Moonlighting as a Sommelier-Part1

The Store closed around 6pm and after hours the two private rooms were booked with parties and events.  The Salespeople were scheduled for these events and we turned into Sommeliers for them.  Sometimes we would pick up new customers, but for the most part we were hired bartenders.  At all of these events, we were expected to make a speech.  The speech included a welcome to the store, about the store, and a brief description of all the wines for the evening.  Small parties were fine, but when you had more than 40 people in the large space, a speech could be merciless especially when the group has had some good drinking time in already.

These events are all family style and never enough seats for everyone which was a general complaint, but I understood why.  Standing room only makes guests leave faster, monitor their alcohol intake and they don’t linger long into the night.

I remember my first event.  It was in the large event space and for the most part I was the number 2, meaning, someone else was the Sommelier who gave the speech and I worked the 2^nd pouring table which is mandatory for a larger group.  Gertrude is very set in her ways and she has a very curt way of telling you how to do things.  Some basic rules are:

1)    Never turn your back to the group.  It’s rude

2)    Never pour too much, so you eyeballing skills better be spot on

3)    Never walk through the room.  Walk around it.  This was my favorite especially when I wanted to go pick up a napkin that was discarded in the middle of the floor.

4)    Never imbibe when testing the wines.  Always spit or swallow unless she’s not looking.

5)    Never tell her when you get a tip, otherwise you have to share it with her and everyone else who worked the event down to the dishwasher.  (I NEVER TOLD even when she tried to lure it out of me)

6)    Never leave open bottles on the table as you get to the end of the night.  The guests will think they have to drink it all.  Um, they did pay for it, right?

The worse events were the whole store events.  The store was converted into an additional eating and drinking space.  The desks were pushed together and a table cloth thrown over it to become a food table and the glass check-out counter became the third bar.  The only place to put your belongings was in the small event space which was never used simultaneously during one of these.  And, if you’re not careful, Gertrude will take your bag and throw it down the cellar stairs just because. 

In one of these services, guests are handed a glass of Prosecco when they arrive and sometimes there are a few additional wines for the cocktail hour.  Chef lays out all his finest cheeses and meats for noshing and usually everyone gets too full for dinner.  Once the host is ready, you ask everyone to take a seat and then the dance begins.  It is very essential to coordinate the wine with the Chef so that you are able to pour and talk about the wine before the next course is ready.  Because God forbid that a dish is ready and they are sitting waiting to be distributed, Chef would have your head.  Dishes must go out as soon as they are plated. 

Now in a place like this, it’s a set menu.  No one is ordering a la carte.  The host is responsible for letting us know if you have a vegetarian, someone with food allergies, etc.,  so that he can be prepared to make a substitute dish.  The food all comes in fresh the day of so there is nothing to be whipped up if someone surprises us with this information.  And it always happened and I was always amazed that Chef could find something and make it out of his ass.

Chef also had Michelin stars.  He made food to order and meats were always cooked to the temperature he thought was necessary for the meat to taste the best.  This was usually medium rare.  I had never eaten meat this way before and he really opened my eyes.  But, you’re always going to get that one person who wants it cooked more and I feared seeing the look on Chef’s face when I brought it back.  Mind you, he can see us and hear us as there is no wall between the dining room and kitchen, but I hated being that person to bring it back.  The guest is lucky there is no wall there as you never know what bodily fluids might be added to the returning dish.

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Roberto

His mother is Italian and his Father is German and he moved here when he was young.  He was not attractive, rarely showered and his clothes were always messy and wrinkled.  If I didn’t know any better I would say he was homeless.  He was always late making all of us crazy.  Every day he would always offer to get everyone coffee mid-day just so he could get out of there.  These trips were always about 30 minutes long in NYC where coffee shops are on every corner.

Roberto was full-time in The Store and his job was to handle the walk-in customers.  All the pretty women were subjected to his drooling and fawning all over them while the men were ignored.  His wine knowledge was beginner.  He knew what everything tasted like, but he couldn’t tell you a damn thing about the winery.

Every day, we opened 2 bottles for the customers to sample in the Store.  Roberto usually single-handedly was responsible for consuming more than 50% of each bottle.  Every time a customer came in to sample, he would pour one for the customer and one for him.  He did this every day.  One could argue that he did this so that the customer wasn’t drinking alone, but I’m fairly certain he was just a lush.

He was always getting in trouble with Gertrude.  He reported directly to her.  Nothing he did or said was good enough in her eyes.  Sometimes he deserved it, but most of the time he was just the whipping boy. 

He was always asked by Boss to personally serve him lunch when he was entertaining other Italian speaking guests.  Boss never asked the Sales People to perform this function and it’s probably a good thing since all he wanted was a waiter anyway. 

He was finally promoted to Salesperson after over 2 years there.  I heard he didn’t last long.  Boss asked him to go to another country and do some business and I heard he screwed up big time.  Never send a drunkard on his own to a country popular for tequila and expect him to be on time, dressed and on his best behavior.

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The 5 Bitches

There were five of them.  Five head strong women like me, who were superior in their own minds and loved talking down to the employees. 

Bitch #1.  I’d like to start with the Head Bitch Jill.  Bitch numero uno.  She’s been there since almost day 1 of the Store opening.  She runs the paper work – inventory, accounting, human resources, pay checks, whatever.  She never smiles, never says hello, good morning, see you later, hey you.  You ask Jill a questions and she gets pissed off.  Forget about asking about your pay check, especially when you get shorted.  And that happened often. 

She always acted like it was my fault she forgot to pay you those hours or sign you up for that transit check.  Nasty with a capital N she was.  She liked to write in all CAPS, too.  

SHE WAS ALWAYS YELLING AT YOU.   

She made life at The Store so pleasant.  She never spoke nicely to you.  She spoke at you, usually raising her voice.  Ah, the memories.  She's ironically not there anymore.

Bitch #2, Melanie.  Melanie was the GM.  That basically means she did nothing all day.  To this day I still don’t know what she did on a daily basis except steal all the left-over wine from the events the night before, because after all, she was entitled to them.  He main function was discipline, because Bitch #3 who’ll I’ll get to in a minute didn’t like confrontation, so Melanie did all her dirty work.  For example, one night an event was going on in the kitchen, but the store was still open.  We were sending orders down to the cellar, but no one was filling the orders.  The cellar guys were mostly upstairs playing their bus boy rolls. So I called over to one of the Mexicans and said, is anyone downstairs?  He said yes.  Later, Melanie pulled me into the small room to tell me that I couldn’t yell at the Mexicans.  I must have missed something because no yelling was involved.  What she really meant was I was not allowed to ask a work related question of the Mexicans and gave me this whole lecture about the Owner and how he was an immigrant just like them and that he protected them.  It had absolutely nothing to do with anything.  She eventually was fired.  She was an idiot.  But, that came from Bitch #3.

Bitch #3, Gertrude.  Gertrude dresses all in black every day.  She must have owned 5-6 black skirts, never pants, 5-6 dark shirts, black stocking, black shoes, black leg warmers for when it was cold.  She reminded me of Ms. Haversham in Great Expectations.  She went home to an empty apartment, no relations and was miserable all the time, probably stuck in life by some past memory or event that changed her.  She was in charge of the floor staff and the events – booking, compensation, contracts, chefs, and execution.  She had a curt way about her and some of the things she said and did were outrageous.  My fondest memory was with Roberto.  Roberto was a slovenly Italian.  He always smelled, his shirt wrinkled and his hair mussed up.  I’m not sure what set off Gertrude on this specific day (or most of the days), but Roberto was scheduled to leave for a class about 4:30-5pm.  About 4pm, she demanded that Roberto go into the kitchen, take off his shirt and iron it – at his place of business she demanded that he iron his shirt in the kitchen – where we ate.  And he did.  Roberto did whatever she said.  He was her bitch and he knew it.  But she was crazy. 

When I came on board, she was cold to me.  Cold is the perfect word to describe her. 

Bitch#4 was the first female Chef we had.  The only time she spoke to me was to yell at me so I stayed as far away from her as possible.  Thankfully she left on maternity leave and never came back.

Bitch #5 was one of my colleague’s, Tina.  She was young, rich, an amazing salesperson, super knowledgeable and that’s all well and good, but she knew it.  Thankfully, she wasn’t pretty or she would have had the whole package.  She also had most of the top spending customers and when The Store decided to abolish salaries and go commission only, she had her paycheck set.  She was not nice to me at least for the first year and I’m pretty sure she was screwing the President of Sales, but whatever.  It was hard not to communicate with someone you stared at everyday since she sat across the picnic table at me.  She went on to become a big wig in the wine trade magazine business as a columnist.  I cancelled my subscription when I opened the magazine and saw her staring back at me.

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The Day to Day Grind

 Every Monday morning we had a weekly sales meeting where we had to come in earlier than normal to discuss our numbers, our goals and the weekly grind.  I was usually met by the local homeless man as he was sleeping on some cardboard outside the store.

The meeting took place in the dining room which was next to the open air kitchen.  It was so distracting.  While we met, the morning deliveries would arrive and if the Chef or Sous Chef’s were not in yet, once of us would have to get up from the meeting and check in the various produce, fish or meat.

Each week, they would set ridiculous goals for us.  Each day you have to make 20 phone calls and contact via phone or e-mail a total of 100 people a day.  Our software tracked this.  Every time you made a phone call or sent an e-mail, you could record a “contact” of whether or not you spoke, what you talked about, any questions, etc… At the end of the day, Arnie could look at the contact sheet and let the bosses know how many people we collectively reached out to each day.  I sometimes made shit up.  I hate calling people so sometimes I would pretend dial and pretend to leave a message to the dial tone.  Thank god we didn’t have a system where the bosses could listen in like a real telemarketing company.

What was helpful to me was each week one person was assigned a winery that we carried to research it and tell the group about it so we had some buzz words about it and a good grip on who they were and what the produced.  I actually liked this part as it broadened my knowledge, but some of these people would put me to sleep with their lack of presentation skills.

We also went over any new items to push and the newbies like me could ask the veterans for any advice.  Did I mention that at the age of 33, I was the oldest person in the room?

For my first few weeks, I would go up to the office each morning and start my contacting or creating an e-mail to blast out.  We all did this in silence with most people listening to their ipods through ear buds.  Sometimes, Arnie would have me sit at his desk to watch him work or listen to his selling spiel.  After lunch I would stay on the floor and learn the products and help what little foot traffic came in the door.

One of the Salesmen, Stan was a regular fixture on the floor.  He had a desk on the floor in front of Bitch #3’s desk.  This job was important in case a big fish walked in off the street and a seasoned wine expert was immediately on hand.  Stan taught me a lot about the job, wine and life in general.  He was one of the only ones who actually wanted to help me and answer my questions and I was grateful to have him.

I actually liked the sales floor a lot better than the office.  The Store is what I fell in love with.  When a new customer came in we always took pride in showing them around, especially in the kitchen. It was just as exciting for me to see a new customer’s wonder into the little gem they just found.

After awhile Stan, decided to leave the Store to head out to wine country and I expressed an interest in taking over his role as the Salesperson on the floor.  What I didn’t know at the time was that Bitch #3, Gertrude told my boss Arnie that she wanted her shipping person Dina to get the desk.  Dina’s desk wasn’t really a desk at all.  She sat at the end of Stan’s desk with her laptop and phone next to her.  Arnie fought for the desk and later lost out.  So, now I got the move to the sales floor, but I had to STAND in the corner all day and phone/e-mail people.  Good times.

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