Jason Bernard is a connoisseur and self-taught expert of all things wine. After moving to Springfield, MO in 2003, he went from being a customer to managing the Brown Derby International Wine Center. The Scoop sat down with Bernard to discuss his love of wine and some of his observations about wine and the people who drink it.
How does someone become an expert in wine?
That’s a great question. Honestly, it’s has to do with what you want, so, for me it was a passion. Before working here, I shopped here, and I had a genuine interest in it so that helped push me along. A large part of the education process is basically self-taught. I mean you can read about it all you want, you can go to as many classes as you want, but ultimately it falls on you, tasting, opening bottles, and that’s where you are getting your expertise.
Is your knowledge specific to one type of wine, or more general?
I manage the store, so my knowledge has to be much broader, which makes me probably not an expert in anything but I know a little about a lot. But what we have on top of that is that we have experts that are more niche, that can go into a certain category, and I have my own categories that I can delve into, but we have a Champagne expert, Italian and French wine experts that know far greater than I do in those categories while I know far greater about Napa Cabs than they do.
Do you think people have any misconceptions about wine?
Yeah. I think the two biggest misconceptions are that all expensive wine is good, all cheap wine is bad, and that is not true by the way. I certainly think within each of those there are general rules but then I think you’ll find exceptions to the rules. You’ll find some very good value wines and you’ll find some expensive wines that aren’t that great.
Do you find that certain people prefer certain types of wine?
Yes and no, I think generally Chardonnay, for example, is more old school. So that is generally an older clientele that pursues that, while Sauvignon Blanc, another dry white wine, like Chardonnay, is more pursued by a younger generation. I think millennials are more willing to try newer styles while older folks, as you can imagine, are probably more stuck in their ways and they’re probably just going to drink what they remember drinking 20 years ago or 30 years ago.
How do you go about recommending a wine to someone?
If I don’t know you, then we go through a variety of questions, but the first question we’ll ask you is: “Are you using this as a gift? Do you know if they like wine? ” If the answer is, “No, this is for us, we’re doing a dinner,” then, “What are you serving and what price point do you want to stay in?” Those are the most important aspects, and then within that there’s a hundred different directions you can go. “I’ve never had wine before,” we’ll ask how they like their coffee. So those are the kind of avenues that you can go down if you are trying to get to know somebody.
How would you describe the International Wine Center to someone who has never been here before?
Really what this store’s about is establishing relationships with the customers, getting to know them, recommending a bottle, having them come back and say that was really good and now you have a base point that you can work from, or they could come back and say “I didn’t really like that. ” Okay, why didn’t you like it?” Okay, now we know. There’s our baseline. What you like is different from what I like and what you taste out of a wine is different from what I taste from a wine, so you’ve got to find that baseline that you can work off of, so you know.
What is your favorite type of wine?
I’ll tell you this, I have 1,300 bottles in my collection and I’d say 80 percent of them are Napa Cabernets. But I’d also be the first to tell you that my biggest regret is that my collection isn’t more varied.
