Oct. 30--A new Chicago company is serving up a website that aims to make craft liquor easier to buy and easier to understand.
The group behind Ezra's, which opened a liquor store in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood this month, is launching an online shop that also includes what the company is calling curated content about spirits and the companies that make them.
The store, at 1128 W. Armitage Ave., had been a wine shop called The Poison Cup. Now, as Ezra's, it sells craft spirits, wine and beer.
Ezra's was started by twin brothers Adam and Parker Newman and their friend Scott Reich. The trio of 29-year-olds, who grew up in Glencoe, noticed how their friends' beer preferences evolved from mainstream brews to craft beers made by smaller, independent companies. Yet many of their friends who drank spirits stuck to mainstream brands, Parker Newman said.
"Beer had this Cinderella moment, why hasn't spirits?" Newman said.
To him, part of the reason is that picking out a new spirit at a liquor store can be a "really overwhelming" process. With beer, once people find the styles they enjoy, they can branch out to try new brews made in the same style. With spirits, the process might not be as easy, Newman said.
Named after Reich's dog -- a different breed than the St. Bernard with a barrel in its logo -- Ezra's focuses on spirits such as gin, rum, tequila and whiskey. It is trying to highlight local companies, such as Evanston's FEW Spirits and Chicago's Letherbee Distillers, Newman said.
Ezra's is working on obtaining a retail liquor license in Washington, D.C., which could become a second outpost and would give the company access to different distributors and brands, Newman said. Reich, who is currently at Wharton, would run the company's East Coast operations, Newman said.
The company's deliveries are limited by restrictions that vary by state. For now, it is not doing fast delivery such as those offered by services including Qwiker Liquor, though Newman did not rule out the possibility of adding such a service someday.
jwohl@tribune.com
Twitter @jessicawohl
