San Mateo’s Bridgepointe getting new tenant

From boutique craft beers to virtual wine tastings and thousands of options in between, Total Wine is looking to relocate to the 27,000-square-foot storefront near the juncture of Highway 101 and State Route 92.

“The location is terrific and the demographics are great,” said Edward Cooper, Total Wine’s vice president of public affairs.

The Bay Area’s wine-loving and craft beer-craving customer base will have lots to appreciate as there’s a vast selection for palates of all kinds, he said. And for those who aren’t sure what to pick up, there will be two tasting stations to give a new brew a try, he said.

“We’re a wine super store, 8,000 wines, 3,000 spirits, almost 2,500 to 3,000 beers. And for us, we want to be the place that people come and stock up and find really cool fun stuff, not just national brands, but also cool craft beers and craft distilled spirits and wines that they may have never seen or tasted before. That’s the beauty of having a store that big,” Cooper said.

With a Fremont store and having just opened a Mountain View locale in April, the company is looking to greatly expand throughout the Bay Area with new stores also slated for San Jose, San Ramon and Pleasanton. Cooper said they hope to open the San Mateo locale sometime in the second quarter of 2018.

In the meantime, Total Wine has applied to the city for a license to sell and serve liquor, as well as a building permit to modify the interior of the former sports store, said San Mateo Associate Planner Lily Lim.

The improvements will include making space for a classroom, a common amenity at Total Wine locales. A variety of consumer classes including 18 focused on wine, 12 centered on beer and another dozen on spirits are typical offerings, Cooper said. The classroom is also used for “virtual tastings,” where Total Wine visitors can sample various wines or spirits while the maker — be it brewer, vintner or distiller — offers a live demonstration from their facility, Cooper explained.

“We’re pouring the wines there in San Mateo, and classrooms all around the company [locations], and the rock star vintners and brewers and distillers are walking people through their latest vintage or the latest and greatest stuff they’ve brewed or distilled,” Cooper said.

The fully “high-tech,” Wi-Fi-equipped classrooms are also open to the public, nonprofits or companies as community gathering spaces available for rent at no cost, Cooper said.

Another important use for the gathering space will be hosting employee trainings. The large-scale merchant typically hires about 50 employees for their stores. As a company policy, Cooper said Total Wine places an emphasis on having at least 75 percent of their employees working full time.

“It’s not just good wages, but it’s also benefits, and the ability to move up through the ranks of the company,” he said. “We want to invest in our team.”

The wine merchant will be looking to fill the space of San Mateo’s former Sports Authority which, like hundreds across the nation, went out of business. The Bridgepointe storefront has been vacant for nearly a year.

The space became vacant while Bridgepointe owner SPI Holding was still in the midst of seeking to demolish an ice rink called for in the shopping center’s master plan. After years of community dissent, SPI announced in March they would retain the rink and has since signed on with Nazareth Ice Oasis, which operates a Redwood City rink, to run the Bridgepointe facility.

An SPI representative did not return requests for comment about Total Wine, but officials have previously said they’re striving to compete with the rise in online shopping.

On the border of San Mateo and Foster City, Bridgepointe offers a range of restaurants and big-box retailers with strongholds such as Target, The Home Depot, Toys R Us, and Bed Bath & Beyond.

Total Wine plans to join the list by making interior improvements to the property to accommodate new offerings Cooper said he trusts Bay Area residents will enjoy.

“It’s anywhere from really good value wine, all the way up, we’re the nation’s largest retailer of first-growth Bordeaux,” Cooper said. “On top of that, from a beer perspective we want to provide access to all sorts of cool local craft beers and national brands as well.”  

samantha@smdailyjournal.com

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