Meet Business Savvy, Adithya Bathena: President & CEO of Super Buy-Rite Liquor, Jersey City, NJ

Adithya Bathena is the President and CEO of Super Buy-Rite Wine & Liquor in Jersey City, New Jersey; and CEO of Buy-Rite Corporation, currently a total of 55 locations. The Buy-Rite franchise is very different from a restaurant franchise model. It functions as a trademark where members advertise together and get better pricing on products because they buy in larger quantities.

In 1990, at the age of 10, Adithya and his family moved from India to the U.S. Upon arrival, his father, Vimalakar Reddy Bathena, used his life savings and opened-up a liquor store in Lakewood, NJ. Two years later, he purchased another store.  At a young age, Adithya was helping his father at the store after school and on the weekends. He would dust off the bottles, help organize the store, and work the lottery system register.

In 1992, his father joined the Buy-Rite franchise and purchased the company in 1997. Shortly thereafter, Adithya went off to college at Rutgers University and kept helping at the store on the weekends while also working part-time at Johnson & Johnson's headquarters in New Brunswick, NJ during the week. Through his summer internships on Wall Street, first a gopher job with Bear Hunter Specialists, then on the REPO desk for Merrill Lynch, he would begin to develop the financial analysis skills needed to run a business. He graduated from Rutgers in 2002 with a bachelor's degree in Finance. In 2004, Adithya enrolled in the master's degree program in Real Estate Finance at NYU School of Professional Studies, all while running the family business.

Upon graduating from NYU in 2006, Adithya purchased a wine store in Somerville, NJ, which was the beginning of his wine learning experience. He started tasting and studying wine, enrolled in wine classes at the International Wine Center in NYC, and earned his WSET Advanced Certification: "Reading from a text-book and making a connection with wine is difficult. It’s only when you start tasting that you begin to connect the dots." He owned and ran the store for two years before selling it in 2008.

In late 2008, Adithya and his father stumbled upon a rare opportunity - an empty warehouse, surprisingly zoned for retail, right in front of the entrance to the Holland Tunnel in Jersey City, NJ: The idea of Super Buy-Rite was born.

The terrific Champagne selection at Super Buy-Rite in Jersey City, NJ

They worked relentlessly to turn an abandoned warehouse into the giant wine and liquor store it is today. Super Buy-Rite Jersey City opened in November 2009 and immediately became a success: "The store took off. Our first month in business, we exceeded our initial one-month projections by more than 30%,” said Adithya. Adithya did not know what to expect in terms of consumer needs in the area. Around the same time, the craft beer movement was slowly starting, and he decided to focus on the best craft beer selection he could get his hands on: "We put in a 54 beer-cooler door which no one - even today - has in New Jersey. We have space in our inventory dedicated to craft beer, and we became this mecca of craft beer," said Adithya. Little by little, Adithya adapted to the demand for craft beer and fine wines. He currently carries over 6,000 different wine labels varying in price: "Our business model is to bring in nice wines and price them fairly."

In the last couple of years, he has seen the delivery side of the business evolve tremendously. Adithya can attest to that: "Not every customer cares about the lowest price or even the largest selection. However, our online customers all want fast deliveries. We have a complex operation. Imagine finding a bottle of wine in a 1,000 square foot store versus finding a bottle of wine in a 30,000 square foot facility. We're constantly trying to think of ways to improve. We obviously have limitations. If a product is sitting on a shelf in our warehouse, it takes time to pull the bottle. A smaller retailer, that is doing very little business in store, can run that bottle out in 5 minutes. It is about capturing that delivery business, but it's very expensive because we have trucks, drivers, repairs, maintenance, and other overhead that need to be factored into the delivery cost. I am adding all this infrastructure, but I still need the same amount of people working in the store - such as cashier's, floor managers etc. I can't just cut them out, even though there are less people coming in the store.  I see the numbers. As a delivery service, we find ourselves at a disadvantage, as it is suddenly all about speed." In my humble opinion, that disadvantage won’t last for long as Adithya is always thinking of ways to stay one step ahead of the consumer’s ever-changing requests. He is working on growing his delivery business while remaining competitive in the market. Maybe a smaller store with a bigger warehouse could be a solution? I personally can’t wait to see what Adithya has in store for the new year 2020!

Adithya’s forward-thinking and business expertise (not to mention his hard work) has brought Super Buy-Rite Jersey City a great deal of success – including reaching a milestone: Its 10th year anniversary celebrated in November 2019. I wish him many more to come.

For my beloved readers, Buy-Rite Jersey City is offering 15% OFF your next non-sale online wine order with the code: AROMA (free delivery to Hoboken and Downtown Jersey City with the purchase of $60 or more).

Place your order HERE or through the App.

Wishing you a happy and healthy new year!

Anna