Josh, I recognize that you are willing to move on and I get that. If I were in your position, though, I’d probably write a measured, professional letter to the nat’l sales manager or the top exec in their concierge program. I’d explain that buying futures is not like buying a lottery ticket – sometimes it comes through and others it doesn’t. The wine is not unavailable. If Total has to buy the wine at a premium and take a loss, that is their cost of doing business, not yours. If they expect to sell futures, they can’t simply refuse to deliver whenever doing so means they can’t make their anticipated margins.
Chances are they still won’t make it good, but that’s where you are now. A letter is a no-cost effort and you never know, you might get some satisfaction.
+1. If theycan’t Find the wines stateside Total wine is in contact with the European trade. I gather you don’t have much time, but you were sold wine as a future on the basis that you had locked wine in at a certain price. Now they are reneging on the contract. You are not only owed the original cost but any benefits that the early payment entitles you too.
Whether TW violated a contract as a legal matter depends on what the contract says. Which none of us know. That may be a different proposition than what TW should have done as an accommodation as a matter of customer service.
Actually, Total Wine has a direct import relationship with Vieux Chateau Certan. To the OP- I know by now you must be sick of this whole mess, but a polite email to VCC directly could get you some interesting results with little effort.
Any chateau that has given a retailer direct access like that will want to know when futures are not delivered.
Wow that’s a pretty remarkable piece of information. I was rather peeved I couldn’t just change to another vintage. (But I preferred the 15) Sounds like at the least that could have been possible.
I was just informed, no Clos L’eglise 2015 in 375s
According to TW they didn’t make any? Seems weird but I have no reason to doubt them.
I ordered some as futures and they emailed just last week that they would offer 750s at the futures prices. Unfortunately, not such a great deal as according to WS pro, the wine has not really gone up in price.
I just checked current and prior Winesearcher Pro worldwide data and can find no listings for half bottles of 2015 Clos L’Eglise.
That said- one of the benefits of a true futures offering is that chateaux will do bottlings to custom requested formats. This is how many of the largest sizes are made- custom requests on futures.
So the real question is why was Total Wine offering halves of this on futures if they had not already ordered halves on a true futures offering, or were not in a position to treat all customer orders as true futures offerings and make such requests to chateaux when special formats were ordered.
I do not normally like to post and get involved here on retailer-customer disputes, but the concept of Bordeaux futures is too important an issue as many of the largest scale frauds have started with fake futures offerings- and even where fraud is not an issue, too many people sell “futures” that are not in fact true futures where you pay up front, and the merchant hands over your money up front and so and so forth up the chain until you have a guaranteed order coming from the chateaux of the precise order you placed in the precise formats you requested. In the majority of cases you get your money back, but you still take one hell of a loss buying after release- plus you have lost potential earned interest on money spent 2 years prior.
Given that Total Wine is only asking for half up front, this thread is starting to make me think they are preselling orders of their own which are not true futures- which means they are making interest on your money and guaranteeing your order- but you have no way of knowing what their arrangement is on their end and whether they are putting down money up front etc… In other words, given that the term “Bordeaux Futures” has a very specific trade meaning that is generally known to wine buyers- it is possible this is unscrupulous marketing at the very least.
I should also note that if you visit Total Wine’s website- you can see that they too have a “Winery Direct” relationship with Clos L’Eglise. So there is zero excuse for them not delivering as promised. And for the pair of you who got shafted on these halves, writing to Clos L’Eglise directly would be a great service to the wine community if you are willing to let them know of the situation.
Not to sound snarky with you personally as I’m purely picking up on something you said, but paying for something, and not delivering it is illegal.
I hate to disparage another retailer, as it’s not very becoming, but the fact that they didn’t properly account for your case in whatever mistake they made, and then not making good on it…it’s just completely wrong on every level. For a company of that size to 1) not have a state of the art inventory system and 2) not have enough clout with their suppliers (one of whom they apparently working directly with!) to get you a case at the right price to cover you is purely mind blowing. I know how easy this is to fix, and the fact that they didn’t says one thing.
I think they figure most people won’t kick up too much of a fuss, but if you yell loudly enough they will probably do something. The OP did some damage by starting this thread; and I am glad he did.
The failure to abide by the terms of the contract is not a crime - otherwise every single builder who has done renovations on my parents’ house would in prison today.
What I said is correct. People can agree to a variety of terms relating to purchase of goods to be delivered in the future, and the devil is in the details. I’m fairly certain the OP entered into a formal contract with TW, and whether TW breached depends on what the contract says. If the contract lacked certain terms that relate to the failure to deliver the product, then there are background rules of law that may vary by State (in the US) that would kick in. In the US however it is generally difficult to force specific performance of a contract although in this case where a very specific non-fungible good was involved, that may be possible - don’t know.
But contract is not the only possible theory of legal recovery one could consider—there would be various common law, equitable, and possibly statutory causes of (civil) action that may or may not apply under the circumstances.
Unfortunately, you are not the first, and will probably not be the last, to report this story on wine futures purchases. Bad sales behavior is rampant in the industry. Unfortunately, there are a lot of industry apologists on this BB who will give you lots of excuses and justifications. I take the opposite view. As a legal matter, you entered into a contract to purchase the wine. You satisfied all of your obligations under that contract and they did not deliver. Standard legal damage claim IS NOT for you to get your money back. The damage claim is the cost to cover - the cost to buy replacement wine of the same producer and vintage minus what you agreed to pay to them.
This happened to me once with a 2000 D’Issan futures purchase when the scores went up dramatically when it was in bottle. The store said they couldn’t get the wine. My speech went like this, “You are full of shit and you know it and I know it. The wine was sold to someone else at a higher price and you are just going to stiff me on the deal. Here is how this is going to go. I will give you X [I don’t remember but it was multiple months] to find the wine and deliver it to be at the agreed price. If not, I will place a call to the local alcohol regulators and tell them what happened and let them deal with you.”
Sorry, but that is not true. If the chateau sells through the Place de Bordeaux. Like every other retailer, wholesaler etc., they are required to buy the wine through the negociant system. From there, they can direct import all of the wines they buy.
Josh… The problem is, it is harder to make large chains follow through. They owe you the wine. But there is not much you can do it about it, except blast them here, Facebook, Twitter etc and show them the links, telling them this bad press will continue, unless you receive your wine, or at least have it replaced with the 2016. That is a reasonable solution you should push for. If they placed the order, they should get the wine. But there is just not that much leverage you can exert. You can also report this to Winesearcher. If others have the same issue with TW, and also report it to Winesearcher, they will have a problem on their hands.
Good evening Jeff- my information is based on Total Wine’s claim, and their indication on their website for all VCC listings, that they have a direct importing relationship with VCC, among other wineries. I am referring to the “Winery Direct” logo.
Yes- that does mean there are intermediary entities abroad for channeling purchases, and I have no knowledge to suggest some parent company of TW has an ownership stake in those entities- but the representation is that Total Wine has direct relationships with the wineries themselves. And that is why I gave the advice I did.
As you know, when Diageo got out of the game- things got very complicated when it comes to Bordeaux deliveries. Total Wine is doing a degree of volume such that they have effectively become a replacement for Diageo save that there is a wider range of players in the game overall. That is one reason I am so concerned about this post and others.
But yes- getting into the details of order flow, I have no reason to believe they are circumventing the process in Europe. Still, neither did Diageo and yet they always delivered on futures, and in fact even on their pre-arrival program I am not aware of any substantial issues. And I would further note that I and others I know have in the past dealt directly with chateaux and run everything through the system. Having to do that does not excuse TW from their representations of selling futures as well as having direct relationships which very much implies they will deliver on their promises.
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Unfortunately, you are not the first, and will probably not be the last, to report this story on wine futures purchases. Bad sales behavior is rampant in the industry. Unfortunately, there are a lot of industry apologists on this BB who will give you lots of excuses and justifications. I take the opposite view. As a legal matter, you entered into a contract to purchase the wine. You satisfied all of your obligations under that contract and they did not deliver. Standard legal damage claim IS NOT for you to get your money back. The damage claim is the cost to cover - the cost to buy replacement wine of the same producer and vintage minus what you agreed to pay to them.![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}