet by dish or by wine that gives them a quick reference to guide customers. 

3) Gap with customers: This is an invisible gap, but you never know who's going to walk in the door. It could be a certified sommelier, or a rookie trying to show friends Napa Valley. The good news is that any kindness and any suggestion made by the servers will be gladly appreciated by the rookie. But if a random wine is poorly selected, or any nonsensical or BS suggestions made to a person with a wine education is going to impact that person's perspective of the restaurant. 

These can be managed with a steady systematic approach to managing food and wine.