The online shopping world has exploded of the past 10 year, and the online wine industry is no exception, although it hasn’t happened as quickly as other industries. One of the main reasons behind this has been the skepticism behind buying wine from unknown sources.
Over time, there has been more people enter the market with better ideas and better ways to sell wine over the internet. Business models have improved and therefore the level and quality of wine being sold has also improved. But, there are still some bad ways to buy wine over the net.
Online wine auction houses are one dubious way of buying wine of the internet. Many great deals can be garnered by buying through the auction houses with many wineries and wine companies dumping stock that they cannot sell at bottomed out prices. There is one main problem with this. The companies will generally dump their stock as “cleanskins” (wines without labels) which leaves the consumer with no real idea where they come from apart from wine type and region.
Cleanskins are always fraught with danger as you don’t know exactly what you’re getting, especially if you are unable to try them first. The varietal of wine may match with the region, but the quality of the wine is always anybody’s guess. You must ask yourself, “Why would wineries be dumping this stock in the first place if its of good quality?”. Many examples of wines being purchased which have found to be off can be found, with the main reason being the lack of knowledge as to how the wine has been stored. Its quite easy to see a bargain basement price for a $50 a bottle six pack of wine and buying it, only to find its been kept in somebody’s back shed during summer and all the wine is off.
Another type of online wine store to look out for is what is known as “affiliate” sites. These wine stores look like a normal wine store stocking almost any wine you can think of. The bottom line is these stores don’t stock any wine at all. They are on-sellers and just pass on your order to the originating wineries and take a commission for them.
The best way to pick these types of web sites is by checking their “Shipping/Delivery Information” pages. You will generally find with these sites that most will ask you to check the shipping costs either from the winery themselves or a special shipping page which shows the costs of delivery per winery. You are better off finding the wine you like and ordering it directly from the winery themselves as the service levels will be no different and you are supporting the winery directly. If the wine you’re after is from a smaller, boutique style winery, they will appreciate your patronage more so directly than paying an affiliate a commission.
