disgraceful customer service a well known retailer - Chambers Street Wines

[Michael_S_Monie]

If this thread has demonstrated anything it’s that we all have way too much free time!

[L_Wang]

@Michael S. Monie

If this thread has demonstrated anything it’s that we all have way too much free time!

and its hard to buy aged chartreuse! prob more so after this thread.

[Mark_Golodetz]

And also don’t expect a second chance when you plaster the BBs with headlines including the word “Disgraceful.”

[Dennis_Kanagie]

Actually Markus, Mr. Wang did give us a number earlier in the thread in one of his posts. If you remembered how to do word problems from math AND reading comprehension (i.e. read the posts instead of merely scanned them) you could have easily deduced the small quantities we were dealing with.

[L_Wang]

@Mark Golodetz

And also don’t expect a second chance when you plaster the BBs with headlines including the word “Disgraceful.”

I am sorry I mis-typed, it should have been “very graceful customer service”. I hope that will get me to score a second chance! what do you think Mr.Golodetz?

butthead says "scoree… yea… scoree… "

[Pat_Martin]

Just signed up for Chambers St’s email list.

[Ramon_C]

@Pat Martin

Just signed up for Chambers St’s email list.

At the risk being quoted as stereotyping you, Patrick, I’d say CSW’s Bordeaux offerings are not one that you would get excited about.

[Paul_Miller]

Bounced around through this. May have to start at the beginning and go all the way through. This thread has real entertainment potential.

Regardless, that South Park video was worth the price of admission. I have a friend who I’m sure I’ll get to share that with in a couple of days.

[Pat_Martin]

@R Cabrera

@Pat Martin

Just signed up for Chambers St’s email list.

At the risk being quoted as stereotyping you, Patrick, I’d say CSW’s Bordeaux offerings are not one that you would get excited about.

I hear you! But I do love Loire whites and Piedmontese reds.

[L_Wang]

@Pat Martin

@R Cabrera

@Pat Martin

Just signed up for Chambers St’s email list.

At the risk being quoted as stereotyping you, Patrick, I’d say CSW’s Bordeaux offerings are not one that you would get excited about.

I hear you! But I do love Loire whites and Piedmontese reds.

I had some Guiberteau Breze 2010 and Agnès et René Mosse “initial bb” 2013 recently, both drinking nicely!
Domaine Huet Vouvray Demi-Sec Le Mont 1985 was also good!

[Michael_S_Monie]

@Mark Golodetz

And also don’t expect a second chance when you plaster the BBs with headlines including the word “Disgraceful.”

Second chance for what? We’re talking about buying booze, not saving lives. There are plenty of places to buy booze.

[Mark_Golodetz]

Michael,
You can of course buy booze anywhere; it is when you start getting picky the choices narrow.

[Matt_Snow]

@Ken V

I am a long-time customer of Chambers Street Wines and frequently recommend it to others. They do deal in rarities and have an excellent reputation for the quality of their wines, so it is not that uncommon that there is a feeding frenzy response to many of their offers. In fact, on March 17th, the day before this saga started, Jamie sent out an offer of old Nebbiolo with this caveat at the top (the photo was of British Bobbies holding back young women as the Beatles passed by):

Demand for these may not be quite as intense as shown in the photo, but please don’t wait too long! Unlike missing a glimpse of the Beatles, you can confirm that a wine is still available by clicking-through to our website. However, we sometimes get a flood of orders; we process them in the order received, but since this can take a little while, it’s possible that a bottle that has already been requested is still showing-up on the website. Nonetheless, we really do promise first-come, first-served. And unlike the poor Bobbies, we guarantee that all of the bottles are in good condition. Jamie Wolff

I’m not a Chambers customer, so I don’t know if the “first-come, first-served” promise quoted above is typical in their emails. I do know that, if this is what they normally say, then they should not – from an ethical or legal perspective – be pulling wines out of a first-come, first-served allocation in order to favor big customers. Offering cherries to long-time customers is cool and so is offering rarities on a first-come basis and creating the thrill of the rush to the checkout. But if you promise one and then do the other, you’re just plain lying, which is wrong and, in the commercial context, a breach of most states’ consumer protection laws. This could be why Chambers was at pains in this case to deny that they were favoring other customers and to attribute the reallocation to computer error and fake bottles. And, I’m not prejudging the truth or falsity of those statements. I’m just saying that this fundamentally changes the debate about “even if they did reallocate to make some big customer happy, that’s all ok.”

– Matt

[Wes_Barton]

“Fake bottles” is a pretty wild assumption. Inauthentic to the description can be anything. Fill level, label condition, wrong vintage, etc.

We see that happen with auction wines now and then. Something wrong with the description - and with bids based on that description, they pull the lot, correct the description, then put the lot up again at the next appropriate time.

I’ve had auction and non-auction where a discrepancy was noticed post win/sale, I was contacted and the issue resolved. (Leaker - no thanks. A '79 in with your '78s - Oh, that’s just fine.) One would think that if this were a mere discrepancy, he would’ve been thusly informed. Might be awkward if they were more valuable bottles.

[Arv_R]

I signed up for CSW mailing list based on this thread.

I used to go into their shop when I worked down there but lost touch after moving.

They were able to find some older bottles for vertical tastings a few times.

[L_Wang]

@Arv R

I signed up for CSW mailing list based on this thread.

I used to go into their shop when I worked down there but lost touch after moving.

They were able to find some older bottles for vertical tastings a few times.

What type of wines do you like?

[Jon_Hesford]

I don’t have much respect for Chambers Street Wines but that’s entirely due to the fact that I’m the only winemaker in the world who used to buy wine from their store on a weekly basis but they have ignored every email and voice massage I have sent them about my wines.

As an aside I met Ed McCarthy, who wrote Wine For Dummies, last week. He suggested that my importer and I should try Chambers St as it is has a great reputation. We told him that they were now Naturalistas who won’t consider anything without a biodynamic or organic label. He said “That’s such a shame. They were a great wine shop once.”

[Nick_Ryan]

@Jon Hesford

I don’t have much respect for Chambers Street Wines but that’s entirely due to the fact that I’m the only winemaker in the world who used to buy wine from their store on a weekly basis but they have ignored every email and voice massage I have sent them about my wines.

As an aside I met Ed McCarthy, who wrote Wine For Dummies, last week. He suggested that my importer and I should try Chambers St as it is has a great reputation. We told him that they were now Naturalistas who won’t consider anything without a biodynamic or organic label. He said “That’s such a shame. They were a great wine shop once.”

Do you have to make every thread about your inferiority complex Jon?

[Bill_Tex_Landreth]

I couldn’t help myself…

Caddyshack

[Sc0tt_F_tzgerald]

I have no dog in this hunt as I’ve never purchased from Chambers and don’t know Le. I think it’s great that most of the regular CSW customers here have received superlative service and have no doubt they run an excellent operation.

But I can tell you that this thread with 200+ posts on the poor experience Le had does nothing good for Chambers Street. There will be hundreds (if not thousands) who will Google their business, briefly stumble across this thread, and then make a nanosecond decision to pass on them. And that’s not including the hundreds of people Le will recount this story to which will cost them additional business. Acquisition costs of new customers is high, so I can’t imagine this is the outcome they wanted.

That all said, every business makes mistakes - best they can do is hope someone at CSW picks up on this thread, and then reaches out to Le to mend fences.