Erika from Usherforever posted up this interesting tidbit about Usher's latest wine venture. If you live within the ATL area you can met Usher tomorrow night.
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"Tonight there will be a Press Conference and a VIP party, but The Grape will be open for business to the general public, starting tomorrow (December 14) for dinner, around 6pm eastern.
The Inman Park branch of the Grape wasn't open to customers last week, and it wasn't yet the corporate/sleek vision of urban wine and nibblies.
Workmen drilled noisily under the counter. Young staffers crowded around the bar to sample mini crab cakes and sips of wine poured from bottles with "Training" Sharpied on their labels. A manager taught them to use words like "velvety" and "seductive." A can of Dulux "Proper Purple" paint sat open on the very purple windowsill of this very purple room.
There was something else purple, velvety and seductive here, as well. The boss: Usher Raymond IV, a singer, actor and general superstar known to the universe by his given name.
Usher wore a purple velour blazer over a purple shirt, and he hoisted aloft a glass of deep purple pinot noir called Credo. He was co-branding.
"This is my favorite wine," Usher said. "But I also like Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru," naming a storied French vineyard. "If you're gonna call yourself a wine drinker, you've gotta have at least a burgundy in your stash," he said with a laugh. Usher called himself a wine drinker, a "wino" and a "wine connoisseur" at this, his first franchise of the Grape.
It won't be his last. Next comes a Grape in New York (its opening will coincide with the release of his new album in late 2007), then the Las Vegas Strip and Los Angeles. After that, who knows? Usher and his partners — Grape CEO Jack Mazur and business manager Solomon Smallwood — have talked Chicago, South America, Shanghai and Tokyo.
It's been a ride for Usher's new business boo, Mazur, who started the chain with a single unit in the Vinings Jubilee shopping center in 2000. Sensing a growing interest in wine among younger drinkers, Mazur and his partners devised the unique concept. All the wines poured in the bar are available for sale in the attached store. They are also classified in a copyrighted list of 10 numbered styles, which allows new drinkers to describe their preference.
That worked for Usher. "When you get your classification card and you're sitting at the tables, he said, "you become a wine connoisseur." During his not-infrequent visits to the Phipps Plaza Grape, he found out he was a 5, i.e., a drinker who likes "medium-body red wines of fruit flavors that are soft and velvety to the palate." "I was known as the guy who'd buy out the store," Usher said. "When I tasted something I liked, I took everything they had."
So, has the superstar been a fan of the grape as well as the Grape for long? "Well, I am 28, right," Usher laughed. "So, legally, for seven years."
After an invitation-only meet and greet with Usher on Wednesday, the wine bar will open for business Thursday. Usher sightings will be catch as catch can."