Kudos to Total Wine (Concierge)

Total Wine did me good. Totally surprised me. Totally happy. The first of my 2019 bordeaux bought EP arrived at my local store- a few bottles of Brane Cantenac. I picked them up, drove home and was in the process of transferring them out of my car to put into the wine cabin (as my wife likes to call it). To my horror, the bag broke, and in a slo-mo kind of way, I watched one bottle head into the air. I was able to make a grab for it, but no, it landed on the driveway and the top and bottom both broke off. Pissed as hell at myself, I cleaned up the broken glass and hosed off the red wine. After a bit, just for the heck of it I called TWC and asked “do I have any recourse with TWC”? Surprisingly the answer was yes. I was asked to return the broken bottle to the store for replacement if in stock (it was not), or from the warehouse if not. I received the new bottle today. I am very pleased with this customer service. This was a wow for me.

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That is a little bit of a surprise. Good on them. I purchased a 375 of 2016 Pontet Canet and it was horribly corked. I returned it to the TW store I got it from and they didn’t even blink an eye and refunded me in full. I picked up a 375 of Smith Haut-Lafite 2016 and it was killer!!!

I went to a Total Wine (Naples FL) for the first time in many years, because I was out of town and looking to put together a small tasting for non-geek relatives.

I asked the sales employee where were wines from the Loire. He had clearly never heard of the Loire, even after I spelled it to him and described it and dropped names of wines from there like Vouvray and Chinon, which he hadn’t heard of either. He eventually said they don’t carry that. Then a few minutes later, I found the section of Loire wines. Which was a lousy selection, but they at least had one, maybe three dozen different wines or so.

I don’t say that to tar all the Total Wines stores or employees – likely, it’s hard to get competent workers there like everywhere else these days. But it was just a little funny.

Maybe he could direct you to the ‘Winery Direct’ aisle…

The one closest to us has now started participating in various 3rd party delivery services, which they had resisted for a long time. I’m not sure how their parking lot will support that increased flow; it’s not really large enough for the scale of their business.

So first let me say the concierge service I have found to be fantastic…pricing average but service and transparency nothing short of terrific! As for the Loire section, it is truly a very sad, depressing, woeful, pathetic, place to find yourself.

Should at least heard of it but most of the employees working the floor are not wine experts. Usually there is one somewhere in the store but can’t say I can think of a shop in MN that has a large Loire section.

It wasn’t remotely a big deal or at all upsetting to me, it’s just a random Total Wine experience I had last week.

I’ll forgive the lame Loire or whatever selection, non-wine-geek staff, etc. etc. for just 50% down and the option to cancel at any time with refund. Does anyone else selling futures do this?

Exactly…I think the concierge service is awesome!

I may be the only one, but I find this episode a little strange. It wouldn’t have occurred to me to ask someone or a business to make me whole on a mistake that was mine. I’m not criticizing or being judgmental, I just can’t relate to this. I’m glad for the OP-er that TW was willing to do this.

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If you want to have some fun ask them what Cabernet under $20 you should bring to a dinner event tonight. Winery Direct wines coming.

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Honestly they have the worst way to bag a few bottles. I now bring a wine tote there as those bags are not of high quality for transporting wine.

My reaction as well but I now see a down-thread reference to bag issues. Perhaps that was the rationale?

I was about to tell you that’s not really about competence because it’s more about lack of training, but then I remembered some recent experiences in hiring and I’ll grant you it’s at least a little bit of both.

Before you spelled them for him, I can just imagine his mental picture of what you were saying: Lou Are, Lou R or maybe Luar; Voo breh; She non, or who knows what.

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To answer, I just thought, what the heck. Bag issue?- maybe. In the end, it was my responsibility whether the bag was good or not. But nothing asked, nothing gained. I expected TW to say “sorry”. Maybe a replacement at original additional cost if I was lucky. And their response left me amazed, which was the sole point of the post. They did exceptional.

I’m a huge fan of TW concierge Bdx futures program…especially since there are now stores in San Diego for delivery. Used to have to travel to Irvine or Sacramento to pick-up bottles.