When he became ill, and as he got sicker, he increasingly neglected his business, and some customers suffered for it. It was a long, drawn out illness, and the treatments and suffering were grueling. After he died, his wife and young son and older daughter were in no position to try and sort out the business.
Though I understand how it came to pass, and the choices he made, I don’t excuse him for letting his customers down, and I don’t blame those customers for being angry.
As one who lost wine as a result of Max becoming ill and dying, I disagree with your conclusion. Intent matters and I believe Max intended to make things right but ran out of time. Regardless, I mourn his family’s loss.
Was he at any point taking money with no intention of filling the orders?
Businesses fail for a variety of reasons . . . if an owner gets sick and the business collapses as a result that doesn’t make it a scam.
And I don’t think Vint Marketplace was a scam. Apparently a business model that wasn’t going to work long term. And perhaps a scam at the very end if they continued to take orders for wine they couldn’t deliver (which it’s not clear they were doing)
(FWIW, I placed one order with them in 2024, which they fulfilled. There was a hiccup in that my shipment did not include all bottles on the first go, but they sent the remainder eventually).
I ordered a number of things from vint and they sent them to me. I had one prearrival that they told me they couldn’t fulfill and then refunded my money. If people were buying from them near the end when it was clear they were going to go under then they certainly could be upset but it was clear after tariffs were put in place that their business model wasn’t going to work.
That is my strong belief. I obviously don’t believe someone getting sick and passing away - and not fulfilling orders as a result - to be a scam.
But I won’t comment on this again, as the point I was making was different - you try to warn others on this forum, and you will get a multiple fold coming at you instead, to K_Shin’s message which I responded to.
Thanks. TBH I don’t order from any of these places that are going to Europe to fulfill orders. At that point I’ll buy it there myself. The only place I trust is Flickinger.
Wine Scout has acknowledged that my entire order from Vint Marketplace (over 6 cases of wines) has been received by them and are awaiting for cooler temperatures before arranging shipment to my wine storage facility in Phoenix.
I will admit I do feel like I got a bit lucky since it seems like the assets of Vint Marketplace got bought by a functional and professional team which could have gone another way. However, in my defense, after reading through some of the thoughts from other members in this thread - I had purchased probably 10+ cases of wine while Vint Marketplace was functioning and received all of those in a timely matter. Most of these issues came crashing in the last year. I would recommend anyone who had orders at Vint Marketplace and still have not received them to reach out to Wine Scout.
