BEDFORD, Ohio - Snow White drinks wine.
Four words you'd never associate with the wholesome Disney character, but it's true.
Laura Ciccarelli, general manager and sommelier at the newly opened Magna Wine Boutique in Bedford, worked at Walt Disney World in Florida during her college years. Among her duties was dressing up as the princess.
"It still sticks with me," she said. "Every now and then you'll hear me say 'Oh goodness!' or 'Oh my!' It was a blast."
The job also turned out to help her in the wine business.
"One of the big things that I learned was dealing with the customers and trying to make people feel comfortable. At Disney World you have people from all over the world. So you have to be able to put them at ease. They're in a new place, they're excited. Same as you walk in to a wine shop and you have no idea what you're looking at. You have to be able to read the person. See if they're nervous, see where they're looking."
Ciccarelli, who grew up in Hudson, says she has retained the character's hand movements and mannerisms.
"At first I wanted to be Jasmine, but I'll take Snow White," she said.
All that customer experience and a love of wine is helping her at Magna, which is located on Broadway Avenue in Bedford, in a former driving school along a line of storefronts. It's just west of Interstate 480 and a couple of blocks from Columbus Road. Magna is primarily a retail space that offers tastings and plans to do classes down the road.
Owners Brittany and Dre Wiley opened the shop several weeks ago, and the day their inspection was due was "the day everything shut down," Ciccarelli said.
"It was heart wrenching," Ciccarelli said.
Magna was eventually granted a virtual inspection, she said, paving the way to open the doors. When Ciccarelli saw a posting about several job openings at Magna she knew she found a perfect job.
"I read the description and thought 'This is something I always wanted to do, this is my dream.' "
Her passion matches that of the owners. The Wileys worked in various aspects of the hospitality industry, and they focus all of their vacations around wine. So it's no surprise Brittany Wiley says "I always knew I'd own my own wine-restaurant-bar-wine shop."
Wine, she said, "brings people together, whether it's family or friends."
Magna's sole purpose "is to take the intimidation out of wine," she said. "This is a very different wine experience."
Magna - which is believed to be the state's only black-owned wine boutique - focuses exclusively on boutique wines. These are from wineries that often have limited case production and can be smaller and very focused on their craft.
When you walk into grocery stories, she said, "the first thing you see is something you already saw. When you walk into Magna you are seeing labels you haven’t seen before."
Price points hover mostly from the mid-teens to the $40 range, and six of seven continents are represented, as are Ohio wines, she said.
"We made sure to show plenty of love," to the couple's home state, Wiley said.
They also made sure to hire someone with the equal amount of passion, love and understanding. Ciccarelli came along at the right time.
Actually, Ciccarelli landed three jobs - assisting the owners, serving and managing. She's helping cull the wine offerings. And she is guiding tastings.
"We wanted to make sure that we stick to all cleanliness standards," she said. "You go online, choose the tasting, and that allows you 30 minutes before the next one comes in. The tastings are four to five different wines that we opened that day for you to try. We usually ask the person what they like to drink, and then based on the information they have given us we take them down this journey of varietals that might fit their palate that they haven't tried before.
"Someone might say 'We really like Moscato' and we'll say 'How 'bout you try this Riesling' then we'll slowly creep in a Gamay, the gateway red, get them going on that. You'll get a nice sparkling red from Italy you've never had before."
Wine has been in Ciccarelli's roots. Her grandparents made it in their basement. She became a level-one sommelier several years ago while working at Regency Wine Bar and also worked at West Point Market's Beside the Point wine bar. She had a stint at a wine shop in Georgia and worked at Akron-based Bottle to Glass wine distributor.
"The idea of hospitality and being able to create something to make people happy and taste good - that’s the Italian in me."
She also worked at Papa Joe's, an Akron restaurant institution that has an extensive wine list.
"I remember going into the back room and touching the Bordeaux bottles," Ciccarelli said. "There was such a history behind it. The first wine that I tasted that opened my eyes was a Paul Hobbs Cabernet. I remember standing in the kitchen and I could taste the different layers. And after that I was hooked. I said 'Why are there berries in here and licorice?' "
The shop seems like a good fit for Ciccarelli and the Wileys.
"She has so much drive," Brittany Wiley said.
Drive and determination also could describe the Wileys. Everything they do in life, she said, whether it's mental, physical or social, "is always about doing the best you can."
With that mindset, choosing the name of the place made perfect sense.
In Latin, 'magna' means 'great.'
More info
Magna Wine Boutique is at 692 Broadway Ave., Bedford, etr@magnawineboutique.com, 440-658-9776. Hours: 4-8 p.m. Monday, 11 a.m.- 8 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday. Go online for tasting reservations.
I am on cleveland.com’s life and culture team and cover food, beer, wine and sports-related topics. If you want to see my stories, here’s a directory on cleveland.com.
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