Tips & tricks
Buying wine online: what to look out for
Buying wine online saves you a lot of lugging around. And the selection is enormous. Because anyone can sell wine online. From supermarkets to hobbyists. But how do you make sure you don’t get ripped off? Nice and simple with these do’s and don’ts.
door Sharon van Lokhorst
DO’S:
- Pay attention to the vintage listed for the wine. Only a few wines improve if you give them some time. Nine out of ten wines come onto the market ready to drink. And then what applies to George Clooney does not apply (‘the older, the more attractive’);
- Shop with companies that also offer wine by the bottle. That way, you can first taste a mixed box before moving on to stocking up on whole cases of one wine;
- Make use of reviews by neutral wine critics who taste wines blind (such as Harold Hamersma & Esmee Langereis);
- Sign up for importers’ newsletters. You’ll be the first to know, and you often get exclusive discounts;
- Are you interested in wines from around the world for every occasion, from a specific country or a particular wine region? Then look for a specialist in that area. Great sites with a wide and excellent selection include Vindict, Gastrovino, Grapedistrict, De Gouden Ton and Okhuysen.
DONT’S:
- Don’t let the price alone tempt you. Some companies prominently list FROM/TO prices, with the FROM price being completely inflated. Also look at the information about the wines: is a clear description provided? Do you get food-and-wine pairing advice? Or is it generic blah-blah that doesn’t help you at all?;
- Don’t immediately be tempted by delivery ‘free to your door’ at an exceptionally low price. Shipping wine is not cheap (heavy bottles, large packages and fragile as well). So if someone offers free delivery with a very low minimum order amount, you can assume that the margins on the wine itself are high.
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