lacking motivation?
Monday, October 21, 2013
i'm behind in my blogging again. :(
still haven't posted my update on the Taste Ontario event that i attended a few weeks back. but don't worry, it's in the queue.
this is one of my less upbeat posts and i'm calling on my fellow readers to give me a boost.
as you know, it's my last course in the sommelier program. this course is mainly about the role of the wine director or sommelier in the restaurant business. for our final project, we have to create a wine list for a local restaurant and provide justification for our choices. choosing the wine is fun but pricing the wine is the part that i'm not crazy about.
i think it depresses me to know how much a customer has to pay for wine at a restaurant. and when i price the wine for the wine list, i think to myself .. i would never pay this much for this wine. if i wouldn't pay for it, i wouldn't expect others to as well. not only that but there's a part of me that feels that i'm gouging the customer. and i am struggling with that.
for me, if i want to make wine more available to customers .. i don't think i would charge restaurant patrons 2.5 times what it would cost if you simply bought it at the LCBO. for example, cave spring CSV riesling .. it costs around $23 at the LCBO. great riesling for $23. but on a wine list at a restaurant, you're looking at $50 for the same bottle. $50!! who would pay $50 for a bottle of riesling that costs $23 at the LCBO? not me.
maybe that's why i rarely eat out. and if i do, i never order wine. i've perused the LCBO enough to know how much things cost without even having to look it up.
so i feel torn .. i understand that a restaurant has to make money to stay in business. i understand that wine sales is a big part of a restaurant's bottom line. but how do you balance that without feeling like you're gouging the customer? the paper is due in a few weeks and i haven't been able to think of ways to promote wine that i feel good about, that benefits the restaurant, as well as the customer. when i believe in what i'm doing, that's when i churn out my best work. and so far, i haven't had that feeling .. and it concerns me.
still haven't posted my update on the Taste Ontario event that i attended a few weeks back. but don't worry, it's in the queue.
this is one of my less upbeat posts and i'm calling on my fellow readers to give me a boost.
as you know, it's my last course in the sommelier program. this course is mainly about the role of the wine director or sommelier in the restaurant business. for our final project, we have to create a wine list for a local restaurant and provide justification for our choices. choosing the wine is fun but pricing the wine is the part that i'm not crazy about.
i think it depresses me to know how much a customer has to pay for wine at a restaurant. and when i price the wine for the wine list, i think to myself .. i would never pay this much for this wine. if i wouldn't pay for it, i wouldn't expect others to as well. not only that but there's a part of me that feels that i'm gouging the customer. and i am struggling with that.
for me, if i want to make wine more available to customers .. i don't think i would charge restaurant patrons 2.5 times what it would cost if you simply bought it at the LCBO. for example, cave spring CSV riesling .. it costs around $23 at the LCBO. great riesling for $23. but on a wine list at a restaurant, you're looking at $50 for the same bottle. $50!! who would pay $50 for a bottle of riesling that costs $23 at the LCBO? not me.
maybe that's why i rarely eat out. and if i do, i never order wine. i've perused the LCBO enough to know how much things cost without even having to look it up.
so i feel torn .. i understand that a restaurant has to make money to stay in business. i understand that wine sales is a big part of a restaurant's bottom line. but how do you balance that without feeling like you're gouging the customer? the paper is due in a few weeks and i haven't been able to think of ways to promote wine that i feel good about, that benefits the restaurant, as well as the customer. when i believe in what i'm doing, that's when i churn out my best work. and so far, i haven't had that feeling .. and it concerns me.
1 comments:
If you apply your theory to eating at a nice restaurant in general, no one would eat there. :) If they just charge what it would cost to get it elsewhere, then they can't cover their overhead.
Perhaps you can think of it this way. The sommelier is merely choosing good wines to expose customers to wines they would not know about otherwise. So in some ways, the customer is paying for the sommelier's knowledge in building a good wine list.
Hope this helps! You're almost there!
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