JASON DOYLE INTERVIEW IN NIGHTCLUB & BAR MAGAZINE

With wine bars of all shapes, sizes and types cropping up, one growing concept in the category focuses on offering something unique and special.

Jason C. Doyle (pictured below) is the founder and CEO of The Wine Loft wine bar (www.thewineloft.net), and his concept will have 18 locations open by the end of 2008. The first Wine Loft opened in New Orleans in 2003, and the company has commitments for more than 80 franchise locations in five countries. Additionally, six corporate-owned locations are in various stages of development.

NCB: What criteria are necessary to run a great wine bar?

Jason Doyle: The concept of a wine bar world can be broken down into three types. Number one, you have half-retail, half-tasting. These are concepts like The Grape. Then some places offer a bistro concept. It is a café concept, and they offer some wine. The third is a lounge concept. That is what we are. We offer an upscale atmosphere with heavy emphasis on wines by the glass.

We have 50 percent sales of our sales coming from wines by the glass. Another 15 to 20 percent of our sales come from bottles, 15 percent in food, 15 percent in spirits, and another 5 percent is beer sales.

Lots of people operating in the other categories don’t serve spirits. We do, because our target market is women, and women purchase cocktails a great deal of the time.

I feel that a good wine bar is marked by its wine-by-the glass selection. There should be selections from around the globe –– Chilean, South African, Italian ­­­­–– and then there should be an orbital selection in each varietal. You should be able to get a glass of Australian Chardonnay, California Chardonnay and then also a great French Chardonnay, for example.

NCB: Why do you think your Wine Loft concept in particular has become so successful?

JD: We spend a lot of time training our staff. We have an online training program we utilize called Bacchus University, and we train everyone through that program. Our wine component is called Wine Sage, and it is a partnership with the Wine Spectator School. Our servers, cooks, bar staff, etc., can individually self-promote by going through all the schools Wine Spectator offers, and we also offer it through Certified Specialists of Wine.

Essentially, what this means is, a server can come on with us at The Wine Loft and in three to six months become a specialist on his or her own. We don’t have a lot of turnover, because of our intense training.

NCB: Tell us a little about how you approached the franchise process with your concept.

JD: Our first location opened in 2003 in Louisiana. We began franchising in 2005. During that time, we paid all the legal fees and trademark registration fees, so when we were ready we could just launch. We worked on our intellectual properties — all things a franchisee is looking for. And, we worked on our internal systems to become as profitable as we could.

We then signed leases in Lafayette, Baton Rouge, Birmingham, Houston, Dallas and Atlanta. We wanted to create a regional pipeline of inventory, so again, when we did launch, we would have that pipeline in place. All of that happened from the end of 2004 through June of 2005 … and we were in construction in Baton Rouge and in Birmingham at the same time when someone offered to buy the Baton Rouge location.

From there we sold the second one in Birmingham, and things have taken off. Looking at the long term domestically, we believe we have an inventory of 350 locations. We are also working on an international franchise program in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan in the coming years. They are emerging markets. Our goal is to take the infrastructure we developed here and duplicate it in those countries.

NCB: How do you stay on top of the latest trends in wine and wine service?

JD: We dine out and travel quite a bit. I think the best way is to physically be in the middle of it. I am in Las Vegas every quarter and in New York City almost every month. We have construction in Redondo Beach and the Northern Bay area of California. So we are in great food and wine towns regularly.

(On-premise) we have a company intranet we use. When you open it, every week there are new video blogs, articles and any techniques with respect to our business. For example, on there now is the 2007 Wine Blog Awards. Our franchisees know our intranet is a primary source for them to stay on top of trends in food and wine.

NCB: How are you dealing with the rising gas prices and the increased cost of shipping?

JD: They haven’t really hit us yet. We have been more affected by the weak dollar and heightened euro. Wines from the old world have gone up in cost, which means we have to price them higher on our menu. We also have to look harder and deeper for better wines at lower prices. South Africa, Argentina, Chile — those countries haven’t seen increases from a euro standpoint, so we look there too.

With shipping, most inventory has been in those markets prior to six months ago. My gut is that as we approach third quarter, we are going to see our costs go up. Distributors who have employees and trucks — those folks are going to be affecting us with incremental increases.

As for bringing people to our locations, we are a lifestyle brand. When people come in, they are coming for the experience. That puts pressure on our unit level operators to create that great experience, so we can compete with the other venues.

We sell social experience, so as long as we can continue to create that environment, we can beat out our competitors.

NCB: How often do you change your menu?

JD: We have the ability to print off menus every day in every venue. Local operators in our company may want to take advantage of a particular promotion a distributor is offering, and then they can print a new menu that day.

We take the same approach with food. We have 30 items. Six are consistent, and then the operators choose the rest. They have to carry at least 12.

NCB: Where do you see wine bar concepts like The Wine Loft headed in the coming five years?

JD: I think the space is going to be more competitive. Our business is one where people are always striving to carve out a niche. Our goal is to run efficiently as a franchise, but not to be perceived as a franchise.

When people come into our establishment, they come because they want to come to Wine Loft, not just a bar that has wine. We want to be sure that in our spaces customers have the experience they are seeking.

They are coming to us as a destination in mind, and that we capture them for two to three hours at a time is a must.