wine watch

Changing the wine-buying climate at the Chestnut Street State Store

Is Fine Wine and Good Spirits finally living up to its name?

CELLAR FLOOR: Max Gottesfeld has created a warm and welcoming space to buy wine at 12th and Chestnut.
Charles Mostoller

With their harsh neon overhead lighting, linoleum-tiled floors and cold metal shelving, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board’s Fine Wine and Good Spirits stores’ wine-buying experience can best be described as clinical. It’s not all that surprising, given that State Stores were originally set up as dispensaries, almost exactly like drugstores — but for booze. 

And while the pharmacist at your local CVS is always happy to help guide you through the finer points of, say,  allergy pills, you’re basically on your own at  the State Stores when weighing the stylistic differences between old and new world chardonnays. 

Happily, this is not the case in all of the stores. Walk straight to the back of the Fine Wine and Good Spirits at 1218 Chestnut St. and the difference is palpable. The lighting is dimmer, the shelves are made of stained wood and cases of wine line the aisles. On the shelves are thoughtfully written “shelf talkers,” complete with vital wine-buying info like region and varietal. There’s even a corner with a few chairs and a table stacked with books, including Jancis Robinson’s indispensable The Oxford Companion to Wine and back issues of Wine Spectator. In short, the Chestnut Street store just doesn’t feel like it belongs in Pennsylvania. 

The rear half of the store is filled with countless bottles that you won’t find anywhere else in the state: Biodynamic bottles from pioneering natural winemaker Frank Cornelissen out of Sicily, obscure orange wines that get their unique color and mouthfeel from skin-contact fermentation, and a spectrum of rosés from all over the globe. 

The reason that all of these gems reside in the Chestnut Street store has to do with one man, Max Gottesfeld. Nine years ago Gottesfeld got a job at as a part-time clerk at a State Store in Exton, but back then it was more of a job than a career. 

“My parents are really into beer and when I say beer I don’t mean Budweiser or Yuengling. My dad has been drinking Victory beer since they opened, so it’s really a craft-beer background. I just got into wine and started really liking it.”

Arriving at Chestnut Street four years ago, Gottesfeld rose through the ranks and is now a Wine Specialist, a relatively new position in the PLCB system that involves both sales-floor customer service and ordering. “Before that you were a clerk and if you were interested in wine, they’d throw you back there and you’d also have to ring [up customers], too, and all the other stuff,” he says. Now Gottesfeld and a handful of other wine specialists from around the state attend monthly seminars and tastings along with buyers’ meetings and Chairman’s Selection tastings to keep up to date on the wines that are in the store. And while having the state run the wine sales in Pennsylvania doesn’t breed sophistication, Gottesfeld sees plenty of progress. 

“In the past three years, there’s been a lot of change — which is good,” he explains. “They finally got us this position and that’s great. And since then, there’s been a big push for better customer service, more than ever before. They’re trying to keep on educating people. We have our own education and it’s enough that they [State Store employees] should be able to talk to people in the stores and help out probably 75 percent of the customers.”

But whether you’re working in a state-run or private retail situation, customer service is always tricky. 

“People get frustrated with me when I ask too many questions, but I have to ask questions if they want a good bottle of wine. Some people come in and ask crazy questions. Someone will come in,” Gottesfeld says, gesturing to a wall of reds, “and ask, ‘Do you have any red wine?’”

Then, of course, there’s the opposing side. “It’s no biggie, but someone came in and asked if we had any assyrtiko [an obscure white varietal from Greece]. Or they’ll ask a relatively new part-timer difficult questions like, ‘Do you have any cabernet francs?’ And if you just started you might not know what that is.”

But Gottesfeld sees a positive change not only in the PLCB, but also in his customers. He sees people coming in more willing to try unfamiliar varietals and even drop a little more money. Workaday bottles like heavily oaked California chardonnays are collecting dust while he’s doing a brisk business in Madeiras, fino sherries and wallet-friendly sparkling wines from places other than Champagne. 

While I was chatting with Gottesfeld a few days ago, a pair of middle-aged women came over to us. One got out her cell phone, opened up photos and showed him a label of a wine that she was looking for. It was a German riesling that falls on the sweeter side of the spectrum. 

She went on to explain that as a Moscato drinker she enjoyed it immensely, but was looking for a red because her doctor had recently advised her to add a glass to her diet. She told Gottesfeld that her go-tos were blackberry-flavored Manischewitz and Barefoot Sweet Red. “I know they’re the cheap ones, but they’re sweet,” she said. 

Rattling off the trifecta of Moscato, Manischewitz and Barefoot is the kind of thing that’s sure to illicit eye rolls from all but the most sensitive wine professionals. But Gottesfeld sent her on her way with a bottle of good Lambrusco (“Almost like a grown-up soda,”) and a fruity garnacha from Spain that he assured her would be a pleasant introduction to the world of drier reds. 

“Now I know I had to come in the back!” she said, taking her bottles up to the front register. “I didn’t even know you were back here.”