The Pier Pairings — an AI drink sommelier for a Toronto food hall bar I workThe Pier Pairings — an AI drink sommelier for a Toronto food hall bar I work
The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Back to feedPost
Bryan's avatar
Bryan Nakache
pro
• Jul 11
The Pier Pairings — an AI drink sommelier for a Toronto food hall bar
 I work behind this bar. Now it has an AI sommelier, a slot machine, and sales attribution it never had.
The before
The Pier Bar sits in the middle of Wellington Market at The Well — 25+ kitchens around it: ramen, tacos, jerk chicken, lobster rolls. A drinks-only bar whose whole reason to exist is the food surrounding it.
Its online presence: a one-page site untouched for 2 years (Pumpkin Martini still on the menu — in July), a bare directory listing, zero customer data. Its biggest asset wasn't mentioned anywhere.
I'm a supervisor there. So I fixed it myself.
The product
The Pier Pairings — live on Base44, opened from a QR at the bar. Three taps, 15 seconds:
Tap what you're eating (the real market vendors)
Pick your vibe
Pull the Pair-o-Matic — a slot machine spins hand-painted glassware and reveals your drink, the price, and why it works
No signup. No forms. Menu paralysis becomes a moment of play.
The automations
AI sommelier — knows every vendor and the real menu, handles "less sweet" / "no tequila" / "no alcohol", guardrailed to never invent a drink. Rule-based engine underneath so it never breaks — even offline in a lower-ground food hall.
POS-tracked conversion — the pairing becomes a 10% voucher shown at the counter. We created a dedicated discount code in the POS, named after the app, exclusive to these redemptions. Every app-driven sale is counted in the register and inventory. I apply it myself on shift.
Self-generating analytics — every session silently logged. The owner dashboard shows top combos, re-spin rates (= menu gaps detected without a single survey question), busiest days, CSV export. From zero data to knowing what to stock, promote, and staff for.
The design
No SaaS template. A hand-painted cocktail zine: paper background, wobbly ink outlines, hard offset shadows, every drink illustrated to match the real printed menu — the Well 76 in its signature purple coupe, the Working Thursday with its tiki umbrella.
The transformation
Before: a dead one-pager and zero data. After: a gamified experience that converts at the counter, tracked through the POS, run by someone who pours the drinks.
Live app: https://pier-pour-pair.base44.app
base44giveitaglowchallengeWeb DesignWeb DevelopmentBase44
Post image
Bryan's avatar
Bryan Nakache
pro
• Jul 12
Some other visuals
Post image
Post image
Post image
Back to feed
The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started