To begin with, can you tell us what brought you into the wine world? What attracted you to this universe?
It was a bit by chance. I have a DESS, a master’s in management sciences. So I was rather set to work in finance, but my first internships made me understand that I was not at all cut out for accounting. I liked it, but I wasn’t going to make it my career. I looked for a postgraduate degree compatible with my management degree and I came across the famous DESS in management and marketing for the wine industry that was taught in Bordeaux. So I spent a year discovering the wine world through the best of doors, because we were sponsored by several great châteaux. Our year, incidentally, was the Pape Clément year. We spent a year discovering the world of wine, then all the trades around it (wine law, wine marketing, communication), and it was at the end of that year that I joined the house of Johanès Boubée for my end-of-year internship. It was just after the merger between Promodès and Carrefour, which had just also taken over the management of the whole Carrefour group and therefore had significant needs. I immediately took charge of developing the wine aisles, notably in Eastern Europe. At the time, Carrefour had opened in Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, Russia. […] I did that for 3 or 4 years. Then I took charge of all the development of the French overseas territories for the Champion group, with in particular the resetting of all the stores in Réunion. […] A small example: by resetting properly and showcasing the wines, by completely changing the look of the store, we multiplied sales by 4 within 2 years. […]
Afterwards, I was headhunted by Grands Chais de France to go back into export and look after the development of Africa and the Middle East. I spent 13 years there and stopped because, with COVID, travel was forbidden. I still survived the first lockdown, but when we were let out, we still couldn’t travel and I didn’t know how long it would last. I told myself it was time to launch a new project. As I ate out at restaurants almost every day, I had always told myself “Vincent, if one day you stop travelling, open your restaurant; you don’t know what to do, but you know everything that you shouldn’t do. So do the opposite of everything you shouldn’t do and it should already work”. One of the things that irritated me, as a consumer, was the price, the choice and the selection of wines on lists. High prices can be justified if the wines are of quality and renowned. But selling run-of-the-mill bottles very dear, no. That is why my wine list is affordable. I have always said that the price of the bottle should not exceed the price of the meal. If you sell your bottle for more than your meal, there is a mismatch. Of course, gastronomic restaurants, which are another type of restaurant, can afford to sell a bottle for more because the price of the meal is also high. But in my restaurant, you eat for 45 euros at most, starter-main-dessert, and I had always told myself not to go above 50 euros, whatever the bottle.
Does your experience in the négoce and in the wine market help you to unearth gems for the restaurant?
Yes, it helps mostly in terms of tasting, quite simply because I have tasted so many wines that I have become a good critic. I am beginning to know the type of profile consumers are looking for. That is hugely important because we are in an era where it is complicated if you get it wrong. And when I taste wines, there is a notion of price of course, but it is really secondary. First there is a question of profile. Because above all, wine is immediate pleasure and I look for wines that are already ready to drink, hence the frequent search for off-beat vintages. We are making more and more ready-to-drink wines. […]
In your view, are there appellations in Bordeaux that are particularly interesting but much less known to consumers, and that you think deserve to be showcased more?
Ah yes, there are. There is a very small one, but it is brilliant. I have a blast every time I drink wines from there; it is the Côtes de Bordeaux Sainte-Foy. In general, all the côtes, whether in Bourg, Blaye or Castillon, have really fantastic wines but lack renown. In fact, the restaurant customer, notably in Bordeaux, is open, very open to discovering new wines. Lastly, another interesting appellation is Moulis-en-Médoc, which is also a very fine appellation with many wines that are very good and whose aromatic profile corresponds well to the current consumer’s taste
And conversely, are there appellations that are very well known today but for which it is harder to get good value for money?
No, frankly no, because, for example, I sell a lot of Saint-Estèphe, a lot of Margaux, and by far, in first position, Pessac-Léognan. They have strong renown. In my sales, Bordeaux currently represents more than 80% of sales. I offer only Bordeaux by the glass. The other wines are also open and I offer them only if people specifically ask for them. […] The Médoc is beginning to make very good whites. I am thinking in particular of Lamothe Bergeron, which brought out a very good wine. And I also have a Saint-Estèphe château that brought out a magnificent 100% Sémillon. Many properties are beginning to bring out blancs de noirs too. This type of wine is much greener and appeals less than Sémillon-type profiles, which are more about roundness. Once again, consumers today are looking for immediate pleasure, notably by the glass. By the bottle it’s different. But when they take only one glass, you mustn’t get it wrong. In any case, I start from the principle that wine needs to be demystified. There is one important question, which is “Do you like it? Yes? No?” The tasting commentary, we don’t care, we’ll reserve that for specialists. People are not here to receive a lesson in oenology, they are here to enjoy themselves, have a good time, and so it is very important to put people at ease. Even by the glass, I let them taste the wine; if they like it, great; if they don’t, no problem, I play it down and we change style. And we always end up finding a style that pleases consumers, whatever their taste, whatever their type of wine, and in Bordeaux there are all the possible aromatic palettes. For example, I replied to Jérémy Brun of Domaine du Carrelet, who has just brought out a Carmenère, called simply Carmenère. It interests me precisely, I am going to take a few bottles just to let my customers taste it, to see their reaction. Because I have customers who are very interested, who are open to discovering other wines and other Bordeaux appellations. Because in Bordeaux you can spend 2 – 3 months drinking a different appellation every day. […] And it is also a game for me to try each time to find the profile that will please the customers, who repay me because they are happy. They also come here because they discover things. I have lots of loyal customers who come, come back, and each time they want a different wine. They don’t take the wine list, they leave the choice to me. It is satisfying to see their smile and to find the wine that goes well with the customer’s palate and with the dish in front of them. There is still a food-and-wine pairing to respect.[…]
By the way, how do you make your selection?
Well, that’s my problem because I go very much on gut feeling. I work with anyone who wants to and who has good products; I’m open. Then it’s managing the wine list that is more complicated, because I often come in with lots of new wines. All the wines sell; I have no rotation problem. On the other hand, I have more of a problem updating the wine list and the vintages. That is why I almost no longer put vintages on the wine list, because sometimes the producer changes vintages, which would mean that each time a vintage changes I would have to update the wine list. […] For example, the last time the owners of Château d’Arche came to see me, they presented this red (editor’s note: “A” Château d’Arche in Graves) which I didn’t know and which is a lovely discovery. I worked with them for the Sauternes and their dry white. It is a profile that will please 95% of red-wine drinkers and it is sold at a very reasonable price. It is the type of product I love because it is a real discovery that I then have my customers rediscover, and they are delighted because we have a ready-to-drink Bordeaux wine.
Do you deliberately seek to introduce your customers to new appellations and new wines?
All the time. It’s a game because, precisely, wine consumption goes through that, through discovery, and we have a playing field that is wide enough to boost wine consumption, arouse consumer interest and broaden their range of knowledge so that they feel more confident in their knowledge of wine and thus have much less apprehension about buying a bottle. Even if we have a new class of non-drinkers who drink nothing — it’s all new, these are modern times — we still have 85% of people who drink wine, more or less regularly, and who often feel apprehensive about drinking it because they tell themselves they know nothing about it. And once again, we have to break that myth; we don’t care that they don’t know. The important thing is to know whether they like it or not, whether they enjoy it or not, because in fact you must always bring wine back to the notion of pleasure. In life, there are fewer and fewer pleasures. And eating a good dish with a good glass of wine is still one of life’s little pleasures that won’t be taken away from us, I hope.
Would you like to discover the full interview? You can listen to it on Les Chroniques Féret.
