I’ve been receiving repeated e-mails from NakedWines.com to join their wine club & receive monthly a case of their “well-curated” wines at a cheap $80/case. I am, of course, highly insulted by their promises/offers of wines made by their renowned independent winemakers. Most all of whom I’ve never heard of. When you Google these “renowned” winemakers, NakedWines is the first entry that pops up. Their WebSite has scam of novice winedrinkers written all over it. My bull-$hit antennae goes into the high-gain mode. It has all the earmarks of the SarrantyWines/TotalWines scams written in large.
Has anyone here had any direct experience w/ NakedWines.com??
Tom
don’t do it.
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Bullshit antennae ought to indeed be off the scale.
They’re not scammers, in the sense that they will deliver the wines you order (as well as a very heavy volume of marketing spam).
It’s very much a social media driven organisation, where members can sign up to be ‘angels’, getting additional benefits, but with these ‘angels’ being enthusiastic astroturfers of social media, talking up the wines / company. It’s been successful in the overall concept of being a social-media savvy wine company for young people buying into the (embellished) stories. In that I have some small respect for them, of having an attitude that aims to wipe away the pompous bullshit that pervades our hobby, plus there’s genuine innovation in customer interaction, but that respect tempered by the bullshit they themselves peddle in its place.
As for the wines, yes there’s a high level of marketing bullshit, including outright untruths, about these boutique winemakers, when the reality is of wines of equivalent quality to cleanskins / bulk negociant wine. You can get lucky (and they do run tastings, which I applaud), but you’ll know the sort of success rate to expect.
The company emerged out of Virgin wines, and operates out of Norwich, coincidentally in recent years out of an office I used to work in called Norvic House. Nicknamed the ‘Blue Hotel’ (after the colour of the building, originally owned by RAC, hence the blue colour). The naming ironic, as it was a dreadful building to work in, cold in winter and baking in summer, with plumbing that sometimes didn’t cope, resulting in the toilets overflowing resulting in a shower like effect in the lift shaft.
I assume the US operation is linked. It’s been around for a couple of decades here.
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it’s the same crap as that angel wines website that calls their customers angel investors or whatever.
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Interestingly, I’ve heard rumor they are not doing well, laying off quite a few staff members. It was freakin’ everywhere just a few years ago in terms of those inserts you’d get in any shipment of anything, so they had a massive growth surge then. Not sure it’s working as well anymore since everybody now knows about it (apparently other than the legendary Tom Hill!) and has passed on it dozens if not hundreds of times (yes, that’s how many everybody received over the last 10 ish years)
EDIT Yup, quickly found an article confirming as much - Naked Wines cutting jobs as sales continue to slide | Evening Standard
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Looks like Kendall Jackson is eating their lunch.
Maybe if they put on some clothes they’d do better.
I bit on it, back in 2015 when it was 60 bucks a case. Don’t remember much about the wines, but I recall concluding that the case was worth 60 bucks at most. Maybe a couple of wines I thought punched above their weight, but in the end, it’s just another case of something sounding too good to be true.
Parenthetically, I would add that just because you have not heard a winemaker doesn’t mean they aren’t great.
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Strangely, they carry Quevedo wines, a legitimately pretty good port and Douro table wine producer. Sometime last year someone on here or the For the Love of Port site posted about a huge sale with a promo code, and I bought a mixed 15 bottle case for something like $120.
Have never been remotely tempted to buy anything else.
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If you are here, this is not the service for you.
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Yet another thing that caters to the Faux Authenticity that Gen Z and younger millennials love!
They’re in on the secrets that only they can find through Instagram while all those idiot losers read books and talk to knowledgeable people… and pay more than $9 per bottle of wine.
Bottomless mimosas for only $29++? Another awesome find on their feed. Imagine getting to drink almost $5 of Andre for only $48! This is why you non-gen Z fools don’t know how personal finance works. Idiots. Losers. People with houses. Who needs em!
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Nakedwines has been having ‘financial troubles’ thus various bottlings having been showing up at retail, at markedly lower prices than their DTC MSRP, so I nibbled after another site had recommended one bottling in particular. The 2021 Rick Boyer ‘unoaked’ Chardonnay [Central Coast] is reputed to come from Edna Valley grapes and offers a fair rendition of that style; I’d say it’s offers 80% of the taste of Mt. Eden ‘Wolff’ for 20% of the cost. There is some mint leaves, tea, and then just a bit of dishwater, but overall it’s a satisfying chardonnay. It’s not dense nor long finishing but that’s ok for a midweek quaffer. The 14.5% is almost a surprise. On my card, It’s a solid B, and should get notched up if value is considered. Agglomerated cork. I did not reload though
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Rombauer and Nakedwines chardonnays back to back!
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Naked was well positioned when Covid hit. Their membership blew up and they tried to expand quickly. We sold them fruit to Matt Parish and Derek Rohlfs…pardon my spelling. They made wines in various facilities in and around Kenwood. One year, maybe 2019? I agreed to also sell 6 tons of Gewurztraminer to one of the VP guys. As it turned out we couldn’t keep up and I was unable to get that stuff in. The winemaker couldn’t understand why we couldn’t just run over to his field and pick his stuff. We picked something like 20 out of 22 days that stretch. I’ve also seen they’ve been having money troubles recently, but the guy who replaced me says they’re still paying bills on time.
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They were a sponsor for the Napa Marathon when I ran it a couple of years ago.
There was a wine tasting at the Expo the day before the race, and they were pouring a number of different wines. I remember trying a sparkling and a white and not being impressed. Weird that an online wine company was a main sponsor for a marathon in the middle of Napa.
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Their US headquarters are in Napa.
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Well then that makes sense.
As my kinsmen say (in sanskrit)
नित्यं शार्डोन्नेय
Everyday … Chardonnay
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Everyday, Chardonnay. Or otherwise Cabernet, rose, Beaujolais, Jamet, gamay, Lafon Rochet, Fonbadet, Fleur de Gay, Terre Nere . . .
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I joined several years ago before finding this site. Most of the wines were jammy and over oaked messes, but I did find a couple of producers that I liked. Scott Kelley made an Oregon Pinot that was pretty good most years, really good in some years. Definitely worth $10. But then after COVID the prices kept going up and pretty soon it was over $20 pb which it definitely wasn’t worth.