So the NY Times's Wirecutter rates wine clubs

Eric Asimov wrote a column earlier this year about wine clubs, mostly run by retailers and restaurants.

Now the Wirecutter, the Times’s consumer rating department, has ranked wine clubs, along with its usual subjects like toaster ovens, stereo speakers and all-weather tires.

The 2 Best Wine Clubs of 2023 | Reviews by Wirecutter (may require subscription, or even a super-subscription

Bottom line: They like Wine Access and Somm Select, based on the choice of wines and the information supplied with the wines. But Martha Stewart’s club ranks third because the wines were decent and cheap.

OK, who here is signing up?

(I was curious to see if they rated the Wall Street Journal wine club. I’ve been receiving mail from them for years. But there was no mention.)

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It was mentioned further down- along with the NYT club!
“Media clubs: The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and National Geographic all have their own wine clubs. These media companies lend their names to separate wine firms, which fulfill the orders and give them a cut of the profits in return. Our best advice is to avoid these types of subscription services, since they’re run by large corporate wine firms whose priorities seem more about making money and less about helping you discover interesting wines.”
Bravo for them for not recommending the NYT club. Bull neither WSJ or NYT was actually tested. Besides the 3 recommended, it seems they also tried Winc and the Grand Tour Wine Club

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Hmm. Don’t know how I missed that. Probably all the friggin’ ads in the Wirecutter articles, which make them hard to read.

I mean, good for them I guess, but they still collect affiliate money if you click on the links to the wine clubs they reviewed and purchase something. While they showed the bare minimum of integrity by not recommending the NYT wine club, who knows whether they just rank the list of wine clubs by amount of affiliate revenue that they generate?

The Times and other serious news organizations have strict walls dividing editorial from advertising so advertisers don’t influence content. It’s part of the culture. I worked at The American Lawyer magazine, The Deal, Dow Jones and Bloomberg, and it was true in all those places. Trade publications are a different story…

That said, I’m uncomfortable with the links. I remember when the Guardian started providing links to booksellers in its book reviews. But even Consumer Reports now provides links. But those are to multiple sellers of the same object (e.g., Best Buy, Amazon, Home Depot for dishwashers). With the wine clubs, there’s just one supplier.

We may politely disagree on wine, but I have to call BULLSHIT on this one. To suggest that ALM does not mix editorials with advertising is to not know ALM’s chief lobbyist. Richard the Ruthless, who I have known for 40 years, never met a revenue-generating issue that he could not turn into a political/editorial issue. We just discussed that exact problem at the Business Law Section Executive Committee Meeting yesterday. Never trust the media to maintain walls. They are about as good at it as analysts at investment banks.

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I’m talking American Lawyer in the Steve Brill days (up to 1998), when it was a point of pride to bite the hand that fed us (mainly large law firms, though subscriptions).

You may well be right of the publication today. It bears no resemblance to the magazine up through the early 2000s. From the outside, I watched some of the protections erode in the 2000s, after I left.

The conflicts are much more severe for trade publications, which typically rely heavily on advertising and subscriptions from the people and firms they write about.

Big news organizations like the Times, WSJ, etc. have much more diverse subscriber and advertiser bases, so it’s much easier for them to keep editorial content independent.

It’s easy to cynically postulate, as Chris did, that content is purchased without knowing how places like the Times operate.

I’ve really enjoyed using WineAccess. The best customer service I’ve come across. Highly recommended.

I have never seen a wine club worth joining unless it is from the actual winery and they are doing a sampler. There are way too many good wines you can order from numerus places across the country and fill a cellar.

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(I was curious to see if they rated the Wall Street Journal wine club. I’ve been receiving mail from them for years. But there was no mention.)

Never anything featured I would want to try. Just go to a good local wine shop with a good salesperson and say I want 12 really good $15.00 wines.

SommSelect is really the only one I have ever paid money for. But that was specifically because I was practicing for WSET3 and their “Blind 6” subscription service was very helpful for that.

I still recommend Kermit Lynch’s Club Gourmand. 12 very good wines every two months. No mention in the NYT article.

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I hesitate to mention it here, but I am a happy member of Alice Feiring’s wine club. It is a good source of unusual, offbeat, and authentic wines if your tastes tend that way. Mine do, and I’ve found that if Alice likes a wine I am likely to enjoy it as well. You do have to prepared for the occasional disappointment, but if you are in the habit of searching out those types of wines you already know that.

I could almost join the Source Material wine club. I wish there was a William Kelley wine club–that everything he was putting in his cellar, he would get one for me.

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I review wine clubs for a living (since 2009). After reading this article I was dejected about my previous faith in Wirecutter. What an embarrassment. 100s of wine clubs, they taste test 5, pick 3, and call that a good review?

They worked with a somm (presumably because the author is a general “Kitchen” writer) and I can’t help but see that 3 of 5 clubs they taste tested are somm clubs.

The review was definitely geared more toward the Wine Berserkers audience than the general wine-drinking public. It was accompanied by a long article about private label wine, something that most wine drinkers could care less about, even after it’s explained to them.

I love Wine Access but I think WC missed out on WA’s best club. I’ve reviewed (tasted multiple) shipments from three of their clubs and their Michelin Subscription is fantastic.

I haven’t ordered from SommSelect but I’m on their mailing list and their Build a Case subscription looks like a good way to order from them if you’re club-averse.

FWIW, as Wine Berserkers, I’d consider Picked by Wine.com — it’s the equivalent of walking into a giant wine store and asking an actual sommelier what you should drink based on what you know you like.

You might also want to check out the brand new club by Vices called Iconic Wine Club. Their inaugural shipment is going out soon. I know what’s in it but I can’t disclose it until December 3. At $295 per shipment, it’s not cheap, but IMO it’s worth it.

For those of you wondering, no, they didn’t order them based on how much affiliate payouts are. And SommSelect does not, to my knowledge, have any kind of affiliate program.

I would worry less about the influence of advertising on the editorial and more about the slanted point of view. The somm they worked with clearly had a lot of influence on what was reviewed and even discussed in the “How to choose a wine club for yourself” section. Most retail wine club members have no idea what a sommelier is and most retail wine club members cannot imagine paying $25+ for a bottle of wine except on a special occasion.

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“The only disappointments are those who cannot understand ginger vin de soif since they don’t use the correct vessel - a Georgian khantsi”




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I belonged to the Wine Access club for a long while, just ending it this month, actually. The wines they sent were fine, and I suppose worth what I paid for them, but the real kicker was stacking the 10% members discount on top of Amex offers and other coupon codes. Now, many of the “premium” bottles exclude discounts, and Amex offers are fewer and farther between.

As an aside, I just got 6 bottles from my Frog’s Leap club yesterday and was reminded how excellent their club is as they regularly send library bottles. This shipment I received 2x 2020 Chard, 2x 2015 Merlot and 2x 2019 Cab — so 4 bottles of current release wines that are already a fantastic value at $29 and $55 respectively and some definitely underpriced 6 year old Merlot straight from the winery’s cellar at $51.

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I decided that over the next year I was going to explore Kermit Lynch’s wine imports (special thanks to my departed pal Larry Moss for the inspiration) so I signed up for Club Gourmand at Kermit Lynch. To give you an idea of the selection here is a list of next month’s wine selection: one bottle each of
2017 Bourgueil “Clos Sénéchal” • Catherine & Pierre Breton
2018 Barbera d’Alba “Bricco del Pilone” • Piero Benevelli
2018 Bandol Rouge • Domaine Tempier
2019 Cahors • Château La Grave
2019 Chablis “Les Truffières” • Henri Costal
2019 Ardèche Syrah “Syrah Mauve” • Jean-Claude Marsanne
2019 Bourgogne Aligoté • Domaine Taupenot-Merme
2020 Muscadet Côtes de Grand Lieu sur lie “La Nöe” • Éric Chevalier
2020 Pignoletto Frizzante • Fattoria Moretto
2020 Coteaux du Loir Blanc • Pascal Janvier
2020 Beaujolais “Charron” • Quentin Harel
NV Spumante Extra Brut • Riofavara

Total cost including shipping and tax was $346 and change. The club does exactly what I want it to - introducing me to producers and wines I’ve never tried (well except for Tempier which I love) and giving me easy access to Kermit Lynch’s imports. I’ve been pleased with the selections thus far. Jim

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If they didn’t review the Ancient Wine Guys, it’s a flawed list.

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Your website recommends Blind Six (from Somm I think) as the best for Experienced Wine Nerds.

Do you think that Picked and/or Iconic are better choices for us?