A friend of mine and I spent a few years developing a new wine preserver called the Pungo that we recently launched on Kickstarter:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1649956048/pungotm-the-ultimate-wine-preservation-device
Comments, reactions (and purchases) are appreciated, thanks.
Wow! This should get very interesting rather quickly.
Looks like Coravin has some competition…interesting that two groups were working on a similar novel device simultaneously. Nice to see others thinking along the same lines - well done!!
My initial reaction is that the needle is too thick, particularly if a sealing pin is necessary (can the pin ever be tight enough or does that enhance the risk of ingress of oxygen???), and it may be a bit less straightforward to use because it doesn’t hold to the bottle with a built in guide but has the separate one (though not a big deal perhaps). Though the greater flow rate is nice, I like the fact that with the Coravin the cork reseals itself and without the need for a sealing pin, you can have an unlimited number of bottles in use at the same time. However, I do like the much lower cost of use given the cost of the argon per use.
Though in theory there is the blanket of argon, I think I would be concerned with potential ingress of oxygen in the time between removing the device and putting in the pin and then for the next glass, the time between removing the pin and inserting the device. Just seems like the “system” within the bottle is exposed a number of times even if briefly and even if in theory there is a blanket of argon above the wine.
Interesting that it doesn’t pressurize the bottle a bit the way the Coravin does - wonder how that plays out…
I didn’t see a price but my gut reaction is that it would have to come in at a lower price point than the Coravin to compete.
Morgan - nicely done - I hope you get funded - good luck with the fund raising and roll out of the device!! There is a good market out there for it (though you will have to play catch up a bit given the lead to market that Coravin has).
Lovely presentation. I also would worry about the thickness of the needle.
Thanks Dan.Gord0n for the reply,
“Though the greater flow rate is nice, I like the fact that with the Coravin the cork reseals itself and without the need for a sealing pin, you can have an unlimited number of bottles in use at the same time.”
The problem here is that not all corks can reliably reseal themselves. Coravin even admits that synthetic corks really don’t reseal and some users are reporting that natural corks don’t always reseal reliably. This jives with our testing which has shown the resiliency of cork to vary by a wide margin especially on older bottles. We prefer the pin because it provides a positive and tight seal and applies side-ward pressure to the cork improving its seal as well.
If you want to dispense multiple bottles, removing the Pungo from a bottle and replacing with a pin really doesn’t affect longevity. We’ve had users go many months with pins with no degradation. When the Pungo is pulled out, the argon is at a slight positive pressure. If the pin is quickly inserted, no appreciable amount of oxygen will not have entered the bottle. The reason why gets into the physics of gas diffusion rates, and testing has shown this to be the case. Further, down the road, when the pin is removed, you’ll still see positive pressure because some of the argon will have come out of solution.
Thanks Ron, we appreciate the comment.
We spent a lot time testing various needle diameters, and we settled on the one that allowed easy puncturing of a cork balanced with smooth and quick flow. Our needles are double chambered allowing gas and wine to flow at the same time. With the larger diameter, wine can flow smoothly at just a few PSI, which is important from safety standpoint (putting a lot of pressure in a glass container is generally not a good idea). This also conserves argon - the lower pressures maximize the number of glasses one can get from a bottle.
Morgan, I’ll be following this discussion with interest. An Argon device I developed is used on open bottles and that seems to negate its effectiveness in the minds of many high-end aficionados. Personally, I agree with your point regarding quick insertion of a pin as similar to my belief in quick re-insertion of the cork, because I have confidence in the gas science involved.
One conclusion I came to was that palate sensitivity has a huge impact on all this. I have no idea of the price of your device, but I’ve concluded that people willing to pay $299 for a Coravin seem to be far more sensitive than the general public.
Very cool! Good luck!
I only see one tiny problem with very old bottles with fragile corks. That fairly wide pin may force older corks down into the wine instead of penetrating them. We’re talking about less than 1% of uses here, so a TINY problem.
Hey Peter, thanks for looking.
You’re correct, older, fragile (natural) corks generally have lost resiliency and grip in the bottle neck, making them harder to pierce. We’ve never had a problem with synthetics. If the cork is removed and quickly replaced with one of the Pungo stoppers, the bottle will not suffer any appreciable degradation. Any wine that was exposed to air in the neck will be dispensed with the first glass. And further, the reactions with oxygen are not instantaneous, which is why it can take a few swirls and few minutes or more for a glass of wine to breathe properly. Mainly, if you dispense wine without allowing air to enter the bottle and blanket a large surface area; and you have a tight closure on the bottle between pours, you’re about 99% perfectly preserved.
Hi PeterJ, thanks for taking a look.
I looked at your device; I guess that makes us competitors, but you sound pretty sharp. Our retail price is $279.00, but depending on the establishment, a bar or restaurant can make that back in a matter of weeks. Compared to the industrial wine dispensers, this sunk cost is cheaper per bottle. The argon is a little more per glass for ours, but still less than a quarter. The unit could be made more cheaply, but we wanted to make it durable enough to handle commercial environments.
We had early prototypes in some wine bars, and the operators liked three key features: One, bottles could be quickly pierced; two, dispensing was super easy - pull the trigger, fill the glass, done; and three, because there was no degradation, they could start selling more expensive wines per glass. A further benefit was that the bottle could be presented to the customer before serving.
Great presentation! I own a Coravin and use it regularly so this was fun to see how you engineered the various parts.
Good luck; I hope you get the funding you’ll need to take this to production. The more competition Coravin has all competitors will be forced to make improvements and in the end prices could eventually drop to a level that makes them attractive to a larger group of wine drinkers. Ok, that probably won’t happen but it would be nice to see a preservation system of this quality retailing for $150 or less.
As with the gassing of anything (my experience is with wine tanks, obviously), there is almost always going to be a little a little oxygen remaining. That is where you have to rely on the fact that argon is heavier than oxygen and the argon will the the gas in contact with/blanketing the wine.
As others have said, older corks could be a problem, but that was the issue I had with the Coravin. I am skeptical that an older cork would seal efficiently enough to not allow in oxygen. At least with a plug you could mitigate that issue.
Thanks for looking.
We looked at a range needle sizes, but the larger needle gave us three advantages: One, we could make it double-chambered allowing gas and wine to flow at the same time. Two, the larger diameter allowed us to dispense at very low pressures, which conserves argon and is safer. Three, the larger needle allows the Pungo to remain on the bottle. Most of our users just do this because of the convenience. This was also critical for commercial establishments where time is money. Commercial is our primary target market, which is why we built the thing to be pretty indestructible.
In the end, the larger size isn’t a problem in terms of piercing. It goes easily in a cork about 99% of the time. From what we’ve found, if a cork cant be pierced, it has lost resiliency to the point where it is no longer an effective closure. At that point, just pop in one of the stoppers and enjoy your wine!
Sealing pin is a golf tee?
I like it but don’t like tipping the bottle and disturbing sediment in older wine. Can the needle be longer so it reaches about 1 1/2 inches from the bottom of the bottle; then curve the piece where the wine comes out so the bottle won’t need to be tipped. Does that make sense? Or have options of different needle lengths depending on whether one is drinking a young or old wine and can tip or not tip the bottle.
With the gas coming out of the pin, if it was that long the gas being injected would probably disturb the sediment. No?
No, we actually make this; the dimensions are slightly different. As is turns out, the golf tee design is fairly well evolved for its purpose.
This would have to be made custom. My concern is that it would be a little unwieldy to pierce a cork with a needle that long. The stopper option might work better in this case.
Cool product. You may want to edit the following as Mags generally seem to cost more per ounce due to their relative scarcity:
The Pungo also makes using larger 1500-ml magnum-sized bottles practical, which are often more economical than the standard 750-ml size as well as being more environmentally friendly.