Located in the land of Packers and Cheeseheads, Wine Cellar in De Pere, WI, celebrated 50 years of business in 2024.
The shop first opened its doors in Northeast Wisconsin in 1974. Founders Victor and Rita Dombroski ran Wine Cellar until their son Dale Dombroski and his wife Lori took over in 2000. Five years later, Dale moved operations to a larger site within the same plaza, resulting in the 6,000-square-foot, popular destination store that continues today.
Current owners Patrick and Desi Johnson purchased Wine Cellar in 2021. Under their leadership, local products have remained a major focus, a favorite for out-of-towners visiting to watch football. The Green Bay Packers play at Lambeau Field less than five miles north of the plaza, while Green Bay’s Austin Straubel International Airport is about the same distance to the west.
“We get a lot of people coming in who are here for the Packers,” explains Patrick. “They want to experience a taste of the city.”
Highlighting Local
Conducting business as a tourist destination, Wine Cellar makes it simple for these sorts of customers.
“We set up the store so that people can easily find the local sections,” Patrick explains. “Beer and spirits are aligned in sets of local options.”
When people think Packers, they also think cheese. Both in the form of big yellow foam hats worn by screaming fans, and the real stuff, too.
“We offer a lot of local meats and cheeses from around the city,” Patrick says.
Naturally, this creates pairing opportunities. The cheeses come out along with wine tastings every Friday, while other local alcohol options are always offered at the store’s tasting bar. (Future planned tasting opportunities include a classroom space under development in the back of the store, as well as a former school bus the Johnsons are remodeling into a bourbon bar on wheels.)
Of course, Wine Cellar is more than just a stop for NFL fans on their way to tailgate outside of Lambeau. “We try to make ourselves the essential hub for people to shop from all around in just one stop,” Patrick says.
Customer Service
How does a business grow and succeed for 50 years through three different sets of owners?
“We have an outstanding community that supports us every day,” Patrick says.
Wine Cellar then turns around and offers this level of support back to its customers.
“A dedication to quality service: That’s what drives us every day and makes us a home away from home for people,” Patrick says. “That starts at the door. Someone is always there to engage the customer as they walk in. We also offer to help guide customers through the store. Though we do have an easy layout, designed so that people can easily peruse the shelves.”
“I try to be the forefront of the store myself,” he adds, “there to help people.”
Even regulars at Wine Cellar may need helpful suggestions, given the store’s impressive 8,000 SKU count. This includes 33 doors full of craft beer.
Assisting customers in finding the right products among such a wide variety requires employees with the proper level of knowledge and service. Wine Cellar currently has a staff of 10. The store takes hiring and training very seriously.
“We really do a significant vetting process,” Patrick explains. “From the beginning we make sure there is some beverage background with people. We’re happy to train, of course, but we need some background.”
Once hired, employees will often shadow Desi, a certified sommelier. Staff are also kept in the loop on new products coming in, including important information on how to suggest, explain and sell these new items to shoppers.
Building Wine Selection
Wine Cellar takes pride in its expansive array of offerings. Over in the wine section, the store has recently explored uncharted wine regions.
“Wines from Eastern Europe,” Patrick explains. “Wines from Greece, Cyprus, Croatia, Lebanon. You get these areas that have amazing quality for the dollar.”
This time of year, late summer into early fall, Patrick sees customers purchasing lots of sparkling wines, Italian whites and sauvignon blanc.
“We do have a huge selection of cabs, as well,” he says. “There are plenty of people in their comfort zones buying their cabs.”
Wine Cellar has found effective ways to compete in wine with Big Box stores and grocery.
“I always try to offer good values on great brands,” Patrick says. “I work with smaller distributors to try to avoid overlapping with Big Box stores, because smaller distributors carry smaller producers.”
The State of Whiskey
Like many other stores in recent years, Wine Cellar has developed a reputation for their store pick single barrel whiskeys.
“It’s an obsession of ours,” Patrick says. “We get competitive with our single barrel program. We want to outshine the competition.”
And they have. A Four Roses Single Barrel Barrel Strength dropped by Wine Cellar last year was named best SiB in Wisconsin in a statewide tasting competition.
Other recent notable whiskey picks from the husband-and-wife team include a pair of Penelope Architect single barrels. Named “Patrick’s Choice” and “Desi’s Choice,” these two picks let customers take part in a competition that pits the palates of the married owners against one another.
Whose bottle has sold better? “So far, it’s Desi’s,” Patrick admits. “Her bottle has additional complexity over mine, and I think the people are liking that.” Whereas Patrick’s choice is more of a big blast of flavor and spice, perhaps not ideal for the mass market, but geared more for high-proof whiskey nuts like Patrick and this article’s author.
On the subject of cask-strength monsters, the store also recently released a single barrel of Chicken Cock Reserve Cask. One of only 17 barrels available of this bottle in the country, Wine Cellar’s pick clocked in at 8 years old and 125.2 proof.
Sharing a challenge with beverage alcohol retailers across the country, Patrick and Desi must deal with a high demand for limited allocated whiskey bottles. And among those demanding is a core group of intense bourbon hunters and flippers.
“There’s a pretty obsessive group that we have in this area,” Patrick says. “We see all the familiar faces on a weekly basis, all asking the same questions.”
Which presents the tricky problem: How to handle allocated products fairly?
“I try to take care of as many people as I can,” Patrick says. “I do try to put these bottles in the hands of people who are actually drinking them.”
Wine Cellar will hold back some allocated bottles for a special raffle come holiday season. Otherwise, “I handle them with a loyalty program,” Patrick says. “I’m not tracking anything, but I know who’s supporting us the most, who’s in our store buying stuff every day, who’s not just buying bourbon here but also their wine and beer.”
These bottles may also find their way into gift baskets that the store puts together for customer purchase. “If someone is willing to do a high-dollar spend, then I’m willing to chuck an allocated bottle into the basket,” Patrick says.
Wine Cellar staff travel to Kentucky twice a year to pick out single barrels. However, like other retailers, Patrick and Desi have noticed that the store pick craze that took off during the Covid-19 era has cooled off somewhat post-pandemic.
“The single barrels have slowed down overall, but they’re still selling every day,” Patrick observes. “There’s just not this tidal wave of buyers anymore. There are still those certain bottles that will sell out in a day, but, overall, it has noticeably tapered off.”
To what does Patrick attribute this shift in consumer purchasing? “People are looking for value at other price points,” he says, “or exploring other categories.”
Tequila Trends Heavily
Top of the list for those other categories that consumers are exploring these days is tequila. Agave spirits have enjoyed momentum in recent years, with no slowdown in sight.
What’s the consumer demographic here? “There’s some segue from burnt-out bourbon drinkers,” Patrick says, “as well as people escaping from the vodka category for more flavor.”
“The premiumization of tequila has really drawn some interest,” he adds. “You can actually take a sip of your tequila now and enjoy it, instead of having to take a shot and choke it down.”
With so many bourbon drinkers interested in tequila, it makes sense that these customers would shop in similar ways as they would buy whiskey.
“These clients are now building up a tequila collection,” Patrick says. “They try one tequila with their friends and then they come back here and they want to buy another new one.”
Exploration of the category has begun.
“It used to be that these bourbon guys mostly just drank añejos, because of the oaky, sweet notes,” Patrick says. “But now the blanco, repo and even mezcals are starting to pick up. Even the good blancos are standing out.”
Accordingly, Wine Cellar has beefed up their tequila selection in the last few years.
“We went from carrying 60 tequilas to carrying 140 tequilas now,” Patrick reports. “We’ve tripled our selection. And it just keeps going and going. We might have to go even bigger as demand keeps going. Especially for additive-free tequilas.”
Customers who want to taste their way through the category can find opened bottles to sample.
“We have our sampling bar in the store,” Patrick says. “Lips to glass remains key.”
THC Beverages Take Off
As other beverage alcohol retailers report nationwide, Wine Cellar has recently seen a sharp uptick in sales for cannabis beverages.
Setting the stage for this moment was the 2019 federal Farm Bill, which legalized hemp and had a critical loophole. Hemp plants contain small amounts of THC (unlike federally illegal cannabis plants, which obviously contain lots of it). Companies can technically extract this THC from hemp plants, and legally put it into products for retail. Hence, the countrywide boom in drinks containing this derived THC, known as delta-8.
“Our area of the country is not well known for progressive THC laws, but these drinks are absolutely exploding right now,” Patrick says.
Currently Wine Cellar stocks more than 100 SKUs in this red-hot category.
“I’ve had to amend the doors from craft beer for THC drinks to offer more cold serve there,” Patrick says. “More variety means more people coming in for these products.”
The demographic for cannabis beverages “never ceases to amaze me,” Patrick says. “Lots of people in the ages 30 to 49. Lots of women. Guys in their late 40s, late 50s.”
“There are some younger customers,” he continues, “but mostly its people my age, the Gen Xers. I think a lot of these people are looking for nonalcoholic alternatives. Maybe they see these drinks as being more interesting than nonalcoholic beverages. It’s the same thing, only you also get an effect, while still being able to socialize.”
The potency of these products varies widely. THC levels are as little as 2.5 mg, and can reach as high as an eye-opening (or perhaps eyes-shutting) 50 mg.
“There’s one guy who keeps coming back in for his 50-mg beverage,” Patrick says.
While these products tend to be single serve, another version is the 750-ml. meant for multiple use. Nowadays is a growing cannabis beverage brand that offers 2.5 mg and 5 mg THC products the 750-ml. format.
“You can put a little shot into your drink and make a cocktail with it,” Patrick says.
Community Involvement
Serving as a local hub for all things alcohol means more than just superior customer service and product selection. Savvy stores like Wine Cellar remain active in their community.
“We just did a showcase event for a local charity, where I plated cocktails for 300 people,” Patrick says. “I banged them all out in 90-degree heat. It was awesome.”
The store is a sponsor for Willow Tree, an organization that helps children suffering from abuse. “We also do Make a Wish donations, too,” Patrick says.
Altogether it makes for a leading beverage alcohol store that has celebrated 50 years in business for a reason, poised for further success in the decades ahead.
Kyle Swartz is editor of Beverage Dynamics. Reach him at kswartz@epgmediallc.com. Read his recent piece, Our 2024 Retailer of the Year: Macadoodles.
