Don’t forget to kick them off your mailing list when you’re done.
Noah - That’s an interesting, and extreme, position you’ve staked out. I disagree with pretty much everything you said.
If I buy a defective product I expect the place that sold it to me to fix it. It’s not my concern, nor should it be, to consider the business model of every entity upstream in the supply chain. That’s how it works for most consumer products. Wine is different. Just because it is that way doesn’t make it right. I don’t agree with it but that doesn’t stop me from buying wine.
IMO, an exception for bottles over x years old (x open to debate) or that have changed hands multiple times is reasonable if disclosed in advance. But for younger bottles residing with the original buyer, there is no logical or ethical reason that the seller should be off the hook if the wine is defective.
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What percentage of production are you assuming is flawed? If small then I don’t understand the fiscal burden and if large then it’s an issue that should rectified.
Noah only drinks port and sherry so you’re spot on with the extreme label.
Not to get in the middle of the tussle going on, but I agree with John. Noah seems to think that no matter what caused a wine to be bad, all blame and cost eating goes to the consumer. If you have a car which causes an accident, it’s the fault of the driver, obviously. If you eat salad leaves which contain salmonella and sicken or die, yup, your fault again because you bought 'em and ate them. I could go on-and-on, but this is why we have consumer laws, and despite the current government trying to weaken them, this is what we expect in the United States. Maybe in China or India or…anything goes, but as long as defective products are being sold, there ought to be recompense to right the situation. Otherwise a seller could sell things knowingly faulty without repercussions and get away with it.
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The fault isn’t even down to the *producer, but rather the people that supplied them the faulty product that has contaminated the wine. The problem has been no-one ever taking the losses back to the cork suppliers and delivering them a bill for the contaminated wine and associated costs.
Winemakers at least have choices now, and cork is no longer the only game in town. As well as switching closures, it would allow the opportunity for a producer to sue their cork supplier, knowing it’s no longer a captive market. Such action in the past might have resulted in being unable to find an alternative.
- the producer does of course have a choice, at least outside of appellations that prevent usage of anything but cork.
“No more Whirlpool appliances for you!”
Auto insurance, Workers Comp and multiple other modes of insurance are typically “no-fault” insurances. Risk is inherent in the process and insurance is meant to mitigate those risks irrespective of fault.
There are a lot of people whining about corked bottles whose cellar values begin at $25,000 and range into the millions. I would love it if I could send corked, oxidized, heat damaged, or otherwise bad bottles back and get my money back, but I think it’s somewhere between naive, entitled and plain arrogant to expect it. Honestly, wine - period - is a crapshoot. That’s for young and old bottles, direct or auction. And there are literally dozens of tasting note threads on this forum where one person found a bottle ever-so-slightly corked and others thought it was fine. Dozens. Suck it up, people. This isn’t a dishwasher that came broken out of the box. It’s not a close comparison or reasonable analogy, either.
Madeira. Zombie wine. Try to premox that!
Right, If you’re buying wine 5 years and older and the policy isn’t clear ask or accept the possibility that you’ll need to eat the cost of the bad bottle.
This. Period.
I agree with those who say that wine is a unique product, not something which can be guaranteed to be perfect in every case. So my attitude is that I generally chalk up faulty bottles to bad luck. I have, on occasion, mentioned a bad bottle to a producer, and, particularly with the producers I buy from, they will almost always replace the bottle. And I have taken a few corked bottles back to big retailers, who will usually give credit for the bottle. And though I don’t buy from LF, I sympathize with small retailers and importers. The wine is just passing through their hands, and most of them probably don’t have a lot of recourse, or ability to absorb the loss, if I attempt to return a bottle. It all comes down to how you want to interact with producers and businesses. If you think every product should be perfect, and want that perfection guaranteed, maybe wine isn’t a good hobby for you.
NB: this doesn’t apply in my mind to white burgundy producers who have a long history of selling likely-to-premox bottles at exorbitant prices, and don’t stand behind their product.
Sounds like you’re angling to become counsel to the National Association of Wine Importers and Distributors. 
If they’ll put me on retainer even though I’m a doctor not a lawyer, I won’t turn away the cash. 
So if I understand Noah’s point, people who can afford good wine have to accept defective product.
Must be some romance of cork thing.
Yep. That’s about it. You chose the “hobby” not the other way around.
I don’t agree with the manner in which David frames it, but I generally agree with Noah at least as it relates to me. I accept the risk, most of the time, and am fine with that. The other part of it is just the hassle of seeking a credit or return.
You could solve that problem, your shipping challenges and your tax exposure by moving to DC or NY.
I don’t read John as saying everyone must return every flawed bottle no matter the relationship, no matter how old the purchase, and so on. He’s saying you should (and often do) have the right to, and that’s how the system ought to work.
I agree with him, but that’s not to say I don’t exercise my own judgement and decide it’s not worth the hassle or just doesn’t make sense under certain circumstances, even if I technically could press the issue.
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