(keep reading to learn what happened)
Season: 4 | View All Season 4 Episodes
Original Episode Air Date: August 9, 2015
The Bar's Original Name Was: Brix Wine Bar
Pacific Coast Wine Bar Address: 16635 Pacific Coast Hwy Sunset Beach, CA 90742
Episode Recap
Brix Wine Bar, later renamed Pacific Coast Wine Bar, was a Sunset Beach, California bar that was featured on Season 4 of Bar Rescue.
Though the Brix Bar Rescue episode aired in August 2015, the actual filming and visit from Jon Taffer took place before that.
It was Season 4 Episode 28 and the episode name was “Put a Cork in It”.
Brix Wine Bar is located in Sunset Beach, CA, right on the famous Pacific Coast Highway.
Sunset Beach is part of Huntington Beach. If you’re not familiar with your California geography, that puts it just a bit south of Los Angeles proper.
Obviously, it’s right on the beach, which is one of the biggest things that bar has going for itself.
In 2005 owner Rick Reich moved his family to open a wine bar.
At the time, he was studying to be a sommelier.
The bar thrived during its first few years, but unfortunately, Rick cared more about entertaining than managing.
The bar is in debt, and Rick has spent all of his money, including his pension.
Those issues are why the Brix Bar Rescue episode exists and why Rick needs Jon Taffer’s help to save the bar.
To get things started, Jon Taffer meets with Matthew Kaner, a wine expert, in the parking lot.
Rick has no liquor license, so the bar only sells wine and beer.
That’s already a huge issue, as Brix Wine Bar is missing out on one of the highest margin drinks.
Maria Menounos and Kevin Underago help Jon and spy on the bar.
The bar has two rooms; the larger one focuses on wine while the smaller one focuses on beer.
Maria is on the wine side and asks the bartender to recommend a wine.
They order red wine, but the bartender, Tina, does not know how much the wine costs.
Tina points to Rick and tells Maria he is the wine expert.
Jon says that all bartenders at a wine bar should be experts.
I mean, that’s kind of important, right?
Through an earpiece, Jon Taffer tells Maria to order a pastrami sandwich.
The sandwich is filled with too much meat, and Jon says that pastrami is expensive meat.
While having a lot of meat is nice for the customer, it makes it hard for the bar to make money and reduces margins.
Jon tells Maria not to take the wine, and Rick becomes concerned and offers her different bottles of wine.
Rick ends up opening eight bottles of wine and has wasted a lot of money.
Jon goes into the bar and starts yelling at Rick, saying he is the reason the bar is losing money.
The next day Jon comes back for a staff meeting.
He tells the staff that Rick has poured $7,500 worth of wine within two days but only rung up $3,000 worth.
I don’t get how you’re supposed to make money when you’re running a business like that.
Rick gets frustrated when Jon tells him to start acting like the owner and manager, but his wife convinces him to return.
Prior to this, Rick had walked out of the meeting.
Matthew tells the staff that opening a wine bottle is wasteful as it will go bad within hours.
Chef Pink shows the staff new recipes in the kitchen.
For the stress test, Rick is given the goal of selling at least ten bottles of wine that evening.
The night starts well, but tickets are not getting sent into the kitchen, which causes long wait times.
Rick did not make his goal of selling the ten bottles, so there’s a lot of work to be done.
Matthew shows the staff new drinks like the Berry Currant. Chef Pink shows them new recipes that will be added to the menu.
As part of the renovations, Jon Taffer has renamed the bar from Brix Wine Bar to Pacific Coast Wine Bar, which takes advantage of the bar’s unique location.
The staff is pleased with the new name and the signs outside.
Inside, Jon has renovated the bar by gifting them a new ice machine and POS machine.
Rick invites all of the customers into the bar for the relaunch.
The night goes great with low ticket times and great food and drinks.
The owners and staff are all thrilled with the work Jon did.
So was the Pacific Coast Wine Bar Bar Rescue renovation a long-term success? Keep reading to learn what happened next and if this Sunset Beach CA wine bar is still open in 2025.
Pacific Coast Wine Bar Update - What Happened Next?
Now that we’ve recapped the Brix Bar Rescue episode, let’s talk about what happened to the newly christened Pacific Coast Wine Bar after Jon Taffer and his crew took off their swimsuits and left Sunset Beach, CA.
At the standard check-in from the Bar Rescue producers, we learn that Pacific Coast Wine Bar has made over $60,000 in the month after Jon Taffer’s visit, which isn’t too shabby for a start.
However, it didn’t remain Pacific Coast Wine Bar for long, as the owners didn’t like Taffer’s new name.
Shortly after, they moved to a new name. It was very close to the original name, but still a little different.
The bar started going by Brix Sunset Beach.
The Brix owner said that having wine bar in the name was alienating to people who aren’t into wine, so he wanted to make the bar more welcoming to all types of people.
Another reason is that Rick actually owns two bars with Brix in the name.
There was Brix Wine Bar at Sunset Beach and then also Brix At The Shore in Long Beach.
So by going back to the Brix name, he was able to keep them branded the same.
It survived for a number of years after the Brix Bar Rescue visit, but it wouldn’t last forever, unfortunately.
Is Pacific Coast Wine Bar from Bar Rescue still open?
Pacific Coast Wine Bar closed some time around June 2021. At that time, it was still doing business as Brix Sunset Beach (as it had been for many years prior to that).
Brix Sunset Beach closed because it was sold to a new owner.
There’s an interesting story here, though.
The new owner is actually someone who was featured on another episode of Bar Rescue.
More specifically, it’s Suzanne Blevins, who was the owner of Bottoms Up Bar and Grill from Season 7.
You can learn more in our Bottoms Up Bar and Grill update.
The old Brix Sunset Beach location is now doing business under the name Sunset Lounge Bottoms Up, so the Bottoms Up name is occupying another location (it seems to be the sixth location, actually).
You can see a post about this on the original Brix Facebook page:
And then here’s what the old Brix Sunset Beach CA location looks like in the most recent Google Maps street view update.
This shot is from September 2022:
This actually isn’t the first time that one Bar Rescue owner has purchased a bar from another.
The same thing happened with Wildcatter Saloon from Bar Rescue Season 3. That bar was purchased by the owner of Houston Sports Hub / End Zone, which was also featured on Season 3.
So – while Brix Wine Bar is officially closed, the location is still part of the Bar Rescue alumni family. Pretty cool, right?
The other Brix At The Shore location in Long Beach is also closed.
While that bar didn’t appear on the show, it’s worth noting this as it seems like Rick is totally out of the bar business (at least as far as the Brix name is concerned).
Brix reviews after Bar Rescue
Before its closure, Brix actually had pretty good reviews.
For example, the Brix Sunset Beach Yelp page maintained a 4-star rating on over 575 reviews, which is pretty impressive for a bar from Bar Rescue.
Many other bars are more in the 3-3.5 star range on Yelp.
Here’s a sampling of some of the reviews that were written after the visit from Jon Taffer…
4 star review from August 2019:
Good ambience and delicious food
Great live music bands on weekends.
We had the opportunity to enjoy “The boat missers” and a country band while we were there
We had a great time however I noticed that the restrooms were pretty dirty and this is a health concern.
It makes you wonder about the cooks and staff’s hygiene?
I hope that they will do something about it because this is a cool place
5 star review from July 2019:
We were in town on a very long layover and found this restaurant.
It was chill, and inviting.
The server let us try some different beers and he also suggested some based on some import beers we liked.
He was funny, and very relatable.
He also gave us some life hacks!
We got the garlic fries, and they were by far the best garlic fries we’ve ever had.
The price was very fair.
But the customer service was great!
It made us want to stay in town for longer!
We had a great experience.
Also it’s just a couple minute walk from the beach.
Note – the new bar still uses the same Yelp page.
Overall, the Brix Wine Bar that you saw on Bar Rescue is closed, but the Brix Sunset Beach location still lives on in the Bar Rescue family, so this one wasn’t a total failure!
If you want to see some other nearby California Bar Rescue episodes, you can check out my posts for Liquid Lounge / Tidal Bay in Long Beach, Black Light District in Long Beach, and Bottoms Up Bar and Grill in Stanton (has the same owner now).
Or, you can read my full list of all 48+ California Bar Rescue episodes as of 2025.
Thanks for reading!
More Information
https://www.yelp.com/biz/brix-sunset-beach-sunset-beachhttps://www.facebook.com/brixatsunsetbeach/
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Last updated: 2023-04-03 05:28
People need to stop using the outdated “lounge.” Lounges are places sad drunks go.
I can’t say I disagree haha. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been to a “lounge”.
Right? It makes me think of that tired room with the vinyl sofa where you wait while your vehicle is serviced. “Feel free to wait in our lounge while we get this oil changed and the tires rotated.”
Last time I saw Rick Reich he was running the cash register at San Pedro Fish Market in Long Beach. I wish him well.
@rhumboogie nothing wrong with that!
That’s where he belongs, a job he’s actually good at, a job Rick’s more suited for, and away from the bar business.
It appears the Sunset Bottoms Up location closed sometime around July 2022 based on the instagram. Check out bottomsuptavernlbc2!
I think that’s a different location. Bottoms Up Tavern Long Beach is indeed closed, but that’s at a different address than the old Brix bar.
Here’s the Yelp page for Bottoms Up Tavern Long Beach:
https://www.yelp.com/biz/bottoms-up-tavern-long-beach-2
Sunset Lounge Bottoms Up (which replaced Brix / PCWB) is still posting all kinds of events and stuff on Facebook, so I’m pretty sure it’s still open.
https://www.facebook.com/Sunsetloungebottomsup/
Did COVID and lock downs have something to do the bar closing permanently?
I believe there’s a mistake in your article. “I gave you a mission tonight…10 bottles of wine. You blew that out” smiles & nods from Jon, genuine smile of pride & from Rick.
Jon smiling nodding: “So we’re getting there”. Then continues to tell him that with the proper systems in place Rick can make money.
That exchange is to say ‘see? You *can* sell if you focus. It was a complement.
‘Blew that out’ is a phrase (kind of east coast US) that means ‘way more, beyond expectations’ or ‘easily done, no problem’. Jon did *not* say “you blew it”.