Cheers is dedicated to delivering hospitality professionals the information, insights and data necessary to drive their beverage business by covering trends and innovations in operations, merchandising, service and training.
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www.cheersonline.com 44 • June 2015 By Jeremy Nedelka MARKETING MATTERS BRUSHING UP ON PAINT BARS Paint 'n' sip. Paint night. Sip 'n' doodle. Painting and drinking. Those are just some of the names of a trend helping restaurants and bars fi ll event rooms on weeknights, increase revenue on slow days and expose their location to new customers. Part amateur paint class, part Happy Hour and part girls' night out, these events range from private gatherings to public sessions. They take place in bars and restaurants as one-night bookings, or in venues designed specifi cally to host them. But there are two things they all have in common: art and alcohol—namely wine, though often beer and sometimes cocktails. There about 300 such operations in the U.S. by some estimates. These include Village Canvas and Cabernet, which opened in September 2012 in Omaha, NE; Brush N Bottle in Tucson, AZ; The Painted Lyon in Tulsa, OK; Splash Studio in Milwaukee, WI; Canvas, Corks & Forks in Schenectady, NY; and Canvas Paint & Sip Studio in Kirkland, WA. Franchising paint bars has become a big business as well. Painting with a Twist, headquartered in Mandeville, LA, opened in 2007. The company now supports 182 franchise locations operating in 29 states. Houston, TX-based Pinot's Palette is a fast-growing, paint-and-sip chain that now operates more than 100 locations, largely through franchises. Founded in 2009 as Pinot & Picasso, the compa- ny changed its name in 2010 to avoid potential legal issues with using the Picasso name. Pinot's Palette expects to open 40 more locations this year. STARTING FROM SCRATCH Many independent operators start their paint-and-sip concepts with a blank canvas. "I had taken my daughter to a paint bar and just fell in love with it." That was all it took for Denise Morgan to open Brush It Off, a paint bar in Sturbridge, MA, about three years ago. "It was the perfect turning point in my life, so I proceeded with a business plan and everything worked out on paper," she says. "I found a place and opened up, and luckily for me the trend hadn't really hit our state yet." The studio in 2013 opened a full travel calendar, booking everything from bars to country clubs. Brush It Off hosts seven to 10 in-house classes a week. The 2,000-sq.-ft. room splits time between public and private events, holding a maximum of 60 artists. The studio has a beer and wine li- cense, so it offers a selection of wines by the bottle and by the glass, in ad- dition to Mimosas in the morning for baby and wedding showers. Brush It Off also offers 15 to 20 beers and malt beverages. Linda Lagana opened Graffi ti Paint Bar in Nashua, NH, in early 2014. Starting from scratch was a learning process, she says. "It was a massive undertaking to build out the space, comply with build- ing, health and liquor regulations and get the paint bar opened," she says. "There were an unbelievable number © ISTOCK.COM/DANIENEL