The Wine Collector

If you could save $50 in shipping costs or $50 on wine purchases but not both, would you instinctively prefer one form of savings over the other? 

Shipping costs are a "hot button" for consumers -- they hate paying them.  Despite saving gas, parking fees, and their time by shopping online for what is typically a much broader selection at cheaper prices, it seems that consumers perceive any shipping charge as a complete waste of money.

But, someone has to pay for shipping.  Fedex and UPS never give it away, even to high volume retailer customers.  The problem with shipping wine is that it's heavy -- 40 lbs a case and more for high-end heavy cabernet bottles or champagne.  While many wine retailers already provide shipping at cost and concentrate their volume with one shipper to negotiate the best discounts on behalf of their customers, it's hard to ship a case of wine cross-country by ground for less than $35-$40.

If the retailer is paying for shipping, then you are probably paying for that benefit in some other way.  There is no "free lunch" in a profit-oriented economy.

The online shopping study summarized in an excellent post titled "New Industry Standard this Holiday Season?" on the Rethink Wine Blog seems to conclude that online retailers believe that they stimulate more sales with shipping-related promotions than a straightforward sale. My own experience in using Amazon's Prime shipping service confirms this as my Amazon spending soared once I signed up (even though it cost $79/year).

Bottom line:  Which option would you prefer, free shipping or wine discounts?  Can the economics of a service like Amazon Prime work in the wine industry given relatively low gross margins, high shipping weights, and nightmarish interstate shipping laws?

The Entrepreneur Profile in the latest issue of the San Francisco Business Times published today is about yours truly.  If you want to know what I think are Vinfolio's biggest strengths and weaknesses as well as what my favorite book is, check it out.

P.S.    See my other recent post on another San Francisco Business Times story, Vinfolio ranked 5th fastest-growing Bay Area company.

It's simple.  Just make an effort -- the latent demand is there.  Decanter.com's recent story, "Bordeaux properties on major China, India tour," contained several factoids that got my attention:

1. The 120 Indian and 150 Chinese buyers and importers materially outnumber the visiting Bordeaux contingent of 80 professionals.
2. Only 20% of the Indian wine market is foreign-sourced.  This is unnatural and caused simply by ridiculously high import duties. 
3. The Chinese market for imported wine is growing 40% a year!

The demand for collectible wine, at least from China, is already surging and over the long term, both China and India will help ensure prices stay high.

P.S.    See my prior post, China's long-term impact on the fine wine market. 

If you've ever come across a wine you'd like to buy when reading an online tasting note, blog post, or article, you now have a one-step way to quickly check Vinfolio's wine store inventory using our new browser toolbar add-on for Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 2.  Click here to read more (and to access a link to install it into your browser toolbar).

Remember, even if we don't have the wine you're searching for in inventory, you can click a "Get quote" button which submits a no-obligation request for us to try to locate the wine for you and respond with price and quantity available.

In addition, clicking a wine name within our wine store brings up a "detail page" with other useful information, including the U.S. retail average price (derived from data supplied by Winesearcher.com) and the latest auction price data drawn from Vinfolio's Wine Price File.

Lest you thought Reidel's stemless "O" wine tumblers were the last innovation in wine glassware, a British friend visiting San Francisco recently for a tech conference spotted this "inside out" glassware at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.  It's the work of a young Dutch designer (but apparently Brooklyn-based), Alissia Melka-Teichroew, also known by her initials AMT.

The description on her site about the Inside Out Collection states:

"The shape of a drinking glass reflects its content: columnar flute for champagne, curvy goblet for wine, short shot glass for straight liquor, stout highball for cocktails. But what if only the negative space of glasses assumes these iconic shapes? That’s the premise of AMT’s line of Pyrex glass barware. All glasses have the same outer shape, but pour in a drink and the glass’s inner identity appears."

P.S.   A pair of Champagne glasses goes for $60 at Charles & Marie.