Trader Joes Overrated?

Interested to get peoples thoughts on this topic, I have been buying a ton of wine from Trader Joes because recently moved close to one in my city. I’ve heard a lot of hype from people and their podcast that their wine is “fantastic” and cheap which made me skeptical. Some of their domestic $15+ bottles I’ve liked but a lot of their international wines (Barolo, Gigondes, Vapolicella) haven’t been on par with others I’ve tried from the area. My inkling is that people like the wines just because they love TJ’s but if you buy that bottle at any other grocer you don’t have the same feeling. newhere

Perhaps TJ’s is overrated if you like the kinds of wine we do here on WB.
I often will go bottom feeding at TJ’s. But you have to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince. But occasionally you’ll find one that’s a real bargain. Not so much in the import section, more in the Calif wines. They buy a lot from Fred Franzia. If the label say made in American Canyon, that’s a tip-off that it’s one of Fred’s and you should avoid it.
That said, bottom feeding at TJ’s is usually more rewarding than at Total Wine, which has some ethical issues with deceptive marketing.
Tom

There is a bit of ‘cult of personality’ to their wine program. Always going to be a hit-or-miss aspect to wines that are always going to be sourced versus estate or contracted vineyards. There used to be a lot more hits as well when they weren’t in so many states, needing to make much larger batches. Also notorious for wildly varying batches of things like the Charles Shaw line, within vintage, coming from tanks of different regions under the same label. If the risk is worth the cheap price, you can definitely find some strong daily drinkers, just don’t expect it from year to year. For the nicer things like Barolo, you can do much better quality in a Langhe Nebbiolo from a good producer 19/20 times.

It’s all relative, I find there definitely is a cult surrounding Tjs and their cheap wine, but they tend to be consumers who think of a $15 wine as higher end, and so they love finding a < $10 bottle that they feel can compete, feels like a steal then. There is a cottage industry of bloggers thriving on this segment of the market. Not judging, it’s just going to be a different attitude on a forum like this. I had a $6 Albarino from TJs that I though could compete with whites in the 10-15 category, but at the end of the day I’m just not looking for that kind of wine.

Compared this to Costco’s wine selection; Costco has recognizable wines at nearly every price points that frequently are great deals compared to other retailers. I find bargain hunting at costco more rewarding.

Additionally, I find the stuff TJs carries at higher price points (20-30) to be outright bad values, their ~$24 Barolo in particular made me wretch.

There is a lot of crappy wine out there. Go to safeway/kroger/albertons/etc and there is a world of plonk in the 5-15$ range. Most not good.
I think trader joes does a better job of triaging and selecting wines than a typical grocery store chain.
In terms of private label stuff- I don’t touch it unless I hear from here that it is worth trying.

I buy my cooking wine at Trader Joe’s. It is satisfactory and cheap.

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Interesting topic - and my guess is that there are more folks on this board who regularly get wines there than it appears - and, not saying anyone is doing this, but no one should be made to feel ‘bad’ about doing so.

The perception of quality in wines is truly subjective, and there i is bound to be a number of folks who find most of the wines at TJ’s to offer them the ‘quality’ that they are happy with. Period. Are there wines sold there that are ‘not as good’ as what you can find elsewhere for the same $$$? Of course - but TJ’s makes it easy to pick up wines along with your groceries without having to make a separate stop, and sometimes convenience is them most important factor.

Bottom line for the OP - compare for yourself. If you feel the international wines do not offer the value you are looking for, look elsewhere - it might involve purchasing online rather than in person, but there are some great places that offer great selections of international wines at all prices. Check out K and L, Wine Exchange, Kogod and many other online wine retailers.

Cheers

In NYC, broadly speaking I find trader joes wine (only 1 in Manhattan as far as I know) to be 20-40+% below most wine shops for most wines ranging for daily drinkers ranging from $10-$25. I don’t expect to find something I don’t know that will surprise or wow me but for some wines that I enjoy it is the best value around here

For me, I really haven’t found a single bottle I would want to drink. My neighbor buys all his wine there so I have tried a lot of wines. Too many actually. I taste them and then end up drinking whatever I brought over.

Me too!

Oh, the wines! Well, they don’t sell wine in the TJ’s near here, but the store, certainly. Many people rave about it, but it is still over-rated.

TJ is proof that you can overpay for a $12 bottle of wine.

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For what’s it’s worth, I was rummaging through a bunch of bottles sitting on the basement bar top a few weeks ago. These are the bottles that friends bring us when they come over for a birthday party or whatever. Just kind of rando-bottles.

I didn’t want to open anything “nice” but wanted a glass of wine. So, I opened a bottle of Grifone Primitivo from the rando stash. It was delicious. It tasted like it had some age on it (maybe ten years) and there was some complexity there. Plus, it was crazy tasty.

I went upstairs (with my glass) to get on the computer and buy a case of what I thought was surely a $30-$40 wine (given my friends’ budgets) that punched way above its weight.

I was shocked (pretty literally) that the glass I was really, really digging was from a bottle that is a Trader Joe exclusive and can be yours for the price of $3.99.

For whatever reason, the Trader Joe’s in Costa Mesa on 17th street has a Bordeaux section with usually around 10 or so good bottles. Producers like Lagrange, Lafon Rochet, Sociando Mallet, Cantemerle, Latour Martillac, Rouget, Clos du Marquis, all (in the last year or so) from the 14-16 vintages, mostly the 15 and 16 vintages. And they’ve had that kind of selection consistently for at least the last year or more, not sure how much longer back than that.

The prices are good, kind of at the lowest end of internet retail. And . . . they show up on the CC statement as Trader Joe’s, not Hi Time or Wine Exchange.

But aside from that anomaly, and I haven’t seen another TJs with those kinds of wines, I think their wine selection is of essentially no interest to me. A lot of unknown bad wine that is not really a bargain despite being cheap, a few okay labels (e.g. Pine Ridge cab type of stuff) that are often not priced very attractively. I’d far rather buy wine, and even cheap wine, at Ralph’s or Vons than TJ, other than the Bordeaux I mentioned.

Back in the early 90s, when TJs basically only sold dry goods (no produce and had only a tiny refrigerated section), they seemed to specialize more in sourcing closeouts from known wineries. I remember vividly walking into one in maybe 1994 and they had a floor stack of Ridge Geyserville at a price that was low even then. You still see some closeouts of solid stuff from time to time, and over the past 18 months or so, they’ve started bringing in a range of classified growth Bordeaux at decent-but-not-bargain prices. That’s the case for all of the Seattle-area TJs, anyway. Anything that has the Latitude Wines from Danville, CA import label is a TJs direct import and quality is all over the place. I agree that their ‘premium’ direct imports for Brunello, Barolo etc are usually very poor value for money.

I am regular shopper at TJ but not for the wine.
Used to try the wine there on a regular basis but like others have said mostly its not worth the price or even drinkable.
I can’t remember drinking a bottle and thinking I need to get more of that.
I think you are much better off at Costco.
I sort of envy people who can drink a $5 bottle from TJ and can’t even tell a difference from a $30 bottle from a well known winery.
I have a few friends like that.
Have not stepped inside a TJ since March though and don’t plan to until the pandemic is over. In the meantime my kids shop for us there.
The item I miss the most is Grana Pandano cheese.

You get what you pay for.

To make wine at that price point, the corners cut are many. When you mechanically harvest and sort on that scale, you are guaranteed all kinds of suspect vineyard material in the tank than if you spent a couple more bucks. Plus the degree of chemical manipulation on some of these can be pretty high.

there have been a few gems in the past, but they are few and far between. They do carry some better/higher end wines, but the price isn’t particularly attractive.

We get the 4-packs of Sutter Home, or whatever else the grocery store has.

commercial post: My business has sold wine to Trader Joe’s in the past and may do so again. That may affect this post:

I find that when they buy end-of-vintage closeouts and/or overstock from known producers, the values can be very good.

I find that for their own brands and exclusivities, the values are hit and miss. Like every other profit-seeking business, they want to buy low and sell high. Like every other profit-seeking business, the buyers sometimes err on the side of paying too little and selling for too much. Shop carefully, aka Caveat Emptor.

Dan Kravitz