If you visit any of Robinsons 300 plus pubs then you can be assured to find as meticulously a sourced wine list than in any fine dining restaurant.
If you grow up in Lancashire, or across the north west of England, then Robinsons Brewery is a bit like having your local pub chugging out beer for you at the end of the road.
Which is not far from the truth considering Robinsons Brewery not only makes beer, but sells itacross its estate of managed and tenanted pubs that actually stretches right across the north of the country.
It has slowly built a reputation for tried, trusted and comfortable pubs, perfect for a family outing or treating your mum for lunch.
It was not, however, a few years ago where you would go and expect to peruse through a wine list that packed with exclusively hand picked, sourced, blended, great value wines from all parts of the world.
Paul Robinson has helped transform his family’s wine business
But that is now very much the case thanks to Robinsons’ wine team headed up by Paul Robinson, part of the Robinson family and his chief wine buyer, winemaker and blender, Noel Reid.
Together they have forged one of the most dynamic, interesting and creative wine partnerships in the country. Yet, outside of the north west, the Robinsons estate and those that venture on to their stand at the London Wine Fair, they are very much under the radar, happy to get on with the job ahead of them. And if that means nipping in to source wines from under the noses of the big national distributors with more receptionists than they have in their entire team, then all the better.
Double act
Robinson and Reid are quite a double act. Not least for the fact one is closer to seven foot tall, whilst the other is nearer five foot.
You will see them at all the major tastings, quietly assessing, benchmarking all the wines on show, before pouncing on the single winemaker in the room they think is capable of producing the great quality, value for money wine they need for not only their own pubs, but a growing number of pub customers across the country.
Robinson’s meticulous wine buyer, Noel Reid
Reid is quite clear what he is looking for in a wine. “It has to be better than anything else at that price. It has to be exclusive to Robinsons and it has to be at the right price.”
He has the palate and the wine buying skills to pick out wines that are £10, £15 or £20 more a bottle at cost to buy, but that is not what his customers want.
For Reid it is all about finding a super quality producer that he can work with to make wines that will be an award winner at between £15 to £25 on a pub’s wine list.
Winning awards is crucial for Robinsons. In the last year the 100 wines it has entered in to competitions have each won an award, with 20 golds, 74 silvers and six bronzes. For Reid it is his way of being able to benchmark each of the wines in the range, and ensure he has the right wine on his own list.
Skills he learnt during spells working with Matthew Clark, Alliance Wine and as a regional store manager for Oddbins.
Building a reputation
Robinson admits it has not been plain sailing building up a wine range and a reputation for wine within a business famous for its brewing. It seems he has had as big a job convincing his own family that they should be investing so much in wine as he might the landlords of the pubs they own and serve.
But you get the sense he has a steely determination to put his own personal stamp on the family business through the wines he and Reid are able to source and sell.
Whilst Reid has been very much part of the wine trade for most of his career, Paul Robinson actually started his career and trained as a chef.
A background he was able to use to help craft and design Robinsons food menus and kitchens across its pub estate.
He explains: “Yes, I spent my early years working in Scotland at the Forte Poste and Crest hotels, then I had some time at Daphne’s in London and the Alderley Edge hotel before coming to Robinsons where for 22 years I was in charge of all the catering across our pubs. I worked on costing and designing all our menus and kitchens.”
The switch to wine
But he was, equally, more than happy to move over in to wine.
“I have always had a passion for wine, but not had the opportunity to understand it before,” he explains.
“An opportunity arose, about eight years ago, when the wine and spirits buyer retired, so I was tasked with finding a suitable wine buyer to take Robinsons’ wine offer on to the next level. After searching the country, I was introduced to Noel Reid. Noel’s palate is very good and I have increased my knowledge considerably working with him.
The big difference bringing in a dedicated wine buyer in to the business, meant it no longer had to rely on the big national players to supply it with their wine, says Robinson.
“Before all our wines were UK sourced. We had about 300 SKUs and only two brands that were exclusive to us. Now 80% of our turnover is from wines we have sourced direct ourselves from vineyards around the world. We think it is the only way to get the best quality and best value wines for our licensees,” he adds.
“It has been a real opportunity for the buying team to source exciting wines from all over the world and show the business opportunities that wine can bring to Robinsons.”
It is clear moving to Robinsons has been arguably Reid’s most important career decision to date.
“I was standing in a vineyard in the middle of La Mancha in Spain when I got a call saying a Mr Robinson wanted to speak to me,” he recalls.
He has not looked back since. “The pivotal reason for wanting to come to work for Paul was that it was a chance to put my mark on the wine range. I had a chance to make real changes.”
Second glass appeal
A typical interior of one of Robinsons’ 300 plus pubs
Robinson and Reid are looking for wines which they call having that “second glass” or “second bottle” appeal.
“Are they good enough for you to want to buy another glass?” asks Robinson. “We are looking to source wines that win best value awards. We know from our strength in the north west that it is hard to sell bottles of wine in our pubs for over £20.
Its wine strategy is very clear, says Reid.“We want to have a wine portfolio that is as good as anyone else’s in the country. But across the board. If you are looking for top quality, best value wines for a smaller list, then we are there.”
Robinson adds: “We want to find great quality, best value wines at a price point that our licensees can make a good gross profit on. To make sure our wine lists are full of wines that make them the most money. To get our pubs to have more wines by the glass at house, mid and high price points.”
To do that, says Reid, it means working extremely hard to find a very tight portfolio of wines, that are each at the very top of their game, both for value and quality. “Every step we have taken has been a new one. It’s taken six years for us to get to this stage. First was getting the own label wines rights, then, it was our by the glass range, and so on.”
Less is more
Robinsons has put a lot of focus on improving its by the glass range
Keeping things tight both in terms of its range and what its pubs have to manage is the way forward, says Robinson. “We have a very tight list of around 170 SKUs and make around 80% of our turnover from 30 of them,” adds Robinson.
It appears to be working. “We were 7.2% up in the last year, turning over £4m. We now sell 250,o00 more bottles per year than when we first started. On average we are selling nearly 1,000 bottles of wine a day in our pubs. But as well as those we are also in accounts like the Grosvenor in Manchester and the Gaucho. That’s important for us,”says Robinson.
But it is not all about working to around the £20 price mark, says Reid. If it wants to grow its third party pub business, then it needsto be able to find wines that can work at all price points on a more expensive, but still based on the essential top quality at best value ratio.
“With our tied pubs we will look at their consumer base, what is selling on their menus and choose wines to suit. If they are selling steak at £25 then they can sell wine up to £60,” says Robinson.
Opportunity for producers
Reid admits not all wine producers are equipped to work with Robinsons. They might have the wines, but they need to have the right attitude and dedication to work together for the long term.
He is also very critical of some of the quality of wine that is offered to him, particularly at lower prices points. Wines he knows are getting picked up by other importers.
“I think we have a huge responsibility as an industry for the wines we are buying. We all need to keep our standards up. Some of the wine we see are very good. Some are shocking.”
He adds: “We are seeing too many varieties that are cheap, but just not very good.
For Robinson, the attraction for a producer is quite clear: “We can offer them the chance to go to a ready made market of 330 pubs. For a producer like Caserena in Argentina we can take on their wines at all price levels and sell either through our own estate or to our key accounts.”
He adds: “Our wine producers also have to understand if we introduce a new wine to a list it might take six to 18 months to see a return. It takes time to build up customer trust and interest. But we can also move quickly, if we like a wine we can just bring it in. There’s only the two of us.”
Argentina’s Casarena has had great success with Robinsons
Caserena, for example, in year one sold around 9,000 cases of Malbec, but by year three that was up to 35,000 and beyond.
The big advantage for a producer, says Reid, is that it is far more willing to work with a winery that might have missed a couple of vintages if they are confident it has the right wines to sell it now. “A lot of wine importers won’t do that,” he claims.
It is all about being very thorough in your research. Reid is constantly scouring wine guides from different parts of the world, picking out wineries with no UK distribution, and sending them emails asking for samples. “We meticulously pre-taste samples before going on a trip to potentially meet a producer. But all the time I am asking myself ‘where would this sit on a list’.”
That might mean for a particular country going through 150 Chardonnays, 150 Chenin Blancs and 150 Pinot Noirs. But it is all about getting that list down to a final 10, based on sending further samples. The 10 that he and Robinson will then go and personally visit.
Trips that they organise themselves and not through any local generic or trade body. “We can then go and see wineries we are genuinely excited about seeing, not just people they want us to see.”
Prices stable
Robinsons was one of the few operators not to increase wine prices during the autumn as a result of the fall in sterling.It has, in the past, made much of the fact it only changes its list once a year and will look at the situation in the new year, stresses Reid.
It is also indicative of how it looks at wine prices overall. There are no secret price lists or one price for special customers with Robinsons. “Everyone gets the same price,” says Reid. “We are not working on a 40% plus margin, we work on a margin that we think is acceptable.”
Robinson concedes as a business they are still learning and developing how the wine arm fits in to its overall business. But its numbers are beginning to do the talking for him.
And if they don’t then Robinson and Reid are more than capable of doing the talking for themselves.
