There are many places to buy wine on line today with all of course claiming to have the best prices and the best customer service. As with buying anything though, the old saying of "Caveat emptor" (let the buyer beware) is very accurate. Like any business, the goal is (or at least should be) to have you buy the product you want, or need, from them and in that attempt, they will try and convince you that the price they are giving you is the best available anywhere as is their customer service after the sale. Many times guys, these claims of best price and customer service is a deception, a flat out lie. While the business owner(s) themselves may have a true interest in keeping you happy, the employees are lacking at times. Many times you may be given the best price but there are inconveniences that you must be willing to put up with in exchange for that best price. In the end you as the consumer have to ask yourself were you happy with the entire process and, are the inconveniences worth the savings? In referance to wine, as a consumer of wine, we have to keep in mind the fact that there is a lot of money to be made with those on line wine businesses and as with any business, these companies should not only have to fight to have us as customers but fight to keep us as as continued customers as well.
In referance to money making and wine, the on line business named Naked Wines generated $450,472,758.51 in sales for the year 2023. According to the site Future Market Insights Blog (
https://www.fmiblog.com/2024/06/08/wine-subscription-market-forecasted-surge-of-20-7-cagr-leading-to-2033-industry-trends-and-consumer-behavior-analysis/) "the market is expected to reach a US$ 3.9 billion valuation. The personalized box subscription type of wine subscription is projected to surge with a projected CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 22.2% from 2023 to 2033." Being that there is so much money involved with the on line wine market, there will be some smart companies that realize they have to stand out in a way that for one, will attract the consumer and, for another, they will realize that once they have the customer, they now have to keep that customer so that they don't stray. Any companies bread & butter is indeed their customer and today I want to talk to you about one company that I am in the process of dealing with that seems in my humble opinion at least, to have some issues when it comes to the customer receiving their product and that company is named Last Bottle (LB).
Last Bottle (Blicker Pierce Wagner Wine Merchants, LLC) is a company that sells "one hand-picked wine per day until it sells out". Last Bottle is not a club you join so that may be seen as a positive for some as no automatic shipments occur and there are no monthly payments made. If you sign up for their email list you get notifications of the daily wine offered and there is never a commitment to buy anything.
The company was formed in 2011 by
Brent Pierce and Stefan Blick who call themselves "wine
fanatics". They claim to be wine insiders and involved in the "global
wine trade" which in turn, helps them to be able to offer up wines "to beautiful
people like you every day". Talk about marketing huh? The company also
goes on to say that they taste about 40,000 wines every year. In case
you are wondering, the infamous James Suckling has 25 employees and they
taste 41,000 wines a year
(https://www.jamessuckling.com/about-us/) so
yeah, it is doable. Now, according to the site Trustpilot
(
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/lastbottlewines.com), LB does not
have great ratings (3.2) with one customer saying "Received damaged
wine. Took pictures, sent numerous emails and no response. Going on two
weeks. Also left numerous voice messages". Another customer said "Save
yourself the aggravation and don’t order from them. I placed an order
with them 2 weeks ago and never received it. They haven’t issued a
refund yet and take forever to respond to email. They are as horrible as
it gets! I will file a complaint with authorities!" Now there are some
sites out there that I find rather suspect themselves that rate LB very
nicely but these sites as I said, seem to be rather suspect in their legitimacy in my opinion. As an example of Last Bottles prices, today, as I
write this review, I looked at Last Bottles website and they were
selling the 2018 Gallica Cabernet Franc Oakville Ranch Oakville Napa
Valley which sells for $175 at Wine Searcher but is available for $85 on
Last Bottle. This seems like an awesome deal if you get the wine and if
you do get the wine, what do you have to put up with in order to get
it?
Now, I want to talk about my own experience with LB. What about
customer service after the sale? What about actually receiving the wines
you bought in a timely manner? Should you (the customer) have to run
after a company that they bought a product from or do you expect them to
keep you updated? The following is a progression of how my order was
handled.
May 27th - I purchased four bottles of the Erikson & Caradin Raptor & Crimson Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley. After
doing my research on the wine prior to purchasing it, I discovered from numerous reputable sites that
the wine is supposedly amazing. I also doscovered that the wine sells for $85 at the winery . Last Bottle had the wine available for $22. The next best price I was able to
find was $33 which was from Vivino but you had to add shipping even if
you bought four bottles and with Last Bottle, shipping was free with
four bottles. This was a great deal and I couldn't wait to get and to
try the wine.
May 27th - 11:21 am. After I ordered, I immediately
received a confirmation email which said the following "This message
confirms your purchase. This wine is sold out on the East Coast, but is
available in our West Coast facility! We will send the replenishment of
wine over to the east coast warehouse to fulfill your order as soon as a
truck can be scheduled for temp controlled transport. (Please note
there can be delays with this process - if you'd rather ship directly
from the west coast, contact us straight away). Tracking will be sent
once packed and ready to ship from the east coast facility."
Okay
so now I'm thinking, this is a little weird. I had to order the wine
before I found out that it was not available at their local warehouse
and that there would be "delays with the process". Still I'm thinking
that my wine should surely be here in the next few days. Unfortunately,
that was not to be.
June 1st - 9:31 am. I contacted LB June 1st saying "I have heard nothing as to where my order is."
Keep
in mind that I ordered the wines on the 27th of May and now it was the
1st of June and I had received no followup from Last Bottle.
June 3rd - 6:12 pm. I received a response from Krissy (last name omitted per request) who is a Customer Service Representative which stated the following:
"Hi Marc,
Your
order was placed from West Coast stock after the East Coast sold out.
We noted this in the checkout process and our order confirmation email,
and replenishment timelines can vary between offers. This process can
take 4-5 weeks to complete. Your order will be shipped as soon as stock
is replenished at our East Coast warehouse. You will receive a tracking
email once scanned for transit!"
Now I am being told again that Last
Bottle is going to ship my wines from their West Coast warehouse to their East Coast warehouse which could take a month to over a month to
complete. Do you mean to tell me that a company that is in the business
of transporting products needs wait until "a truck can be scheduled for
temp controlled transport"? Do you mean to tell me they don't have a company policy to deal with this as a common occourance? I do believe that I might have an issue here. My response to Krissy was:
June 4th - 1:14 pm I responded to Krssy by saying:
Hey Krissy;
After reviewing your confirmation e-mail, I see that it said ..."but is
available in our West Coast facility!" Krissy's email also went on to
say " We will send the replenishment of wine over to the east coast
warehouse to fulfill your order as soon as a truck can be scheduled for
temp controlled transport." Seeing that the wine was ordered on the 27th
of May and today is the 4th of June, are you telling me that a
"temperature controlled transport" has not been available? Are you
further telling me (according to your below e-mail) that I might have to
wait over 1 month in order to get 4 bottles of wine shipped to me from
the West Coast to the East Coast of this country?
I am actually
a wine reviewer based out of Central Florida and I was actually
planning on doing a review of your company. As of now, I am not pleased
with the response I have gotten in reference to the wines I am
expecting.
June 4th at 7:52 PM I received a reply from Krissy saying:
We
can absolutely ship from here (as mentioned in the email-"Please note
there can be delays with this process - if you'd rather ship directly
from the west coast, contact us straight away").
Let me know if
you are okay waiting, or if you prefer to have us ship on our
temperature controlled trucks this week, to arrive next week. Thanks so
much!"
Again I am being told that just to transport four bottles
of wine from the West Coast of America to the East Coast of America
would take over one month or more. This is not to even include the time for it
to be picked up at the warehouse and delivered to me. I responded to
Krissy again, this time having just gotten home from work at 2:18 am by
saying:
June 5th - 2:18 am - Please do so in the temperature controlled truck so it arrives next week.
June 5th - 12:52 pm - Krissy responded with:
Of course!
June 7th - 1:11 am, I received the following email from LB:
"To Our Favorite Customer:
We
have great news! Your shipment has departed our third-party shipper's
temperature-controlled facility and is now en route to your area hub
(also temp-controlled).
FedEx Tracking Number: OMITTED BY ME
Please
note that tracking information will not appear until the label is
scanned at the hub by FedEx Home Delivery, which takes about 4-7
business days. Once tracking becomes active, the ETA on your tracking
page will be accurate.
So it appears that on the 7th of June, my
wine was shipped from the West Coast to the East Coast. The wine will
then wait until it is picked yup by FedEx. I had had enough of this.
Send me my wine from the West Coast directly without stopping at another warehouse only to be picked up by the delivery company. What a waste of
time, I had had enough and responded to Krissy the following:
On June 8th at 11:40 AM, I sent Krissy an e-mail saying:
"Krissy;
Can you please get me in touch with a supervisor?
Thank you, Marc - The Desert Wine Guy
June 11th - 11:59 am I received an email from Kiki (last name omitted per request) who is the Assistant Customer Service Manager stating:
Hi Marc!
I'm the Assistant Manager for our Last Bottle Customer Service team, How can I help today?
June 11th - 2:05pm - I responded with the following:
Good Afternoon Mrs. (last name omitted per request);
I originally came across your company when I was doing some research
on
a wine project I was working on at the time. As I am a wine reviewer, I
decided to check out your site and when I did so, I came across a wine
that was being sold at a great price so I went ahead and ordered four bottles.
I also figured that I would do a review of the entire process since I
have numerous social media sites relating to wine only. My order was
placed on the 27th of May. My first experience with your company didn't
start off well as I received an immediate order confirmation stating "
This wine is sold out on the East Coast, but is available in our West
Coast facility! We will send the replenishment of wine over to the east
coast warehouse to fulfill your order as soon as a truck can be
scheduled for temp controlled transport. (Please note there can be
delays with this process - if you'd rather ship directly from the west
coast, contact us straight away)."When I inquired days later about my
purchase since I had heard nothing (no update) from your company I was
informed via an E-mail by Customer Service Representative, Krissy (last name omitted per request) that my order could take 4-5 weeks*just for it to ship *to the East
Coast facility. The product would then go from the facility here on the East Coast to FedEx. With this being said, I have a few questions/complaints.
My first question/complaint is why would your company wait until after
the customer ordered the product to then be informed that the item they
ordered is out of stock near them? As a customer, I have no idea where
your warehouses are located nor do I care so why would that is be
important to me? This adds to the second part of this question which is
to then be informed as I was by Krissy that "my order could take 4-5
weeks" is crazy which leads me to my next question.
My second
question/complaint is, why in the world would any customer wish to wait
4-5 weeks (over 1 month) just to have their purchased product shipped to
another warehouse and then be picked up by FedEx? To even have that
option is crazy. Is there a benefit to the consumer if they were to have
the product shipped from the East Coast rather than the West Coast?
My third question/complaint is, what is the thought process behind your
company shipping an item from one of its warehouses to another one of
its warehouses rather than ship the customer the item directly from the
original warehouse? Doing this only adds to wait for the customer to
receive their order (4-5 weeks). No wonder the product takes so long to
be delivered to the customer. Again I have to ask, is there a benefit to
the consumer if they were to have the product shipped from the East
Coast rather than the West Coast?
Having said all of this, as of
today FedEx has still not received my package and I (the customer) wait.
It has been 15 days since ordering. I have to tell you Mrs. Kikithat unless I get some satisfactory answers to my questions, my review
of your company will unfortunately not be a good one. as a last note, I
belong to Naked Wines and they deliver me a case of wine in three days
without excuses. Yes, this is regular ground shipping.
Thank you for your time, Marc ****** - The Desert Wine Guy
June 12th - 11:38am Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) responded by saying:
HI Marc!
I understand your concern and appreciate your feedback.
Opposite
Coast orders can take some time to process, and like Krissy mentioned,
this is noted in the confirmation email. Replenishment is shipped to
our East Coast warehouse in bulk on temp controlled trucks, and then
specific orders are processed at our East Coast warehouse to be shipped
individually to customers on the East Coast, so that direct transit time
is shorter.
Unfortunately, in cases like this one, delays can
happen due to truck availability, issues with the delivery, or even the
wine arriving damaged to our East Coast, so the orders are switched to
ship from our West Coast warehouse via third party temp controlled
trucks so that customers don't have to wait another few weeks for new
bottles to arrive at the East Coast warehouse.
I know the wait
time is not preferable for you, but we do have quite a few customers
that would rather wait and have it ship directly from our East Coast
instead of having the longer transit time directly to the customer, as
our third party shipping direct from West Coast to Customer in the temp
controlled trucks can take a couple weeks, even though these shipments
are temp controlled. Our operations team has been looking into ways we
can improve this, and I will make sure they know your thoughts and
complaints with how things are currently working.
Tracking on our
side is showing that this order has arrived at the hub in FL and is
being sorted for direct shipping! Once FedEx picks this up and scans the
shipment, you should receive an email with updated tracking. This
should arrive by the end of the week.
For the inconvenience, I've added a $50 store credit to your account.
Cheers, Kiki (last name omitted per request)
Assistant Customer Service Manager
Last Bottle Wines
Guys,
Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) response, while I truly do appreciate $50 being placed
onto my account, confuses me for the following
reasons.
1) In reference to Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) saying that "Opposite
Coast orders can take some time to process", I don't understand why? The
West Coast is not in another country so why the delay depending upon
the coast the wine comes from. Once again, I have to add that this
information was not given until AFTER I completed my purchase.
2)
In reference to Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) saying that "Replenishment is shipped to
our East Coast warehouse in bulk". I think the issue here is that Last
Bottle waits until they have a lot of orders before they ship. This is
why it can take up to five weeks before a customer gets their purchased
product. This is not a good way to do business.
3) In reference
to Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) saying that "delays can happen due to truck
availability, issues with the delivery, or even the wine arriving
damaged to our East Coast". Truck availability shouldn't be an issue,
they are a company that ships country wide and should be prepared for
such a thing.
4) In reference to Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) saying "... we do
have quite a few customers that would rather wait and have it ship
directly from our East Coast instead of having the longer transit time
directly to the customer, as our third party shipping direct from West
Coast to Customer in the temp controlled trucks can take a couple
weeks". Once again we run into Last Bottle not wishing to ship four
bottles by themselves and wanting to wait for a lot of orders to be
completed. I believe this boils down to money for them. If that is the
case, they shouldn't offer free shipping wth four bottles.
5) In reference to Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) saying "tracking on our side is showing that
this order has arrived at the hub in FL and is being sorted for direct
shipping! Once FedEx picks this up and scans the shipment" I called FedEx
on June 11th and they informed me that they did not have my package
yet. I have to wonder if throughout all this traveling, my wine was not
temperature controlled as I did spend an extra $8 to have this done.
In complete contrast to Last Bottles customer
service, I belong to an on-line wine club and I will not mention the
name because I do not wish to have this twisted into an advertisement
but my last order from them on May 28th and received my wines on June
1st by FedEx, that's including the date I actually ordered. That's four
days folks for six bottles of wine to get to my home, why is LB
having a hard time?
Want another example? There is a site
named Wines Till Sold Out (WTSO) and they offer free shipping if you
purchase a minimum of $60. I had placed an order with them April 6th. I
received an immediate confirmation email and on the very next work day
(the 7th was a Sunday), I received an email stating that the wines have
shipped. On the 10th of April I received my wines. This and awesome
prices scores WTSO (
https://www.wtso.com/last-chance#product_id=88375) a
very high rating in my book. By the way, I have no affiliation with WTSO.
June 13th - FedEx finally has received my wine.
June 14th - Finally, my wine is out for delivery. Later on in the day I received my wine and having finally sat down with the box, it is time to open it. Inside I see the wine was packed exceptionally well with a big block of re-usable ice. Huge, thick foam blocks surrounded the wines and I have to say, I was impressed. I will try the wine in a few days.
As
I move to wrap this review up, I have to say that I am kind of disappointed
in the service LB has offered up in the way of delivery. At this point, it has been 12 days since I
ordered four bottles of wine and it seems that all I have witnessed is a company that has been around a long time, acting more like a start up as far as transporting their product is concerned. What caused a delay here that I found to be unacceptable was the fact that they shipped my wine from the West Coast to the East Coast and than to FedEx. Why my wine couldn't be shipped directly from the West Coast to my home is beyond me. Keep in mind here that aside from the shipping from one warehouse to another, I also had to wait for FedEx to prepare and ship the wine to me. This is only more time for me to wait. Also, the potential of having to wait 4-5 weeks (over a month) to receive my product due to LB shipping issue, is crazy. Okay now, my final thoughts. Having received my wines I believe that LB is a legitimate company and and while they do deliver the product they promise and at a great price, I think their company needs to do some big tweaking of their delivery process. Moving product from one coast of this country to another and then to another shipper is ridiculous. I do believe that my noting them I am reviewing the company expidided my delivery.
Having said all of this, I kind of have faith in LB and I actually ended up doing another order from them to see if this was just a fluke, an issue with long distance shipping or if it was an issue with all of their shipping. My order was for four bottles of the 2022 Peju (Napa Valley) Legacy Carneros
Napa County Chardonnay and was purchased on June 13th. I will be receiving these wines on the 20th per FedEx. Mrs. Desert Wine Girl opened an account and ordered one bottle of wine, the 2022 Q Appassionata, Cabernet Sauvignon - Stags Leap District as well and both orders will be coming in the same box rom the East Coast on the 20th. Once again I have to note an odity. I never received a notification that this second bottle was shipped.
Has LB redeemed itself? Is the companies only issue their long distance shipping process (shipping in general)? As things stand right now, it appears that way. I also want to state that I had no issues with Krissy as none of this was her fault and she was cordial in her dealings with me, the same goes for Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request). By the way, I will be contacting Mrs. Kiki (last name omitted per request) and giving her the link to this review which I hope she passes on so that LB will be aware of the issues that I experienced.
The Desert Wine Guy
The wine sat for 18 months in French oak and the grapes for it came from the Rutherford AVA of the Napa Valley. The wine comes in at 14.5% alcohol and the bottle is cork sealed. According to Matt himself "The
grapes were handpicked and fermented in small stainless-steel
fermenters. The wine was matured in French oak barrels (33% new) for 18
months." Matt goes on to say "Prior to bottling I select the best barrels and added a touch of
Reserve Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon to elevate the style."
Acidity is on the higher side and helps as well in elevating everything the wine is trying to do. Plum is well represented here as well and it is on the deep, dark side. As a side note and getting back to the black fruit note, I need to let you guys know that the wine is not a sweet tasting, overly fruit forward one, as I previously said, this is a very serious and well controlled red wine. This is a wine that lives up to its varietal reputation. A well placed bit of sage is here in the background as well and it is indeed just a bit and not looking to do anything other then let you know it is present and help the wine continue its robustness. Rutherford dust. Okay guys, to me, when I taste this wine I am reminded of that Rutherford Dust type note that normally is spoken of in a great Cabernet Sauvignon. I have never experienced this dust element in reference to this particular varietal but it works. There are some say this note doesn't exist, I say drink this wine and you will have a great feel for what it tastes like and why I love it. As for any alcohol burn, there is none which is awesome as this is something no one wants but can happen with an alcohol percentage such as this wine packs. Blueberry is a note that is content to be in the background here and it is a great thing that it is not attempting to fight for control. On top of all of this, I am also getting a bit of licorice and let me tell you that it too is nice. Tannin's present themselves nicely and come across as lightly dusty providing a slight coating to the tongue as well. I enjoyed this expression tremendously as in ... like totally though it was great. One note that really sets this wine off to me and I just have to come back to it is the "greenish" note that the bell pepper puts out. This is a common note for the varietal but usually shows up in an older expressions of it. This greenish note is offered up very nicely here and is well done. The wine overall is in perfect balance and I think Matts greatness in wine making really shows itself off here. As a last note, I am getting a spice note that is delicious and just keeps the taste of this wine moving strongly along.
Well it's been a long review but here we are, the conclusion. Let me start off by cutting to the chase and giving you the Desert Wine Guy rating for this wine which is a very solid 96 points. Yeah guys, the wine very simply rocked. As I said earlier, what a powerhouse wine this is and one that I know you will love if you love the Petit Verdot varietal. My recommendation is for you to buy three bottles of this wine (I already have) as you will have one when you get it which will leave you very happy that you have two more in your cellar. So, that's about all I have to say guys, the wine was amazing.
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