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I know Gary Vaynerchuck. I'm not friends with him, but I worked at his father's liquor store in Millburn, NJ in the summer of 1994. I was home from college that summer and he was still in high school. Some years later, after I graduated and left NJ for San Francisco, the original location was completely renovated and became the "Wine Library", which as far as I know is still around today and was definitely a much more upscale operation than Shopper's Discount Liquors.

But context matters, and 1994 pre-dates the rise of the high-end liquor and wine "supermarkets" even in an affluent area like Millburn, NJ. Shopper's Discount Liquors was the prototypical liquor and wine "supermarket" of the time. It wasn't a fancy place per say, but it was definitely one of the busiest stores in the area. It was the kind of place that ran ads in the Sunday New Star Ledger announcing all the sales on cases of beer - "Molson Golden 24 bottles - $11.99" - that sort of thing. It did have an excellent wine selection at the time - I knew a fair amount about wine myself as I'd had a job during my sophomore year of college at small wine shop in the town the university I attended was in. Shopper's was the kind of place you'd go to buy your booze if you were hosting a big summer 4th of July party. It had some of the best prices in town, and it had selection.

I saw Gary quite a bit that summer. He wasn't working at the store, but his older cousin and his father were there all the time. I worked the floor, unloading the delivery trucks and sending cases of booze down into the warehouse beneath the shop floor. It was hard work, but I got to know many of the people who were running the place - including Gary's cousin and his father pretty well. His father was a tough guy, but if you worked hard, he'd respect you in return.

I don't know exactly where Gary was living at the time, but I'm nearly certain it wasn't Queens. I'm almost positive it was somewhere in New Jersey, possibly west of Millburn. He got a car when he turned 17 - a pretty nice classic car, but nothing overly fancy. I don't know if he saved his own money for this or if his parents got it for him. Either way, he definitely seemed more like the typical suburban NJ kids I grew up with than how he now describes his upbringing. I have no doubt, though, that his father built that business from scratch.

Nor should Gary's intuition around going upscale and launching Wine Library TV in the early 2000's be ignored either. He could obviously sense the trend towards the high end shopping experience. The new (er) store (and TBH it's probably been 10 years since I've been there) was designed specifically for those that have lots of money to spend, primarily on wine, but of course it also had a huge single malt and boutique whiskey section, cognac, etc. You can't get into a home in that part of NJ for less than $5MM now and so everything is pretty much high end (although amusingly, I think there may still be a Taco Bell next door, which is where we used to go to eat after parties because it was the only place in town open after midnight.).

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I’d like to see this story in there be of those nifty animated movies…it’s such a necessary nod to reality!

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So, so true.

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