Wine.com fail; what’s the best for online wine delivery?

Hey experts,

So I placed a relatively large order on Wine.com, and while the transaction went well, the wine arrived ruined. They said they would pack ice on it but there was only a tiny ice pack in each box which didn’t do anything for the 3 day transit. The wine was very warm when it arrived and several corks were saturated, so I returned the entire 60 bottle order not trusting any of the bottles. It’s too bad because there were bottles of D’Yquem in there. They said I will get a full refund so we shall see.

Anyway here in Arkansas it looks like it may be challenging to find quantities of higher end wines, so online makes sense for me, but I need a reliable way to get wines that won’t be damaged during shipping. Anyone have any recommendations?

I can’t really say that I’m much of an expert, but I have been ordering wine online for a good while. I’d strongly recommend that you just not order wine online anymore this year until the weather gets cold again or at least cool.

I can’t recommend any retailers, but the important lesson here is to not have wine shipped when it’s really hot out. Good merchants will hold your wine until the weather cools.

Sorry about this. As others have said, NEVER ship wine in the summer. It is really not the retailers fault if customer asks them to ship in heat but some don’t know any better. Unfortunately you learned this with a large and expensive order. The only solution if you are dry is to find something local, drink beer, and try to plan extra orders during shipping season. Again sorry all that wine was cooked.

Sorry to hear, and that is really unfortunate. Most retailers and shops offer to hold the wines until things cool down enough to appropriate wine shipping temps.

If you’re eager, the next best bet is to simply bite the bullet and pay for overnight shipping. FedEx also has a temp-controlled option that some retailers use frequently. It’s called Cold-Chain, which runs around the same rates as 2-day/3-day.

As others have said, shipping wine is best done in Fall and early Spring. That is when most wineries ship.

Yeah, Wine.com said no worries they pack on ice. Each case had a tiny cold pack. Worthless.

It just makes me cautious to use them even with overnight shipping.

if you DO ship during the summer, make sure you do overnight. also I would suggest either shipping it to an office or to a FedEx/UPS hub pickup location. even in cooler months I have mine go the UPS hub nearby so that it doesn’t sit on a delivery truck during the day at all. good that they replaced it but it really sucks if its a not-as-easily replaced bottle.

FWIW: sauternes is fairly bulletproof though. not quite, but more than most for sure.

Wine.com makes sense if they have a warehouse in your home city. For me I usually receive my wine next day. Their ice packs like you mentioned are a joke. I would suggest paying for overnight shipping or cold-chain shipping. If that is not possible ideally I would wait until the weather cools down for any orders/shipments.

Cellaraiders.com lets you hold shipments until fall shipping. Winebid.com as well.

Shipping in summer other than overnight? Nope. (especially for anything expensive)

I can’t imagine buying high-end wine from a retailer that is willing to ship multiple days in the summer. Imho, they obviously are not high-end and are seriously lacking in common and wine sense.

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