winery ship fedex ground with SIGNATURE REQUIRED and you have to be 21 and over and not VISIBLY drunk when receiving the product
You must be 21 years or older to order
By placing an order you represent that you are at least 21 years of age
This item is only eligible for ground shipping
Alcohol cannot be delivered to a PO Box
Someone 21 years or older must be present to sign for the alcohol when it is delivered
We recommend shipping the wine to your business address
@communistjack When wine.woot was in its beta I had everything shipped to work. At the time I was at IBM, and the guy working in shipping and receiving asked what they hell I was ordering that he always had to show his ID and sign for!
If you live near me, FedEx will go to the wrong address 3 times then leave you a bitchy voicemail that they needed someone over 21 to sign and that you have to go to their secret lair between 2:11pm and 2:13pm in the next ten days or they’re sending it back to the winery.
@communistjack It may or may not be close. When they send you the nastygrams telling you to pick up your own damn package they don’t actually tell you where they’re holding it hostage. Last time I had to go through a garden gate at midnight, befriend a talking animal, journey to the place where the water flows up, give my last coin to a beggar woman, and carefully heed the tinker’s advice before my quest was complete and I could turn my weary face towards home.
When I get a shipping notice, I immediately redirect delivery to the Fedex location of my choice – which is not the closest to home, but is the one that is on my home from work AND has Sunday hours.
@arielleslie Not a fan of FedEx. Their delivery folks are contract companies. So the quality of service varies far too much. And for our large metro area, their depot is not close by.
On the other hand, the FedEx store folks by us tend to be great… unlike the UPS Store independent owner folks who seem to be moody.
@RedOak I have grown to truly despise FedEx. Every place I’ve lived they have consistently been the ones who refuse to follow delivery and package handling instructions.
@Korista This is what I usually do (send it to a 24hr FedEx near me, or a FedEx near work depending on what’s being shipped), but I have had a few instances where the shipper set some kind of goofy flag that would not allow me to reroute the package. Never really understood that since I actually have to show ID at the FedEx location vs. just having to be a person relatively close to my home if delivered there (obv. wine always needs ID, but not other things).
Glad to see I’m not the only fedex hater out there. They have been the worst for years. I get stuff mailed from China on the slow boat more timely and in better condition than fed-ex
@Cerridwyn a good friend used to have a company that did on-site/remote truck maintenance. Several of his clients were FedEx subcontractor companies.
FedEx grants rights to routes to independent contractors. Those contractor-companies own their trucks & hire their own drivers. Some contractors have one route and others, many routes/trucks.
Those independent trucks all go to the same FedEx-operated depots to pick up packages.
My friend regularly commented about the wide variation in quality of management of those routes. And it sounded like the depot management didn’t have enough control/influence over the independent contractors. No surprise, the hit or miss… often miss reliability.
Whereas, I believe UPS drivers are UPS employees. More consistent quality control.
Yeah - FedEx has quality control issues because their Ground drivers are independent contractors. It’s hard to maintain quality and employee retention when they are hired and churned that way.
@George24 If you look at the “Sales Format” thread, it says that you will be able to buy 3 bottles or a case (for a lower cost-per-bottle). More deets in the thread.
I think about $15 a month for newbies. Might have that wrong.
Discounts for paying in advance for up to two years.
I have a grandfathered rate. And it’s in a quite expensive (by Texas standards) neighborhood.
Other locations where the commercial rents cost less might will charge less monthly for boxes.
My Mail Box place is sold out and then some, tho they are expanding.
I totally get my money’s worth.
If you do this, please be sure to have the differences between this and a USPS box explained in full. There are some notable differences, mostly positive.
BTW, my place can receive/send pallet shipments as well.
I’m curious about how shipping costs will be impacted. I can’t imagine anyone pays cheaper rates than Amazon. Will wineries ship direct to consumers or will this be handled by Casemates as it was by WW? And will there be new options for holding shipments due to hot weather? Inquiring minds want to know
@noshipsummer the wcc warehouse is a JIT warehouse so no place to hold a inventory for people unless they add quite a bit of space. I can say because I’ve been there.
@CorTot This all makes sense. I wasn’t sure if the folks at Mediorce brought anything to the table, but their location in TX doesn’t help much. This will be WW with a more formalized option for case splitting.
@noshipsummer , in the past, there’s been Summer Shipping. Usually means a refrigerated truck to a central hub, then normal FedEx trucks from there. Unless you are within 2 days shipping from Sonoma.
However, it may be that Casemates can use UPS instead of FedEx. Or in addition to.
In the past most shipments go out of the wine country connect warehouse in Sonoma via FedEx. FedEx can be crap in some areas but the hold service does work well. Walgreens offers a location hold as well now as well as a lot of 3rd party mail box type services. I have everything wine held at a FedEx drop off location. Works really well.
Yeah Yeah I know the options …!.. but they did say they are taking the money then sending said money to the winery and they will ship so why not hold like all the winery’s do when you order direct?
@noshipsummer Because then the wineries would have to trust WCC to cellar and store their fine wine properly until you’re ready to recieve it, and WCC isn’t in the short term wine cellaring business.
Why would the wineries then offer a discount to WCC (and you, by extension) and compete with themselves? The wouldn’t.
The discounts we get are from doing our own cellaring and bulk purchases by the case, essentially.
Casemates moves sunk inventory costs for the winery (their wine) into revenue. That’s also why buying a bottle in a restaurant costs more than the case price picked up at the winery.
There is a lengthy and detailed explanation on wine prices on the wine.woot FAQ for the next few days until Amazon shuts down wine.woot.
WineDavid and Wine Country Connect pretty much are/were wine.woot and this is the current iteration of that business model after Amazon acquired Whole Foods and is shutting down wine.woot.
@mike808 I did not spend enough time in the WW forums. Can you please provide a link to said explanation? I’m willing to copypasta it here, reformatting as needed, provided that no one objects too strenuously.
@mike808 Man, oh, man, I sure hope someone has a copy of that FAQ. It’s already changed. It says “wine” but it goes to “What is Gourmet?
A discussion of salamanders, gorillas and Arizonoids.”
(URL Removed so that Mediocre will not turn it into the link to there, because it will make me sad to see it. “wine.woot.com/faq?fref=t_wiw_faq”)
I noticed yesterday that the bogus search results of “N best WHATEVER of YEAR” had already changed to 2018… I am amazed that they can predict such things, even before 2018 has actually started. The Internet is such a wonderful thing.
Basically, you can’t consistently and for small sub-case quantities. And WCC has contacts with a lot of wineries that aren’t or won’t be offered equally across the country, excepting local prohibitions that neither casemates, WCC, nor the wineries, have any control over.
What about shipping to Virginia? It seems like there was a lot of times lately that wine.woot couldn’t ship to Virginia. Had better luck a few years ago. Was shipping stuff to a friend in TN…but he just move to VA.
you send money to casemates
casemates forwards money to winery
winery ship fedex ground with SIGNATURE REQUIRED and you have to be 21 and over and not VISIBLY drunk when receiving the product
@communistjack When wine.woot was in its beta I had everything shipped to work. At the time I was at IBM, and the guy working in shipping and receiving asked what they hell I was ordering that he always had to show his ID and sign for!
@markgm LOL did he ask for a sample since he did all that work?
@communist I thought about it, but didn’t want to give up any of the good stuff!
If you live near me, FedEx will go to the wrong address 3 times then leave you a bitchy voicemail that they needed someone over 21 to sign and that you have to go to their secret lair between 2:11pm and 2:13pm in the next ten days or they’re sending it back to the winery.
But that might just be here in Colorado.
@arielleslie at least your fedex location is close, the closest fedex office is 45 mins away
the only good thing is that UPS teamed up with my local hardware store to leave packages there so we dont have to travel 45 mins
@communistjack It may or may not be close. When they send you the nastygrams telling you to pick up your own damn package they don’t actually tell you where they’re holding it hostage. Last time I had to go through a garden gate at midnight, befriend a talking animal, journey to the place where the water flows up, give my last coin to a beggar woman, and carefully heed the tinker’s advice before my quest was complete and I could turn my weary face towards home.
When I get a shipping notice, I immediately redirect delivery to the Fedex location of my choice – which is not the closest to home, but is the one that is on my home from work AND has Sunday hours.
@arielleslie Not a fan of FedEx. Their delivery folks are contract companies. So the quality of service varies far too much. And for our large metro area, their depot is not close by.
On the other hand, the FedEx store folks by us tend to be great… unlike the UPS Store independent owner folks who seem to be moody.
@RedOak I have grown to truly despise FedEx. Every place I’ve lived they have consistently been the ones who refuse to follow delivery and package handling instructions.
@Korista This is what I usually do (send it to a 24hr FedEx near me, or a FedEx near work depending on what’s being shipped), but I have had a few instances where the shipper set some kind of goofy flag that would not allow me to reroute the package. Never really understood that since I actually have to show ID at the FedEx location vs. just having to be a person relatively close to my home if delivered there (obv. wine always needs ID, but not other things).
@arielleslie @RedOak @Korista @communistjack
Glad to see I’m not the only fedex hater out there. They have been the worst for years. I get stuff mailed from China on the slow boat more timely and in better condition than fed-ex
/
@Cerridwyn a good friend used to have a company that did on-site/remote truck maintenance. Several of his clients were FedEx subcontractor companies.
FedEx grants rights to routes to independent contractors. Those contractor-companies own their trucks & hire their own drivers. Some contractors have one route and others, many routes/trucks.
Those independent trucks all go to the same FedEx-operated depots to pick up packages.
My friend regularly commented about the wide variation in quality of management of those routes. And it sounded like the depot management didn’t have enough control/influence over the independent contractors. No surprise, the hit or miss… often miss reliability.
Whereas, I believe UPS drivers are UPS employees. More consistent quality control.
Yeah - FedEx has quality control issues because their Ground drivers are independent contractors. It’s hard to maintain quality and employee retention when they are hired and churned that way.
It’s called Casemates…do you need to buy a full case?
@George24 If you look at the “Sales Format” thread, it says that you will be able to buy 3 bottles or a case (for a lower cost-per-bottle). More deets in the thread.
@George24
In the future, people who live near one another will be able to split cases.
Not ready ay launch tho.
@George24 You go in on a case with your mates (or soon-to-be mates) and get a better deal. Hence the name.
FWIW
I have usrd a commercial “Mail Box” business for decades as my shipping address. They are wonderful to me, and I love them.
There is always someone there to sign for things. They expect that.
They can receive alcohol shipments.
Nothing ever disappears or gets rained on. Or left in the porch. Or stolen from the porch. Nothing is tossed from a truck.
The Fedex and UPS people never “pretend” to attempt delivery, and then drive off.
I have never had a security problem.
They even have their own license to ship alcohol, should I wish that.
If you intend on having alcohol shipped to you, and you are frequently not at the destination address, this is a decent alternative.
@f00l how much does it cost though?
@communist
I think about $15 a month for newbies. Might have that wrong.
Discounts for paying in advance for up to two years.
I have a grandfathered rate. And it’s in a quite expensive (by Texas standards) neighborhood.
Other locations where the commercial rents cost less might will charge less monthly for boxes.
My Mail Box place is sold out and then some, tho they are expanding.
I totally get my money’s worth.
If you do this, please be sure to have the differences between this and a USPS box explained in full. There are some notable differences, mostly positive.
BTW, my place can receive/send pallet shipments as well.
@f00l Pallet shipments of wine! Now we’re cooking with gas.
@UncleVinny As long as you don’t cook the wine…
@klezman I dunno, now I’m thinking about mulled wine. It’s not noon yet here on the West Coast, so I refuse to start drinking this early, but…
@UncleVinny Where on the west coast? We’ve got some great folks in L.A. and area.
I’m curious about how shipping costs will be impacted. I can’t imagine anyone pays cheaper rates than Amazon. Will wineries ship direct to consumers or will this be handled by Casemates as it was by WW? And will there be new options for holding shipments due to hot weather? Inquiring minds want to know
Can I request a summer hold on shipping??
@noshipsummer the wcc warehouse is a JIT warehouse so no place to hold a inventory for people unless they add quite a bit of space. I can say because I’ve been there.
@CorTot This all makes sense. I wasn’t sure if the folks at Mediorce brought anything to the table, but their location in TX doesn’t help much. This will be WW with a more formalized option for case splitting.
@noshipsummer , in the past, there’s been Summer Shipping. Usually means a refrigerated truck to a central hub, then normal FedEx trucks from there. Unless you are within 2 days shipping from Sonoma.
However, it may be that Casemates can use UPS instead of FedEx. Or in addition to.
In the past most shipments go out of the wine country connect warehouse in Sonoma via FedEx. FedEx can be crap in some areas but the hold service does work well. Walgreens offers a location hold as well now as well as a lot of 3rd party mail box type services. I have everything wine held at a FedEx drop off location. Works really well.
Yeah Yeah I know the options …!..
but they did say they are taking the money then sending said money to the winery and they will ship so why not hold like all the winery’s do when you order direct?
@noshipsummer Because then the wineries would have to trust WCC to cellar and store their fine wine properly until you’re ready to recieve it, and WCC isn’t in the short term wine cellaring business.
Why would the wineries then offer a discount to WCC (and you, by extension) and compete with themselves? The wouldn’t.
The discounts we get are from doing our own cellaring and bulk purchases by the case, essentially.
Casemates moves sunk inventory costs for the winery (their wine) into revenue. That’s also why buying a bottle in a restaurant costs more than the case price picked up at the winery.
There is a lengthy and detailed explanation on wine prices on the wine.woot FAQ for the next few days until Amazon shuts down wine.woot.
WineDavid and Wine Country Connect pretty much are/were wine.woot and this is the current iteration of that business model after Amazon acquired Whole Foods and is shutting down wine.woot.
@mike808 I did not spend enough time in the WW forums. Can you please provide a link to said explanation? I’m willing to copypasta it here, reformatting as needed, provided that no one objects too strenuously.
@mike808 Man, oh, man, I sure hope someone has a copy of that FAQ. It’s already changed. It says “wine” but it goes to “What is Gourmet?
A discussion of salamanders, gorillas and Arizonoids.”
(URL Removed so that Mediocre will not turn it into the link to there, because it will make me sad to see it. “wine.woot.com/faq?fref=t_wiw_faq”)
@Shrdlu Hi. Hope things are good with you, ma’am.
I noticed yesterday that the bogus search results of “N best WHATEVER of YEAR” had already changed to 2018… I am amazed that they can predict such things, even before 2018 has actually started. The Internet is such a wonderful thing.
@Shrdlu “Wine Tasting for Newbies” one is also a keeper.
wine.woot.com/forums/viewpost.aspx?postid=5048451
@Shrdlu This thread has some info, when someone noted they could get that day’s wine cheaper locally.
wine.woot.com/Forums/viewpost.aspx?postid=1561280&pageindex=5#post1567507
Basically, you can’t consistently and for small sub-case quantities. And WCC has contacts with a lot of wineries that aren’t or won’t be offered equally across the country, excepting local prohibitions that neither casemates, WCC, nor the wineries, have any control over.
@baqui63 The Internet Wayback Machine at Archive.org to the rescue.
web.archive.org/web/20171204212558/https://wine.woot.com/Faq
@baqui63
Isn’t the internet speaking with the Voice Of God?
Oh dear. I feel so let down
@f00l Unless you’re dyslexic… then it just barks.
@baqui63
I thought God barked!
Well! What a day for discouragement.
/giphy ruff ruff
What about shipping to Virginia? It seems like there was a lot of times lately that wine.woot couldn’t ship to Virginia. Had better luck a few years ago. Was shipping stuff to a friend in TN…but he just move to VA.