Owner Debbie Ellen Jones of Ellen’s Wine and Spirites, brings a unique and new concept to the usual liquor store environment. Her creative use of categorization immediately caught my eye once I walked into the store for our one-on-one tasting and interview. Everything is organized by price, colorful dots, and charming emojis. The colorful dots spotlight whether the product embodies, “female power, minority, kosher, I love NY, biodynamic, organic and off dry and sweet” options. The charming emojis are displayed like a fun game game of literal verses symbolic flavors, for example, mushrooms for earthy, and wood for smoky. The store being displayed by price also provides a go-to comfortable area for each individual customer that walks in. Owner Debbie’s hospitality, enthusiasm, vast knowledge, and huge passion come from her 11 years of expertise as a Sommelier, including at a 2 Michelin Star Restaurant, Jungsik in Tribeca.
N: I love the categorization of your liquor store. What brought about this idea and made you want to do that?
D: I’ve been in the restaurant industry in NYC for about 11 years now, and being a female in the wine industry for a long time, it is still represented majority by males. And being a female in the wine industry, I understand that there’s very few of us, and I wanted to represent the underrepresented. There are very few females in the wine industry, there are even fewer minorities in the wine industry, so this is where the ideas sort of came from. But also, I’m keeping in mind about the quality of the product that we have, and representing also the local industry as well, such as, we are in Queens, in Ridgewood, so we want to represent…about 20-25 percent of our inventory is from New York and then everything else is globally. We also have a great sticker system so females in the wine industry are represented by pink, minorities in the wine industry are represented by purple, we have a small amount of Kosher represented by blue, organics by orange, biodynamics is green, and then also off dry-to sweet styles of wine, for ease of locating different products that someone might be interested in. Our wine section is organized by price point so, $14, $20, and $28 on the long wall there, and inside those respected price points, you have about 40 different selections of wines ranging from white, rose, and also reds from all around the world, and each wine has a label and also emojis, because I think emojis are very simple to understand, and when somebody walks into a wine shop, they might feel a little bit intimidated, so I try to make this wine shop as easy as possible to navigate. We also have a small section of orange wines, sparking wine, such as champagne, pet nat prosecco, for example as well, and then we have our spirites section where we represent scotch whiskey, also whiskey from Japan, a lot of American, urbans, and ryes, and then also, Irish whiskey, mezcal, tequila, vodka, gin, and then after dinner drinks such as cognac, amores as well. Some Vermouth, so you can shake up some cocktails.
N: Nice! I would love to know since you did come from a Michelin Star Restaurant, what was that transition like into more retail, more ownership, and more entrepreneurship?
D: I’m still actually a part of the restaurant industry. We just opened the wine shop about 2 months ago. We had our soft opening, and our grand opening was November 16th, so we are a very new wine shop located in Ridgewood, and we’re still expanding as you can see in the center of the store. We have another price-point, categorized, so anything above $30 is in the center, reds, and whites, and in the future we are going to expand these sections, so that it’s a larger section…that is our improvements for the future though. I, in the Michelin Star Restaurant industry, am at the Jungsik, it’s a 2 Michelin Star Restaurant in Tribeca. That transition was relatively easy because I have such an amazing staff at the wine shop to run everything on the day to day. I have great support!
N: Can you speak a bit about being a Sommelier and being that representation, and how you hope to leave your mark in this industry?
D: I hope to leave a mark in the industry by raising awareness of females and minorities in the wine industry. I think that the more that we talk about the equality or the opportunities for some verses others, have to be a little more equal because as a Sommelier, the certifications are very expensive, buying wine itself is very expensive to expand your palette, and to also learn about spirites as well. All of this has a dollar amount. So I would like to expand the awareness of how the restaurant industry and the wine industry can help those who need it.
We proceeded to try the first nose tasting of whisky, glenmorangie’s truffle oak reserve 26 year old whisky. The flavor profile in this consisted of maple syrup, peaches, and cinnamon. Then, we were served our first course which was a delicious salad. Next we nosed and tasted Glenmorangie’s Cask 0004 which was a rare and unique whisky, with a molasses-like flavor. This whisky was spicier and more impactful than the first. Our main course for dinner was steak which paired well with the spirits. Finally, we were able to taste a rare Ardbeg, Ardbeg Cask NO. 0343. This was much stronger than the other two, and this encapsulated a smokiness while also having a floral side. To conclude the evening the guests were given the choice of tiramisu or cheesecake for dessert. Glenmorangie and Ardbeg even gave their guests a send off gift consisting of one their favorite whiskys, “A Tale of the Forest”. Overall, it was a lovely evening with Glenmorangie and Ardbeg.
