I don’t think I have ever purchased 36 bottles from one producer in a year single. Their wine club is a tough commitment that I am not really willing to make at this time. The 15% discount would be nice but I pickup at the winery so free shipping isn’t worth much to me.
Phew! As mentioned by others, I don’t buy 36 bottles from any given winery in a year, but I do buy more than the 12 required to maintain my status on Copain’s mailing list. It’s good to hear that we’ll still get some SVD’s offered to us (presumably what’s left over from club orders being fulfilled).
Thought about this quite a bit and talked to Jim, I took the 6 bottle club Copain. This will allow me to maintain the 15% discount and still buy the SVD’s albeit not priority offering. From chatting with Jim they are going to be pretty flexible on what bottles you receive. This e-mail maybe should have been accompanied with a cartoon flash video to “splain” it a little better. As long as I can at least somewhat tailor what I get with this option then its not that much different than today minus the guaranteed SVD allocations.
As for the Kiser, what was the mag markup?
Guess I need to go to commerce corner and see if anyone wants to split a SVD membership in atlanta… My guess is lots of folks might go this path.
I decided ,after talking with Jim to go with the 6 bottle club,Pinot only.I especially liked the fact that I could stop the club at any time and also delete wines that I do not want. This coupled with the discount makes it a win win for me . Maybe not for others.
Joe
+1
this really pisses me off. As many have said, If I can’t get what I want I’ll go elsewhere.
If this was a Rhys club everyone would be clamoring to get on board.
With that said I was on the Arcadian case per quarter club for 5 quarters and soon realized it was going to take me a long time to drink that much wine, especially since they really are not drinkable for many years. I dropped off their club 4 years ago and still have over 40 bottles left.
I really do like their whole operation and all of their wines so I will chat with Jim as well and probably opt for one of the smaller options.
Give them credit for offering a 15% discount and free shipping option.
I’m glad this showed up here as I’ve really busy today and wanted to call, but didn’t get around to it.
I see my other pep squad brethren have all ponied up for the 36 svd club. Being a long time loyal supporter I don’t think I will do this, like others have said 36 is a lot of bottles and I’m trying to cut down as it is. I would have jumped right in with something like 2 bottles of the svd wines a year, which would be a more managable 18 a year. Remember when everyone complained about the 3 bottle minimun, hell this 4 bottles.
Has anyone done the math on this: what’s the cost per with the 15% discount? I’m sure this will still work out to something like $650 to $700 a release. At that price I will seriously have cut out a couple major players in my buying circle.
Help!!!
I don’t begrudge them doing whatever they think is best for their business, and my instinct tells me the last few years may have been tough for Copain, between the splashy new tasting room, the 2008 Anderson Valley fires, and the recessionary economy, though I have no actual information about the state of their finances.
But I’m not joining a club, especially at that kind of volume and price. I guess I’ll just see what wines they make available to me at what price in the coming year, and either keep buying or stop buying based on that. Hopefully, it will roughly work out for me as it has in past years, but if it doesn’t, there’s no shortage of good wine out there, some of which I’ve wanted to buy more of but haven’t. Also, my neighborhood store (Hi Time Cellars) carries some of their wines each year, especially the blends, at about the same price as buying directly from Copain, so I can probably just buy those there if I want them.
I’ve been a steady customer for several years, but not one of their highest-volume buyers, so it won’t make a big difference to them whatever I do. The posters above in this thread who have agreed to lock in increased quantities in the new club format have already more than offset what it would mean to them if I go away.
Stopped by the tasting room today to pick up an order and told Jim he opened up a can of worms with his little email today. He laughed and agreed with me. Said he’s been on the phone all day but in the end most people have a better understanding after speaking with him.
Took a quick pour of the new Tous Ensemble Chard ![[welldone.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/f/fc9709a841aa9379fd892a9cf0b535b05f473b86.gif "[welldone.gif]"){kind=small}
, the Wentzel Pinot and the James Berry GSM. Wells gets it right across the spectrum of price points and varietals and I like that about Copain. In for a 6er so I can get some SVDs as long as my wallet supports it. So many wines, so little money.
I signed up for the club that let’s me buy 2 of each of the SVD Pinots every year at a 15% discount and free shipping. Oh wait, they don’t have that club. : /
What does that mean? Is Jim going to send everyone who is complaining in this thread an email or make a personal call, or is it on all of us to try to make the time to call him and get an explanation? It’d be a sort of odd reverse telemarketing if we had to call him in order to let him talk us into signing up for a club.
I haven’t had time today to talk to Jim, but if the quarterly 6 allows me to substitute whatever I want, then given 15% discount and free shipping, this probably fits well with me.
Larry,
If this was all svd I would be all over it, but my impression is that this is mostly Tous and Voisins with a stray svd thrown in.
…but from everything I’m hearing this is not how the club works. You are only going to be able to buy a few of the SVDs and get a bunch of the cuvees that really do not interest me. Sure sounds like a hostage wine program to me. I guess I’ll wait and see what SVD’s I’m offered as a non club member and if that doesn’t work out I’ll not have much choice but to move on. I’m glad business is so good Copain can afford to alienate loyal customers. ![[scratch.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/4/42a16863a8714da3c1604419e3eb9206bb87aa50.gif "scratch"){kind=small}
Russ, give Jim a call. I believe there is far more flexibility in this program than you think.
Mike,
I’m not mad at you so don’t take this the wrong way, but why does a business send out such a God awful cryptic email and not expect very bad reactions from loyal customers? IMO they really blew it. Now I have to take the time and effort to contact them to find out what they really meant to communicate. REALLY?? Maybe by tomorrow I’ll have calmed down some and then decide what I want to do. Right now all I’m feeling is a great amount of disappointment with Copain.
I just signed up blindly without knowing I need to buy 36 bottles per year 
I just checked my last invoice from August when I purchased the Halcon syrah and Monument Tree pinot and there is no mention of a 15% discount. What am I missing?
I’m somewhat with Russ. I didn’t understand the email, didn’t understand what any of those different clubs meant when I followed the link to their website, still don’t understand after reading this thread, and don’t understand what is different (if at all) going forward to someone like me who isn’t going to join any of the clubs. I don’t really feel like I should have to to call them to ask them what their cryptic communique means, particularly after wasting so much time already today trying to understand all of this.
I think I’ll just see what is offered to me at what price in the future and either buy it or not buy it, and if at some point I lose my invitation to buy Copain wines because I didn’t buy enough or didn’t do it the way they wanted, that’s fine. No hard feelings, but no big sense of loss or regret either.