Justin Vann wears his passion for wine like a sleek leather cloak that is shot through with live wires and accessorized with a utility belt. He is a wine vigilante, always speaking up for the underdog wines that are of high quality but bereft of the attention of large distributors.

In the name of justice, or maybe just in the name of sherry, he recently started a wine consultancy with business partner and childhood friend Clayton Pierce.

He’s also someone who’s fun to interview, both entertaining but intensely serious when it comes to making great wine accessible to the public. He left the cape at home long enough to meet at 13 Celsius (3000 Caroline) for an interview.

So, you’re one of those wine guys, a somm… somm… somnambulist? Samba dancer?

What? Count Chocula?

What? No. Okay, fine, sommelier. Yes?

Yes. I think so. And a chicharrón. [Editor: Vann jokes. He is also a cicerone – i.e. one with a certification in beer.]

So let’s get this straight. You left one of the most-talked-about restaurants in the country, Oxheart, to go start a wine consulting business. Are you crazy?

Yes. However, it was one of those “I’ll never have a better opportunity than now” things. It’s something I’ve always thought about, but doing it right is very difficult. Most wine consultants aim for large projects, and I just don’t see many aiming for small, independent, family-owned establishments. The consultancies are looking to make enormous sums of money. The clients we are helping are the opposite. They are neighborhood places that already have a foothold in the community, and we trick out their wine list for them.

Also, wine consultants never announce their existence to the public and this is a big focus of ours. If we put a PSA sticker on the outside of a building, we want people to be excited when they see that the business has our wine list.

So, you not only want to help small businesses with their wine lists, but you also want to teach the public about wine?

Definitely. I believe the highest form of advertising is humor. You’re lightly inviting yourself into someone’s memory, as opposed to a jingle. Most wine videos are produced with the idea that wine is inherently interesting, which is often not true. There are a few exceptions, but I get bored to tears watching wine video blogs.

You’ve been revealing your client list one by one and it’s been like watching a novelist release the next chapter of an unfinished book.

I’ve only revealed two clients thus far: D&Q Beer Station (806 Richmond Avenue) and our first restaurant, Paulie’s (1834 Westheimer).

How did you get involved with D&Q The Beer Station?

I’d been shopping there for a long time. It’s a mecca for beer nerds. It’s a small but well-curated shop. We sold a lot of beers, ciders and off-the-wall things at Oxheart, and when people asked where they could buy these, we’d send them to D&Q. It’s a family-owned operation ran by Brandon and Vivian.

I was selling Isastegi cider at Oxheart and for a long time, the only place you could get it was 13 Celsius. I told Brandon at D&Q, “Hey, you should start selling Isastegi! No one else carries it, and it’s driving me crazy.” They actually carried it and to the best of my knowledge, they are the only place that is carrying Basque cider.  (Food arrives.)

Wait, here comes the cheese and meats. It’s a glorious meat plate. That’s a masterpiece.

Are you an ambassador from the Land of Wine?

I don’t think of it like that. This is me presenting my unique vision. (Waves away glorious cheese and meat platter.) No, thank you, I ate two dinners tonight. Some agendas are wholesome. My agenda is making great wine affordable and accessible and tailoring a list specifically to the food program of a restaurant. We’ll do whatever a client asks us to do, but we do have an opinion about it.

What problem does communicating with the public solve?

When I was working in restaurants, there were things that I assumed were common knowledge that were not. For example, I had to explain to many people what Trappist ales are. Many people know that Trappist ales are from Belgium, but don’t know what makes them different from other breweries there. That’s a good example of a bit of information that we can isolate and educate people on.

Maybe I won’t change the world by making silly little videos, but this is what I want to be doing. It lets people know that we exist, it tells people about wine and it makes them laugh, all of which are very important to me.

You can watch some of Justin Vann and Clayton Pierce’s “silly little videos” at the PSA Wines website.