Richard and Joe.
MIT grads Richard Yau and Joe Laurendi were always comfortable ordering craft beer or cocktails while exploring Boston’s nightlife. But when it came to wine, Yau says he ordered the second cheapest wine on the list. As 25-year-old young professionals, they wanted to learn about wine but felt the wine industry was not easy to navigate. That led them to form Bright Cellars, a customized wine subscription service that makes recommendations based on customer feedback.
“We noticed disconnect between the wine industry and a new generation of wine consumers,” observes Yau, Bright Cellars’ CEO. “People say it’s just something they never got into, or they went to the grocery store and picked out a wine that had a nice label.” Yao and Laurendi launched Bright Cellars in 2014 in Boston. The following year, they took part in a 12-week entrepreneur accelerator program, Gener8tor, which brought them to Milwaukee. Bright Cellars is based in the Ward4 co-working space inside the Historic Pritzlaff Building.
Subscribers start by taking a questionnaire to help guide them toward wines they might enjoy. They receive wines through their subscriptions and can rate the wine, which allows the Bright Cellars team to improve matching customers to wine in the future. “That data is what powers our matching algorithm,” Yau notes.
The base subscription price is $80 per month for four bottles of wine. Bright Cellars keeps wines that rate well; if a wine doesn’t rate well, they try to understand why and eventually phase those out. “We’re getting new wines in, and that’s how we create a better service, since we actually get feedback from our members,” Yau says. “We try to understand how and why something does well.” They curate wines from around the globe, from both large and small vineyards.
Letting the Consumers Have a Voice
Yau notes that Bright Cellars operates differently than the established wine industry, which he says is driven more by critics, medals and winemakers than by actual consumer preference. As for whether today’s wine consumers prefer drier or sweeter wines, certain notes or flavor profiles, or wines from specific regions, it’s all across the board. Yau believes that reflects today’s growing consumer demand for customized services—wine or otherwise.
“A good analogy would be Netflix,” Yau says. “Somebody who likes comedies might also like dramas. The algorithm works like that in a sense. Sometimes we don’t know exactly why somebody likes a particular thing, but we are getting a good sense with the algorithm. It’s a large gamut, because traditionally wine is critic-driven, and that can create a homogenization of wine.”
Even Milwaukee, a city known for beer, is developing an appreciation for wine. Yau says the Beer Capital has been welcoming and supportive. Bright Cellars is also testing a cheese-pairing program featuring Wisconsin cheeses.
Bright Cellars took their model of customer-based wine preferences one step further by partnering with a California winemaker to craft Folk & Fable Bourbon Barrel Aged Red Blend, a balanced, drier red with slight spicy, oak bourbon barrel influences and notes of raspberry and hazelnut. Yau says it’s aged just three months and can be enjoyed with or without food.
“Folk & Fable is exclusive to Bright Cellars, and it’s a brand we own. We developed it using data from customers. We tested it online, and it did really well, so based on having that data, we launched it in Milwaukee,” Yau says. It’s available by the bottle at select retail locations and by the glass at The Diplomat, Sugar Maple, The Rumpus Room and other locations. But call ahead; Yau himself recently stopped at two Milwaukee area establishments for a glass and found they were sold out.
For more information, visit brightcellars.com and folkandfablewines.com.
