I’m still kicking myself for missing out on some of the cooler woodturning pieces.
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The more the merrier… Bring it on
One thing I would be interested in, potentially doing “tasting packs”. If there are several small producers making good chardonnay in WV or Zins, etc from an eclectic region or style, maybe create bundles? I find it hard sometimes to pick through the many deals from producers without any purchase history and might be interesting to have maybe 6-12 pack mixed cases from a collective of wineries that are berserker appreciated. It may help spread the wealth and be more of a general help to the small producers as a group? Also help new people find new wines.
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It is generally a logistical nightmare for wineries to arrange for sample packs with other wineries. It’s a great idea, but very, very difficult to make happen. Usually a third-party operation would need to purchase and handle this and that would raise costs.
Hope that makes sense.
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Yeah that makes sense. Maybe could be sent as 3 packs from each winery but purchased as bundles?
Or just buy from each of them period.
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Understand. As perspective, I may buy a case or 2 as done in the past. I may like the 3-4 producers wines, may not. All part of wine exploration. Another scenario, pick 5 days 5 categories. Each day take a poll and top 4-6 producers get to be part of the collective to showcsse their wines. Potentially benefits 20-30 different producers rather than 3-4 and you don’t end up with a case of wine you aren’t sure is your style. That is more fun for me anyways. And engages more groups or spreads the wealth.
I’ve done this a couple of times. The hashtag functions help with groupings, bd16zinfandel , bd16pinot , etc… To get decent shipping and a fair sample I’ve usually ordered 6-packs, this year I did 5 different Zin producers and year before it was CA Pinots. It would be nice to have a combined sampler, but the logistics truly do seem impossible with small producers in a broad region, sometimes even international options, but the individual winery sampler sizes 3-6 packs are usually available.
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This.
It’s been brought up every BerserkerDay as it’s a great idea that can never happen, unfortunately.
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Check out my asylum thread. What recent piece interests you?
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On the winery side, it’s a PITA to coordinate.
On the consumer side, the thing I always have done is find a friend or two with similar palates and then split an order. Venmo and the like make it a lot easier these days, and it’s a way to save on shipping/order from a bunch of wineries without committing to too much volume from each one. Your friends don’t even need to be “as into wine” as you–in fact, splitting cases was a great way to get a few friends of mine more engaged with what they were drinking.
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I think August might be a little easier for people than July. The two options (July 4th weekend and the following weekend) are probably the two biggest vacation weekends of the summer. That said, I love the idea even if I have to order wine in the middle of the night from Europe.
I’ve see where a handful of members join up and splits cases so they can order a wider variety.
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I like this in theory, but I feel like most retailers operate in a way that any discounting they do will be very modest.
And I don’t blame them, but a bunch of retail wine at 10% off or something doesn’t really create much buzz or much of an event.
Wineries selling direct have a lot more play in their pricing model, or so it seems to me.
Now, there are some kind of hustle type folks grab small lots of great deals and sell on CC and/or to an email list of customers. I’m not sure if naming some of them is appropriate or not; if it is, I can think of a few names.
If some of those sellers gathered some great wines and deeper discounts for a retail mini-BD, now you’re talking.
[If my assumptions about how this would look are off base, please set me straight.]
It’s not the craziest thing. There are a variety of ways to offer deeper discounts on select wines at retail while still making money. But generally the margin is not great so there is less room to work with and its always going to be limited to certain wines at opportunistic times.
Of course, the Fe ram idea here should be to ‘support’ participants - not bankrupt them by having them sell products at a loss 
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I love the sentiment of this idea. Maybe the producers can limit the scope of the offerings so as to not dilute the usual BD event and put a bit less hurt on folks’ credit cards.
On the subject of market hurt: Our CA distributor suddenly retired and closed up shop Q4 last year. As of yesterday, we have begun working with another company. It took a while to find the right fit because ‘most everybody’ who would have normally jumped at the chance to rep us has been in ‘fear and retraction mode.’ It’s like too many folks in the water and too few lifeboats right now.
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That sums up the attitude of people and companies pretty well in the DC region. Very circumspect with expenses.
I assume no producer will feel obliged to bankrupt themselves; they have 100% control over what they offer at what price. If they make an offer, it’s something they think beneficial to them.
If the idea is people will buy a bunch at full price because of a desire to support the producers, they could already do that any time without an event.
Hopefully there is a lot of middle ground in there and it can be good for both sides.
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Of course - I wasn’t implying that any winery has to do anything that they are not comfortable with. Not at all.
The middle ground is how it’s always been - wineries offer what they’re comfortable and board members hopefully support these efforts . . .
Cheers
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