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 | Thursday, May 15, 2008 | ... for the Chicagoland small business |
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April 9, 2003
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Lincoln Park business shows
it can change with times |
| By Courtney Tritch |
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Some of us can remember a time when Lincoln Park was a very different neighborhood than it is now. A time before the birth of the Clybourn Corridor. A time when the corner of North Avenue and Halsted housed 8 bars. The time was 1955 and one of those eight bars was a tough saloon called The Barrel House. A saloon Fred Rosen claims may have been "the meanest bar in the country."
That rough and tumble saloon became a liquor store and that store has grown up to become Sam's Wines & Spirits, owned by Fred Rosen and the largest wine seller in the world. Possibly the only liquor store to grace the cover of Time magazine twice, Sam's has much to be proud of and many reasons for budding entrepreneurs to pay attention.
Although it now stands proudly along the Clybourn Corridor, this was not always the case. Sam's began as a small family outfit catering to the unbelievably diverse markets of Cabrini Green and the Gold Coast. While the upstairs carried inexpensive wine and pints of beer, the basement housed a catacomb of fine wines.
Fred's father Sam started the business and instilled in his son the importance of education and working hard to achieve your goals. Fred grew up 12 blocks from the store and developed a love of the neighborhood. He had the foresight to see what the neighborhood could become and he worked hard to stay on top of his game.
Fred now runs the store with his two sons, Darryl and Brian. It is a far cry from the original store, sprawling an impressive 33,000 square feet and packed floor to ceiling with every type of wine, spirit and champagne you could imagine-about $10 million worth.
What is the Rosen's secret? How have they managed to stay ahead of the curve? Fred Rosen tells us his very unique success story in his own words.
In the last five years since you moved to your current location, you said that business has doubled. To what do you contribute this success?
It's a lot of hard work but this is my game. It's fun. We outwork the competition. I get up at 5:30a.m. every day. If the competition wants to do that, then maybe they'll beat us.
My advice is to recognize what your neighborhood wants. People want personal service and they will pass a lot of stores to get to yours if you can provide that.
We are also the most electronically advanced liquor store in the U.S. and we only hire the best people.
How do you make sure you're hiring the best people and what is your training process once they are hired?
We hire like a basketball team. We want to win and if they don't, then they get cut. This means we are left with the best possible people in each position. We have 130 employees and less than 10% turn over each year. (The industry average is 50-60%.)
We travel the world developing relationships with the owners of vineyards so that when it's time to sell their best product, they think of us first.
We also promote from within. Seminars are held twice a week and even the stock boys participate in the tastings so that when they move up, they know what's going on.
What is your customer service philosophy?
We genuinely want to provide personal service and we know that the Lincoln Park neighborhood appreciates that. A bottle of beer is a bottle of beer no matter where you buy it so we need to provide a reason for them to come to us. We work hard to provide price, selection and service. The relationships we have developed last from generation to generation. We will sell for one wedding and end up doing the family's confirmation and their daughter's wedding.
Our store is unique in that we carry as many hard to find products as we can. We also have a lot of fun. Jadot Winery gave us a basketball hoop for our grand opening and it still hangs in the store. They know I love to play ball and we'll have shootouts in the store for discounts.
Even with the problematic economy, you are still holding your own. What is in store for Sam's Wines in the future?
Even though we sell nationally, we still see ourselves as Lincoln Park's store. However, we may develop other operations. If we did, we would partner with a national chain and it would be a very slow, careful expansion.
Courtney Tritch is membership and communications director for the Lincoln Park Chamber of Commerce.
She can be reached at 773.880.5200 or
courtney@lincolnparkchamber.com.
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