SCOUT COMMUNITY HIGHLIGHTS - Lou from P&V
Meet Lou, she’s the amazing human behind P&V Wine + Liquor Merchants - a Newtown local purveyor of amazing Australian natural wines, craft beers and artisan spirits. You may know P&V already, have heard of them through several partnerships with our studio, or if you’ve been lucky enough to try them then you know what we’re talking about!
We took the time to have an interesting conversation with them about the why and the behind the scenes of P&V so if you’re a wine enthusiast or looking for some suggestions as to what booze to get for your next night out, keep reading!
Hi Lou, can you share a little bit of your background and what brought you to this passion for wine and beers?
I guess it really started when I was younger and working in bars, I had studied fashion design and while I was trying to get into the industry I was working in bars, once I finally did get a job in the industry I didn’t really enjoy it as much as I thought I would. I always kept my bar jobs cause that’s where I really had fun at work, one thing led to another, and soon enough I was working full time in hopso. I really really really loved bartending, it was also about the time that booze companies in Australia started to import more interesting spirits and beer, probation cocktails were becoming popular, small bars were opening, there were a few craft breweries popping up and there was so much to try, learn and experiment with.
Before we deep dive into P&V, can you remind us what natural wine is exactly?
Minimal intervention or natural wine, whatever you want to call it, simply is that, wine made with as little human intervention as possible. Things from pesticides in farming to additions into the wines during the winemaking process. The less unnatural shit added to the grapes the less unnatural shit you drink.
Tell us more about P&V - what makes you so different from any other typical bottle shop? Where does your focus on natural wines come from?
Well, I guess the initial idea came out of the fact that there were so many amazing wines we had been selling at work, I was working at Bloodwood and Mary’s in Newtown, and all the wines we loved were only available through bars and restaurants so many customers would ask where they were able to get them and there was nowhere, plus the staff all wanted to drink them at home too! I approached my friends Jake, Kenny and Mike with the idea for having a bottle shop that focused on those same minimal intervention wines, unusual spirits and local beers and they loved the idea. At the time when we opened there were very few other bottle shops which stocked these products and no bottle shops that were solely focused on minimal intervention wines from small producers, and certainly none in Newtown. Newtown is our community and it was important to us that we were doing something that contributed in a positive way.
Being focused on natural wine is huge for us, there are oodles of wonderful small producers out there doing weird and wonderful things but also heaps of old school wineries which never converted over to using pesticides when farming and chemicals additives in their wines. It is good to see that this ideology is now picking up and these great products are being more readily available across the board!
What does a typical weekday (or week) at P&V look like?
Ohhh is there a typical day? It is mostly, let’s see what happens today!
What do you most love about your job / about P&V?
Honestly it is the people and the connections we are able to make! We get to meet all these incredible producers and share all these amazing products with the people! When customers come back in just to tell us how much they enjoyed a certain bottle or how well their dinner party went etc. We really are lucky enough to have fantastic staff and pretty incredible customers.
What is an absolute “must-try” wine and/or craft beer of your selection? (or your absolute favourite and tell us why / what makes this drink extra special)
Here are some of my all-time favourites:
Mukai Ine Mankai 2021, this is my favourite sake of all time, it is made with this ancient rstyle of red rice, think savoury cherry, pomegranate and vanilla aromas with umami-rich palate and made by a female sake master to boot!
Never Never Distilling Co. Dark Series Oyster Shell Gin, this gin is wild, it is made from oyster shells from Kangaroo Island, it makes for such an amazing saline and savoury minerally gin which is perfect for martinis!
Up To Eleven Amaro, this bitters from Beechworth Bitters company, an all Australian bitters company, the owners sauce most of their ingredients from local producers in their area, really fresh and intense. I always have a bottle of it in my fridge, also who doesn’t love a Spinal Tap reference!
P&V Session Rose, ok so this one is a joke with the staff, they think it is funny that my favourite wine in the shop is one of the cheapest most readily available ones we have, it is our house rose made by Blind Corner in the Margaret River. Deliciously dry and thirst-quenching, chefs kiss this wine!
What advice would you give to someone who has no idea of how to choose a wine/beer when entering a bottle shop?
Going into a bottle shop can be so overwhelming, especially when you really don’t know what you want or much about booze, especially wine. So many people feel really embarrassed about not knowing the difference between grape varietals or different wine regions and what that means and I think that’s madness. No one gets that embarrassment about not knowing everything about beer.
Firstly, I would say NEVER be embarrassed about not knowing, I’m big on a vibe you want your drinking experience to go in, is it a Wednesday night pizza night, first date, long lunch, dinner with the parents, what’s happening??!! Talk to the staff, tell them anything you remember about what you have liked in the past. I really love how different people describe their individual tastes and the flavours they are looking for.
Oh also take photos of bottles you have enjoyed in the past!!! It is very helpful.
What goal do you hope to achieve for P&V this year and/or any exciting things to look forward to this year?
Getting to do events with our friends again is probably the most exciting thing, being able to do little wine list takeovers at our friends restaurants and bars. We have some coming up in Melbourne and Brisbane later in the year. We are also working on our third What A Fizzer event which is an event focusing on Pet Nats where producers come and pour for the public, we haven’t been able to do that for two years.
When you’re not at P&V, what are you up to / how do you like to spend your free time?
Probably sitting at a bar, Bar Planet makes amazing martinis and The Enmore Hotel has heaps of good beers on tap and both are dog friendly which I love.
Finally, where do we find you?