I went to an industry wine tasting event earlier this week with fellow retailers and restaurateurs, and engaged in a bit of shop talk while waiting for the event to begin. I was speaking with another retailer about how the business has changed over the last decade, with the role of retail morphing from customer education into almost entirely customer service-related tasks.
“I would argue that that the overwhelming majority of customers today already know what they want, or have an idea of what they want before coming to us,” I said to the fellow retailer; “We’re really just connecting the dots at this point.”
That’s when another retailer sitting nearby overheard our conversation and chimed in: “Yes! It’s so annoying, right? No one cares about our experience anymore!”
I smiled politely and replied: “It’s definitely a new era.”
Part of the reason (if not most of the reason) that people get into the wine and spirits industry is to talk about wine and spirits—and when I say “talk about wine and spirits” it means they talk and you listen. There’s a certain pride that wine industry professionals take in being a serious student. When the educational part of the job gets taken away and all that’s left is the customer service aspect, it can upset those personalities because that’s not the part of the job they enjoy. They’re merely public servants at that point, with no audience to care about their detailed opinions.
There’s this fantasy about working with wine and spirits that continues to carry on, leading generation after generation to believe that the title of “wine professor” is a real thing—that one can just sit in a retail or restaurant space all day long, never have to lift a finger, and simply answer questions or offer expertise about a subject.
Today, I’m here to tell you unequivocally that this job doesn’t exist.
If you’re not making wine or whiskey, then you’re selling it. If you’re selling it, then your job is to make customers happy. If you’re not making customers happy, then you’re not making money for your company. If you’re not making money for your company, then you’re not upholding your duties as an employee.
Even though it was fifteen years ago while working my first retail wine job, I can still clearly remember a colleague openly venting on the sales floor, saying with a sneer: “I didn’t get a level III WSET certification just to move boxes all day long.”
While the industry has changed immensely since then, one aspect has remained entirely the same: the wine and spirits business is a real job, and if you don’t like dealing with customers, then you’re in the wrong business.
-David Driscoll