Total Wine -- new store open for business in Northridge, CA

Delaware based retailer with stores located in NJ, VA, NC, SC, GA, FL, AZ and NV. Northridge, CA store opened last week.

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Does anyone have any knowledge about their selection, pricing, service, etc., etc.? BevMo-ish?

They’ve been running full page ads in the LA Times. From what’s listed, it looks like a wide variety, but basically BevMo-ish.

Warehouse style with deep discounts. Mostly stuff not bought by people on this board. But occasionally a great bargain, e.g. 1998 G. Mascarello Monprivato for $40. Many folks I know bought multiple cases (including me!). Worth a look.

Cali selection is solid. Pricing can be all over the place so it pays to know your price points. I’ve found stuff low and stuff on the high side. Euro selection is usually pretty poor but they do carry some higher end selections at, again, variable pricing.

Very good beer selection at good prices. Plus the often have coupons by email.

My take. Generally mediocre pricing except on specials. Good selection in some areas (Bordeaux) and awful in others (Germany, Spain). Until recently they did not give mixed case discounts which is a big negative for me. I’m not sure if the mixed cases discounts are permanent or a sales pitch. Sales people vary from okay to abysmal.

Finally, much of what they sell are labels that they have a “special” relationship with, e.g., Martin Ray. Unsurprisingly they are total homers for these labels so much that I don’t trust them a bit overall.

Basically there are several locally owned stores that kick their ass unless you need, say, an aged Bordeaux or Cal cab.

They have a much better selection and generally better pricing than Bev Mo. They have lots of local producers at the Roseville, CA store and I have found a few good deals on some mark downs.

They also have two stores in Maryland. For legal reasons one is known as Corrider Fine Wines and the other as Beltway Liquors.

But how are they on wine storage? That’s the big rap against BevMo. The wines supposedly sit in unrefrigerated warehouses.
There’s a new store opening in Reno. Two already exist in Las Vegas. I wonder if the Reno wine is being funneled through Las Vegas first and what kind of handling it’s had.

Good point, Steve.

They just opened their fifth store in Charlotte. They are very successful in this market, selling wine and beer (spirits state controlled). They will advertise national brands at very deep discounts. Sales staff are tasked to switch customers to their proprietary “Winery Direct” brands when the customers are in the store. Close statistical watch is kept by corporate on percentages of “WD” wines sold versus other stock, with stores penalized for not reaching stated thresholds. This is not to say the WD wines are not of good quality, I only shop there for beer, but their sales strategy is crystal clear. I know people who work for Total Wine or have worked for them, I was offered a job there but passed in favor of my present employer. Total Wine is a very financially successful operation.

+1

Although I have found that their Bordeaux and Rhone selections to be steeped in unknowns with a a good bang for your buck.

Definitely need to reiterate the variability in their pricing. I have found wines their for super cheap one week and go back to see that the same wine is now overpriced. Not sure if this is due to where they source them, but it’s a bit of a crap shoot.

And yes, the beer selection is typically pretty excellent, especially with the $2 off coupons for 6 packs our single bottles over 22oz.

The majority of the stuff are just out on the shelves in the shop which I always find comfortable, but certainly not optimal storage temps.

The really high end selections are in a temperature controlled fridge.

Total Wine and More used to be based in Delaware a pretty long time ago I believe. The company seems to have started in Delaware. However, the main office is now in Potomac, Maryland a suburb of DC not too far from where I live. I saw one of the founders speak at a local business event and he gave the company history. In a nutshell, it was started by two brothers. One went to MBA school, the other went to law school. They started with a small store and grew the company exponentially. So it is a pretty impressive business success story. I did not get the sense that the brothers went into the business for the love of wine. I get the sense that they are entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity in wine/beverages and now they are wine enthusiasts. Maryland law forbids chains so, like the other poster said, Total Wine and More does business in Maryland under a different ownership and name. I rarely go there. I am closer to the VA stores but they don’t really interest me. I get to Bevmo about once a year visiting relatives in CA. My impression is that Total Wine is an East Coast based version of Bevmo. From a business perspective, they seem to be pretty well run and make decent money for their owners. Definitely some bargains there if you look and the websites are very well done. I don’t want to say anything negative because the companies are apparently well run and have some good features but . . . bargains aside, especially for beer, Total Wine and More is not really what I am looking for in terms of knowledgeable sales people and interesting selection. That being said, I would definitely go there to buy in bulk for a party where wine is not the main focus such as a school function or a big birthday bash.

I think the way one views a Total wine store has a lot to do with where you are on the aficionado scale. From the top down they are a huge version of BevMo. From the opposite perspective they make BevMo look like a distant second place finisher, especially in the wine area. They opened their store in Tustin, CA during the last few months that I owned my shop about 20 miles away. I was pretty concerned that the size of their West Coast selection (my focus too) was as deep as it was and that they had been able to get labels I could not get or could not carry due to size restrictions and budget. I found their pricing competitive with BevMo and Wine Club; their non-CA stock nowhere near as good as HiTime or Wine Exchange. For what it’s worth, they are 15% below Trader Joe’s on a daily-drinker my wife likes. I think they need to be taken seriously unless you’re securely in the higher tiers of wine.

Just to finish out their story, I believe they were from the Pittsburg area of PA and owned an entity called Beer World before expanding into wine. Most of the Total Wine stores in Northern VA were purchased from the Dart Drug people years ago when that whole business imploded.

Cheers,
Curt

From what I’ve heard and experienced, they open a store with some good prices here and there, but in time the prices start creeping upward after a few months or so. I def noticed that with the Roseville store in the first year or so it was open.

This is exactly what I would have said (except that I’d have said it in a much more long-winded and boring manner). So, well done!

+2

An employee told me they direct import a lot of their Italian stuff. Probably true for other European wines as well based on wines that only seem to be available at their stores.
I used to seek them out during my trips to SC, but now I skip.
Decent liquor selection. I think my first bottle of Fernet Branca came from their Columbia SC store.

Total Wine will be good for the consumer in Reno with a much larger selection of wines to choose from. Their spirits selection is very impressive. Some of the smaller stores will certainly suffer and close up. Steve has a good point on storage, Nevada gets pretty hot in the summer.

When I was ITB Total Wine put extra demands on the wholesaler sales force that was writing the big orders in at least some of their stores. I was just a small fish there and getting new placements was very difficult.