A wine bar that built its following in Cincinnati's Pleasant Ridge neighborhood by pouring vintages from Macedonia is now getting ready to cross the Ohio River. Fine Wine O'Clock, run by husband-and-wife team Pere and Irena Stojanovski, is preparing to open a second location in Bellevue, Kentucky, with a target opening of mid-September.
The new spot will sit on Main Street in Bellevue, according to WCPO 9 News, though the exact timeline still depends on licensing approval and final work being finished at the space. The Stojanovskis are also hiring a team to staff the Kentucky outpost as they prepare to run both locations simultaneously.
The couple's original Fine Wine O'Clock, which opened in Pleasant Ridge about three and a half years before the WCPO report, operates out of 6223 Montgomery Road, according to Cincinnati Magazine, where it pairs a retail wine selection with an intimate tasting room along the neighborhood's main commercial corridor. WCPO reports that the shop pairs its wines with charcuterie, spanakopita, coffee, and chocolate mousse — a menu that leans into the Balkan flavors central to the Stojanovskis' story.
From the Balkans to Groesbeck to Pleasant Ridge
Pere and Irena are originally from Macedonia, per WCPO's reporting, and both have spent years working in the wine and hospitality industries, including stints as sommeliers in fine dining and aboard cruise ships. Before opening their own shop, the couple spent six years distributing Macedonian wines to bars and restaurants around the region, building relationships that would later become customers.
Their path to Greater Cincinnati started in March 2011, when the couple emigrated from North Macedonia after receiving green cards through the U.S. Diversity Visa Program. Cincinnati Magazine's earlier profile notes they chose the city because they were sponsored by the pastor of St. Ilija Macedonian Orthodox Church, and the pair initially stayed with their sponsor in Groesbeck after arriving in the U.S.
Pere told WCPO that wine is an experience that brings people together, and he described the business as their American dream. The Stojanovskis say they opened their wine bar to share more of Macedonia's wine culture with Cincinnati after noticing that customers were intrigued by wines from their home country — an interest that eventually pushed them to think beyond Ohio. The couple hopes to expand Fine Wine O'Clock into other states down the line.
Why Macedonian Wine Tastes Like Napa and Tuscany
Part of the pitch, according to Pere, is geography. He told WCPO that Macedonia sits at the same latitude as well-known wine regions including Tuscany, Bordeaux, and Napa, noting that the world's major grape-growing regions generally span the 30th to 50th latitudes. Macedonia itself sits in the southern Balkans, within that same climatic band.
That geography helps explain the quality behind the pours. North Macedonia's primary wine region gets between 270 and 300 days of annual sunshine and day-to-night temperature swings of 15 to 20 degrees Celsius, conditions that the Firstleaf Wine Guide says favor slow grape ripening and balanced acidity, aided by cooling breezes off mountain ranges like Kozuf.
The country's signature red is Vranec, nicknamed the “Black Stallion” for its deeply colored, high-tannin character, which shares genetic lineage with Cratoshia and Zinfandel, per research presented at Vinexpo Americas. The grape is widely grown across the Vardar Valley, or Povardarie region, which produces roughly 87 percent of North Macedonia's wine grapes and, in 2024, secured the country's first official EU-standard Geographical Indication status for its wine labels. Nationally, North Macedonia produces between 80 million and 91 million liters of wine annually across 28,000 hectares of vineyards, exporting more than 85 percent of what it makes.
Landing on a Historic Kentucky Main Street
Bellevue's Main Street sits within the Fairfield Avenue Historic District, listed on the National Register of Historic Places and home to an accredited Main Street revitalization program run by the local In Vue business association, according to the City of Bellevue. The corridor also falls inside the Bellevue Entertainment District, which lets patrons 21 and older carry approved open-container drinks outdoors along the 200 to 700 blocks of Fairfield Avenue seven days a week from 9 a.m. to midnight.
That mix of historic storefronts and open-container flexibility has made Fairfield Avenue an appealing draw for new bars and restaurants looking to tap into steady foot traffic. Fine Wine O'Clock's move there positions the Stojanovskis' Balkan-focused pours alongside an established local dining and drinking scene just across the river from their original Pleasant Ridge shop.
Cincinnati's own wine retail landscape has grown increasingly specialized, with independent venues carving out niches to stand apart from grocery store aisles, according to Cincinnati Magazine, which points to natural wine bars in Walnut Hills and suburban bottle shops in Glendale and Mariemont as part of that same trend. Fine Wine O'Clock's bet on Macedonian varietals fits squarely into that pattern, giving Northern Kentucky its own introduction to a wine culture most local drinkers have likely never tasted.
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