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What to do with suspect cooked excellent vintages

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Charles Warner

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What to do with suspect cooked excellent vintages

by Charles Warner » Tue Sep 09, 2008 2:56 pm

We have about 500 bottles of excellent vintage wines, mainly Bordeaux, that have unfortunately not been stored preoperly (due to a building malfunction) and it is likely they have suffered relatively high heat for a period of time. Some, when openned, are cooked. Some are not. And, it varies bottle to bottle, not case to case. We do not feel comfortable donating to auctions even with disclaimers. Nor do we feel good about tossing them. Any suggestions? Are there buyers who will pay deep discounted prices for the bottles and the possibilities of getting a good wine? Or, are we faced with the prospect of writing them off. Thanks.
Charles Warner
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Dale Williams

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Re: What to do with suspect cooked excellent vintages

by Dale Williams » Tue Sep 09, 2008 3:10 pm

Wow, sad story. Are you a retailer?
Maybe offer to a charity as pouring wine at an event, where no one would feel ripped off (as they might at auction).
I guess one option is to offer "fire sale" prices to good customers. Of course, no matter how many disclaimers that carries dangers. One of which is that someone just turns around and puts on WineCommune or something w/o full info.
Tough to just write off, but how about sending your 250 best customers 2 bottles each, with explanation of how you didn't want to sell as they "might" be damaged. You'd gain a lot of goodwill, get a rep for caring about storage,etc.
If you did sell at discount, I'd consider a superadhesive label on front label saying why you sold at discount, so they don't just reappear as good condition bottles on WineCommune.
Interested to hear others' ideas.
Sorry for your damage. Any chance of insurance reimbursement?
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Ryan M

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Re: What to do with suspect cooked excellent vintages

by Ryan M » Tue Sep 09, 2008 3:24 pm

Speaking as a consumer, depending on the wines in question and the extent of the discount, I would certainly consider buying such bottles as long as a full disclaimer is given, and I like the idea Dale proposed of an additional label explaining the condition or giving a disclaimer.

I'll go one step further: I'd personally be interested to see a list of the wines in question and what you might consider letting them go for: ksbtapperak@yahoo.com
"The sun, with all those planets revolving about it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else to do"
Galileo Galilei

(avatar: me next to the WIYN 3.5 meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory)
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Charles Warner

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Re: What to do with suspect cooked excellent vintages

by Charles Warner » Tue Sep 09, 2008 3:29 pm

Thanks for the suggestions. Not a retailer. Wholesaler who had personal wines in the warehouse with a zone air conditioning failure that went undiscovered for a period of weeks and the wines reached almost 100 degrees. No chance of compensation as I work for the wholesaler. Just plain bad luck. Idea of disclaimer labels is good. Also idea of pouring wines at events. Possibly could open wines and sell glasses of the good ones at these events. Unfortunately, as a wholesaler, can not sell to public.

Thanks again.
Charles Warner
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MM Anderson

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