There have been a lot of posts about Vinotemp and their poor reliability and customer service. I am not experiencing poor service but I am having a problem with my unit.
About 3.5 years ago I took my first plunge into a wine cooler and bought a N’finity 170 unit, I know that is not considered a premium product here but it was $1700 which is still a good chunk of cash. The unit recently stopped keeping the correct temp in the lower zone, talking with the company there are numerous reasons for this none of which are probably repairable as the unit has no parts availability. Now fortunately I purchased at Best Buy with an extended warranty so with a bit of effort over the next few weeks I can get it sorted.
It got me thinking though, my house fridge freezer is a really nice Samsung unit that I paid around $1200 for 10 years ago and is still running perfectly, I think most people expect a fridge freezer to last 10-15 years as a matter of course. So why are my N’finity and others similar to it so unreliable, its like they expected to go wrong after a few years. In terms of cost its basically a steel box with a glass door and a cooling unit, it doesn’t do refridgeration, ice making or any of the clever fridge freezer stuff yet its way more expensive, don’t tell me shelves cost $1000.
Even the high end units seem to need service or repair around the 7-10 year mark, why are wine coolers not built to same standard as other domestic applicances ? why are they so unreliable, you replace the main AC unit for your house every twenty years and they cost $3-6000 but cool the whole house !!! and why are wine coolers so bloody expensive ?
Really good question! I too am curious to hear the responses. My gut feel is that the market is so niche that no one producer feels enough competition to encourage them to give you more for less (computers, TVs,etc). I also suspect that many source from the same Chinese manufacturer but have never seen any documentation.
They’re not made in the same quantity as commercial refrigerators, so they’ll always be a bit pricey, but the quality issues are entirely the responsibility/fault of the manufacturers. As an example, I have a low-end consumer refrigerator that’s been humming along since 1981, with no decline in performance or service calls in all that time.
Depends.
Bought Danby and Avanti units many moons ago. Now with children (we built a large cellar). Still humming along with no issues.
Great question. I would like to hear some more insight as well. I recently just posted a thread on the Wine 101 forum as I am looking to buy a built in unit for our kitchen remodel next year. It seems there really isn’t a solid choice out there for a long-lasting, worry-free wine cooler.
Danby 36 - costs $200+ each. I have 4, stacked 2 each. If one dies, it’s no big deal to replace it. Since these mult-thousand dollar units don’t have such great service records, why spend more money on them?
I always found Bartles & Jaymes to be consistent and inexpensive…
Thank you for your support!
It really is inexcusable. I finally upgraded to a mid-sized Eurocave a year ago for my at home storage and it has been fantastic. That being said, it is funny how this is priced and looked upon as a “premium” unit and the construction materials and general setup are pretty basic to be honest…
So yea, the margins are probably absurd on these things and the pricing is all over the place so it seems there is no real pressure due to the limited # of these that are probably sold each year to improve price/reliability. Additionally, I think the biggest issue is that many brands just use crap compressors as others have compared their old fridges to…
Small (niche) market = little competition = seller’s market. Not enough critical mass – or alternative – to provoke manufacturer improvement.
I have three units ranging from 300 bottles to 50 bottles in size. Priced from $1700 to $300. The oldest is about 7 years old. They all are running well. Never a problem. Am I lucky?
By the way, many moons ago, bought a Le Cache 5200 for less than 4500. It was still working great six years later when I sold it. It is the gold standard.
My 400 bottle unit ran like a champ for 10+ years before needing a new cooling unit in Sept.
My gripe with them is that they only run at either 50 degrees or 80 degrees, with no in-between. Why they construct the units with that adjustable knob is really frustrating to think about as it does nothing.
It is a mystery. Consider too how hard a regular refrigerator has to work to restore 40F – or 0F for the freezer – after the door has been open on a hot day. Maintaining and restoring 55F should be a lot easier on a compressor. And a full wine cave should have less air and more thermal mass in the form of wine than your average refrigerator.
Wouldn’t it be cheaper to make a really well insulated room and just hook it up to an independent AC unit with temperature control?
We’ve had posts on that before…just didn’t feel like searching them. The real question is how reliable would that AC unit work? You’d also want a humidifier to go along with it.
Four years ago I built a cellar in my garage (read: insulated wood box). It’s a little less than 400 cu ft. Stuck a $90 window AC unit in it, which vents directly into my garage. In summer when the garage gets to be 90-100F, the cellar is around 52F. In winter when the garage is 40-50F, the cellar is around 58F. Humidity is 50-70% without a humidifier. I’m amazed by that little AC unit. Best part is that if it ever dies I can run to Home Depot, buy a new one for $90, and pop it in the cellar.
To it’s own credit, my Breezaire unit in my wine cabinet has had only one $250 repair in the 8+ years I’ve had it. But considering it costs 8 times as much as the window AC unit it’s definitely no bargain.
With a niche market, products are either great or generally suboptimal but still sell. I suspect this is why wine coolers and small storage units still sell.
I have expressed this same frustration many times, and as far as I can tell, there isn’t an answer. You can buy a $200 refrigerator at Sears and it will work without needing a repair for 25 years. You spend thousands on a wine cabinet the same size, and you’ll spend another thousand or more repairing it before it hits the 10 year mark.
I get that this is a niche market and all, and I’m not surprised the value proposition is poor and that quality control is spotty and that repair people are hard to find and expensive, but I think there must be more to it than that. There must be some engineering / physics reason why a wine storage cabinet is inherently so much less durable and less reliable than a refrigerator or freezer.
I really hate how poorly these things work. Maybe in the customer feedback era, there will start to be some pressure on these companies to make a better product.