Our Story
We started off with a dream…isn’t that where most people start off? Let’s open up a wine bar that isn’t pretentious, where people can feel comfortable, relax and just eat, drink and be. Let’s support all these family-owned and operated winemakers who have been making amazing wine for generations, but do not have enough cases for distribution. Let’s do it!
Then, life gets in the way. You have bills to pay, kids to raise, I think you know what I am talking about. You talk about the dream but reality sets in. Then one day you walk by this place for lease and you can feel it. You take a leap of faith and call the number on the door, you talk to your family (because you wouldn’t do it without everyone’s support) and your mom says “Go for it! I will loan you some money.”. Five Vines Wine Bar went from a dream to reality with all the love and support of our families. Why the name Five Vines? We are a family of Five - Randy, Suzy, and our 3 boys: Dylan, Cole and Grayden. Bet you can tell ‘family is everything’ to us!
After 6 months of construction (Suzy’s vision and Randy’s construction skills), we did it! Yes, we drilled all 685 holes by hand in our wine wall, built the bar, created the lighting, redid the floors, built the benches on our patio, built the kitchen, painted the walls the color of our house. Basically, we needed to save money so construction was on us. We opened our doors January 10th, 2013 hoping anyone would walk in. Ten plus years later (I cannot believe it has been 10 years now-time goes by so crazy fast!) we could not be more honored, grateful, and proud. Our family of five has grown as those who have walked through our door as guests have become friends and turned into family. We love our historical town of San Juan Capistrano and the people that live there or come to visit it. We have grown so much during the years since we have opened with: a full-time Chef, a in-house baker, the expansion of a special events room to book parties, the opening of a Wine Club, Beer Club and Book Club, and amazing staff who we call our family (please check out our team link below to meet them!). We feel very lucky to have taken our ‘leap of faith’. And we feel we have created a space that you can feel comfortable, relaxed and can just sit back enjoy a boutique wine, a local craft beer, or some of our fresh eats. To laugh with friends, live with family, and just to Eat. Drink. Be.
We hope you will stop in and say “Hi!” whenever you are in town (we try and keep a ‘Vine’ in the house at all times). You can enjoy amazing boutique wine that Randy (Vine #1) has hand-selected for you or a cold craft beer our ‘Beer-Meister’ Cole (Vine #4) has on his rotating taps or fill up your belly with our tasty fresh social hearty menu Suzy (Vine #2) has created with our Executive Chef Omar. Dylan (Vine #3) might be in there with his wife Stephanie, and there is a strong chance that Grayden (Vine #5) is serving you.
Click below to meet OUR TEAM
we would be lost without these amazing people
who are our family!
10 years later we went back to the our same bench…
It has been a lot of hard work, sweat and tears to get this far. You can see it in comparing this picture to the one at the top of the page. Stress lines, grey hair, tighter pants, bigger boys and a lot of love gets you through it all.
“When you buy from a small business an actual person does a little happy dance”