Wine Locker at Restaurant

[John_Davila]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

[Tom_G_l_a_s_g_o_w]

Seems like quite the racquet to me:

1. Pay to be member of the club
2. Pay monthly dues
3. Pay the monthly locker fee
4. Pay the markup on the wine

Maybe it is just me, but I don’t see the attraction to this model at all.

Exactly. If we go to a restaurant with lousy pricing we will either look for relative bargains or have a cocktail. I refuse to be gouged.

I do the same … Although at my “Home Restaurant… the food, service and music is usually way better…

How much does your wife charge you for corkage?

[Philip_N_Jones]

It is quite the racquet only if the wine locker is at your tennis club.

[Jason_T]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

That’s pretty cool. Not sure I’d ever go the the same restaurant enough to make it worth it, but if I did, this would be a nice way to go.

[MattBerto]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

What’s up with the bold part? I understand from the server’s perspective, but why would the restaurant go so far as to put it in policy?

[Jim_Clary]

Good article on the lack of BYOB in today’s Wall Street Journal.

[Mark_Golodetz]

Each state and jurisdiction, not to mention commercial entity, obviously is going to have its own situation.

Here in Ohio I would be surprised if there is even a single restaurant which allows on-site storage of outsiders’ wine, but I would glad to be so informed.

At our club, the wine locker program is very worthwhile because here are the wine options:

– order off the list, decent enough selection, and typically marked up to 2-3 time retail, plus pay 20% service charge, plus pay 7.5% tax on the whole thing

– join the locker program for $125/year, buy wine from the club (anything available in Ohio from a distributor who will deliver to the city) at state-minimum retail (without case discount), pay the sales tax, obviously, drink at your leisure. Also, attend distributor showcase for free twice/year (2 persons)

So…if I drink at the $35/bottle retail range and order a bottle off the list for dinner, it is going to cost me at least:

$ 70 wine
$ 14 service charge
$ 6.30 tax

$ 90.30 TOTAL

If I drink from my wine locker, I can have my choice of $35 bottles, and pay just $37.63, including tax, with no service fee.

This is over $43/ bottle MINIMUM savings, every time we dine, and usually it is a lot more, since the markups vary.

No brainer for us, YMMV

Why aren’t you paying service? Do they open the bottle, provide glassware? Even if they don’t I still compensate the staff who are losing out when you BYO.

[Bob_C]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

What’s up with the bold part? I understand from the server’s perspective, but why would the restaurant go so far as to put it in policy?

My guess is that if they were to use credit cards, they would have to pay the two or so percent of charge to cc company.

[ykwon]

It is quite the racquet only if the wine locker is at your tennis club.

I see what you did here

[J_a_y_H_a_c_k]

Late to the party here. I had a locker at Morton’s in White Plains just for fun. Berkserkers would see my name on it and send me messages claiming that they had raided my locker while having dinner. The wine I kept in it had an average retail price under $10 just so it looked full, and I would respond to such messages with a request for their TN on the Las Rocas or the Borsao. The only reason I kept it (they never charged me for it) was that when a friend or client would mention that they were going to Morton’s for a special birthday or something like that, I would put a special bottle in the locker and arrange for the manager to deliver it to their table with a flourish. It was worth it for that, but not if they had required me to buy their overpriced steakhouse wines to keep it full every year.

The only other notable thing about the locker was that it was between the lockers for Judge Jeannine and Nelson Peltz.

[Greg_Ossi]

Late to the party here. I had a locker at Morton’s in White Plains just for fun. Berkserkers would see my name on it and send me messages claiming that they had raided my locker while having dinner. The wine I kept in it had an average retail price under $10 just so it looked full, and I would respond to such messages with a request for their TN on the Las Rocas or the Borsao. The only reason I kept it (they never charged me for it) was that when a friend or client would mention that they were going to Morton’s for a special birthday or something like that, I would put a special bottle in the locker and arrange for the manager to deliver it to their table with a flourish. It was worth it for that, but not if they had required me to buy their overpriced steakhouse wines to keep it full every year.

The only other notable thing about the locker was that it was between the lockers for Judge Jeannine and Nelson Peltz.

Jay - you are not late - see post #11 above. You are consistent, however!

[Tom_G_l_a_s_g_o_w]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

What’s up with the bold part? I understand from the server’s perspective, but why would the restaurant go so far as to put it in policy?

My guess is that if they were to use credit cards, they would have to pay the two or so percent of charge to cc company.

Something to do with their liquor license?

[John_Davila]

I have a temp controlled locker at a Myrtle Beach area restaurant. The restaurant gives you the locker for free IF you purchase a $5k gift card. You also get a 20% bonus on your $5k and no corkage fee. The restaurant will source wines for you at retail and you can place your own wines in the locker. The one restriction is you tip in cash.

It really makes the restaurant feel like a private club with great food and an excellent wine list.

After reading all of the scenarios above, I feel quite lucky.

That’s pretty cool. Not sure I’d ever go the the same restaurant enough to make it worth it, but if I did, this would be a nice way to go.

The two big reasons are it’s the best restaurant for 60 miles in any direction and it is a block from my house. We eat there 1-2xs a week. Well worth it!

[John_Davila]

What’s up with the bold part? I understand from the server’s perspective, but why would the restaurant go so far as to put it in policy?

My guess is that if they were to use credit cards, they would have to pay the two or so percent of charge to cc company.

Something to do with their liquor license?

It’s just their policy. You can’t use a credit card for the tip nor can you use the credit from your account. So, dinner costs me $30-$40 in cash tip. No big deal.

[Jim_F]

My CC rents wine lockers for $50 per year which : eliminates all corkage on byo (always allowed), I fill it with my wines, I get discounts on Club wine dinners, and have received some amazing discounts on wine purchases…e.g., just before Christmas Taittenger NV was $25 a bottle when bought by the case. Pretty happy with this.

[JDavisRoby]

My CC rents wine lockers for $50 per year which : eliminates all corkage on byo (always allowed), I fill it with my wines, I get discounts on Club wine dinners, and have received some amazing discounts on wine purchases…e.g., just before Christmas Taittenger NV was $25 a bottle when bought by the case. Pretty happy with this.

Is it temp controlled?

[Brent_C_l_a_y_t_o_n]

I had a locker at Morton’s for years. It was a big joke because it was not temperature controlled and the most expensive bottles I kept in it were things like Borsao and Las Rocas. After the first purchase of wine to get the locker, I never bought any more from them because the prices were a joke. IIRC, my locker was between Nelson Pelz and Jeanine Pirro. Dubious company. The only value was that if I found out that a friend was going to Morton’s for a special dinner like a birthday, I would deliver a bottle to the locker a few days in advance and the manager would make a big deal about opening the locker and giving a fancy bottle to my friend in front of the rest of the restaurant.

Deja Vu all over again!

[Jim_F]

My CC rents wine lockers for $50 per year which : eliminates all corkage on byo (always allowed), I fill it with my wines, I get discounts on Club wine dinners, and have received some amazing discounts on wine purchases…e.g., just before Christmas Taittenger NV was $25 a bottle when bought by the case. Pretty happy with this.

Is it temp controlled?

Yes.