Are you saying that they basically stole your wine because you had paid for it but wouldn’t release it to you? How did this get resolved?
It was resolved by my paying the fees, with no discount or consideration. Nor would he tell where Ben had gone to, or check to confirm any of my statements with him. I told him to keep the wine and refund the money, but that was also refused. In the end it was probably fine since the wines were all good (and any dealings I’ve had with TCWC when Ben was there were very good), but Simon was an absolute pr–k.
So you are saying that you had to pay storage fees for wine you asked them to store when they couldn’t legally ship to you? And further that you bought the wine knowing that they couldn’t legally ship to you? And that in the end you got all the wine you bought and it was in good condition? Doesn’t sound that bad to me.
He’s saying he had to pay storage fees that he was originally told he would not be charged. We don’t, of course, know what the total was.
It was a while ago and it was not the biggest deal in the world, but Mr. Lambert, in my opinion, is one of the world’s larger a–holes.
In short, I participated in auctions online, sometimes buying a few bottles, sometimes cases. Shipping was not available, so it was agreed prior to my original bidding that I could accumulate a certain amount without incurring storage fees before making a 10 hour trip to pickup any purchases. I did this a few times, including once where I brought numerous cases to de-accession. So it was quite q surprise when I was charged storage on the last excursion. the fact that I got angry enough to be willing to leave the wine if he would have given me my money back is at least somewhat indicative of how obnoxious he was. It was hundreds not thousands. Nonetheless I would be very careful with Mr Lambert. And TCWC was sued by Mr Koch.
I have done a ton of business with them and no issues.
Sounds like you should have gotten something in writing and didn’t. I’ve never known Simon to be anything but a gentleman, but he’s also a businessman. I don’t think Ben ever had that level of authority to give you free long term storage, which is why Ben probably didn’t put it in writing. I think your ire should be directed at Ben, who it sounds like told you whatever you needed to hear to continue to bid at auctions, knowing you couldn’t take delivery.
BTW, the fact that Koch sued TCWC at one point is immaterial to this discussion. It’s little known that Koch was one of the original investors in TCWC. That also probably doesn’t matter to the discussion at hand. I just thought I would point it out.
I have purchased from them for the past couple of years and they have been wonderful.
I have bought a lot of wine from these guys. Simon has always been wonderful to deal with.