While most wine collectors know about Winesearcher.com, the popular wine price comparison engine, many seem to overlook the fact that it presents partial or complete search results depending on whether you are an unpaid visitor or a paid subscriber to their "Pro Version" ($29.95/year).
Here are some statements from different parts of Winesearcher's site which paint a clearer picture (italics added):
- "Free searches are often restricted to wines from merchants who sponsor us."
- "If a wine can be located among our sponsors, we do not show other retailers' wines."
- "The subscription Pro Version provides full price comparisons between all price lists."
- Using all data, "we have found that the average price of the cheapest supplier is half of the most expensive."
So just to be clear, when even one sponsor has a listing for a wine, the only price listings you will be viewing in the free version for a given search are those of sponsors. Despite this, 97% of site traffic visits the free version and there are only 8,500 subscribers to the Pro Version (worldwide). If most of their 8,034 wine stores were sponsors, it might not be an issue but my best guess is that Winesearcher has only a few hundred sponsors.
Bottom line: Given the price of a good bottle of wine relative to the reasonable $29.95 annual fee, subscribing to Winesearcher Pro is as close to a no-brainer as it gets for any wine collector.
(Disclosure: Vinfolio is a sponsor of Winesearcher.)
