Melissa Davis
Staplehouse | Atlanta
FEBRUARY 2018
Born and raised in Atlanta, Melissa Davis has worked in some facet of the beverage industry for more than a decade. She started in tea and coffee, and took a formative job as a food runner and then bartender at Billy Allin’s Cakes & Ale as she pursued a degree in literature. Writing and literature abandoned (professionally speaking, at least), Davis managed bar programs at The General Muir and Woodfire Grill before returning to Cakes and Ale as sommelier and becoming a Certified Sommelier through the Court of Master Sommeliers. Next up, she joined mega group Concentrics Restaurants as beverage director of One Midtown Kitchen.
In 2017, Davis took her hard-earned beverage knowledge and electric energy to direct the beverage program at Staplehouse, where she has built of a list 100-plus off-the-beaten-path bottles and beers and more to pair with Chef Ryan Smith’s boundary-pushing, fermentation-driven Southern cuisine. With an affinity for the Loire Valley, an extensive knowledge of all French and Italian wine regions, and a zeal for expanding adventurous drinkers’ horizons, Davis was named to Zagat’s first-ever national “30 Under 30” list in 2017. She is an avid supporter of The Giving Kitchen, the nonprofit that helps the city’s restaurant workers in times of dire need.
