Roost evolves to cope in changing times

MOSES LAKE — Businesses, especially small businesses, could be considered their own kind of ecosystem. And in any ecosystem, it’s important to find a niche.

Roost Lifestyle & Design Collective owner Bruce Bailey is working to find that niche. To aid that, Bailey tapped into a network of other business owners, most of them small businesses, that work with each other in ways that help them all, which has been important in a very challenging year.

The most visible part of Roost’s current business at 101 W. Third Ave. is the shelves of wine along every wall, and a display of wine bottles backlit by the front windows.

“That’s the way I designed it,” Bailey said. “It makes it like a stained glass window. An expensive stained glass window.”

All the wines come from one region.

“I stock all Washington state wines. No place else,” Bailey said.

About 90% are from eastern Washington, from Chelan to Tri-Cities, west to Prosser and Yakima, southeast to Walla Walla.

Bailey said he travels the state, talking to winery owners and sampling their products.

“It’s a whole learning curve for me,” he said.

Wineries and business owners like Bailey have built networks that allow the wineries to introduce their wines to new customers, while giving Bailey a supply of merchandise his customers like.

But part of staying in business is flexibility, so Roost is not only wine.

“It’s getting that kind of, I guess, diversity going on,” Bailey said.

He displays art from local artists, all for sale, and has some home decor pieces, although most of his home decor has been moved to a second location on Third Avenue. For the Christmas season, there’s an elaborately decorated tree, with the ornaments for sale, where the chandelier used to be. (A customer bought the chandelier.) He’s also started making gift baskets to order, he said.

Bailey sells, among other things, relishes and jams from producers he’s met at local farmers markets, and a line of chocolate truffles. Additionally, people can buy a charcuterie board (meat and cheese, olives, pickles, crackers, jam or jelly) designed to compliment the wines on sale.

Bailey is offering seating on his patio, selling wine by the glass, along with mulled wine for the winter.

“I’m thinking I’m going to start doing a meal du jour for Friday and Saturday,” he said. “It’s finding those little micro-niches. I keep trying to reinvent everything.”

Reinvention, finding something that sells, has been especially important in 2020. State officials prohibited indoor dining in restaurants and facilities like Roost in the spring, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some restrictions were lifted temporarily during the summer, although restaurants never were allowed to return to full capacity. Gov. Jay Inslee recently prohibited indoor dining again through Jan. 4.

Luckily, customers are using the patio, even in December.

“Having the patio helps,” he said. “People have responded to it and I’m very appreciative of that.”

But Bailey’s ultimate goal for Roost, he said, is to make it the kind of place where people can take their time.

“I want people to be able to enjoy what they’re doing. I want people to feel transported. Maybe that’s the whole thing,” he said.

Roost will continue evolving after Christmas.

“Come January, I’ll reinvent the shop a little more,” he said.

There will be, among other things, a new chandelier and a paint job.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at [email protected].