# Why is this company selling wine so cheap?



## geek (Jan 15, 2013)

I got this Groupon in my email, click here.

$59 for 12 bottles? (free shipping) ?
that equals to less than $5 a bottle...
Does anyone know this NakedWines company?

More curiosity than anything .....
..


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## BobF (Jan 15, 2013)

I don't know anything about them, but ... 'Naked' *could* mean without oak. If they aren't spending $bazillions buying and managing oak, then $5 might be about right.

OR ... they're taking a loss to get a buncha people to try enough of their wine to develop a taste for it.

OR ... it's really lousy wine that they couldn't sell for $6 ;-)


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## geek (Jan 15, 2013)

haha....who knows.....I will ask if they oak their wines, I'd be surprised if they don't.


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## pete1325 (Jan 15, 2013)

Even $3 buck chuck is not all that bad..........plus you get a free bottle to reuse.


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## mjrisenhoover (Jan 16, 2013)

According to their website you put in $40 bucks every month and then pick the different wines you want shipped. I don't think that's for me.

NakedWines.com


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## geek (Jan 16, 2013)

mjrisenhoover said:


> According to their website you put in $40 bucks every month and then pick the different wines you want shipped. I don't think that's for me.
> 
> NakedWines.com



right, but the Groupon offer is you pay $59 and they send you a 12-bottle case of wine, free shipping. See link posted above.


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## hobbyiswine (Jan 16, 2013)

My wife purchased the groupon before i saw this thread. Sounds like an interesting concept of how to sell wine. I will be ordering a case from them with my groupon and post how it turns out.


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## ckassotis (Jan 16, 2013)

A good book if you are interested in the selling of remarkably cheap wine: 

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0742568202/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

As they said above, Charles Shaw sells drinkable wine at $2.99/bottle. 2 buck chuck (almost 3 now, but they can still call it 2 till they bump it up a cent!). The quality varies, I find, and they can accomplish this by sourcing excess bulk wine on the gallon basis for cheap.


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## DoctorCAD (Jan 17, 2013)

pete1325 said:


> Even $3 buck chuck is not all that bad..........plus you get a free bottle to reuse.



Yea...it is bad. Not even worth the $3.


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## Brew and Wine Supply (Jan 17, 2013)

when I owned a liquor store, we carried the "Naked" line, I think the were retail around $6 to $8 a bottle. 
If that is direct, cutting out a few middle men that price is about right. It was decent wine, but I still like Barefoot for the price


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## ibglowin (Jan 17, 2013)

Actually Consumer Reports just did a recent test of some Merlot's. 2 Buck Chuck scored very well on a QPR scale and even outscored some $20 and $40 Merlot's....


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## Boatboy24 (Jan 17, 2013)

Mike,

Based on that graphic, I'm headed to 7-11 today to pick up some Merlot.


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## ckassotis (Jan 17, 2013)

Yeah like I said I don't find 2 buck chuck to be very consistent. There are good batches and not-so-good batches. The majority of the ones I have tried though are not bad at all.


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## Noontime (Jan 17, 2013)

ckassotis said:


> Yeah like I said I don't find 2 buck chuck to be very consistent. There are good batches and not-so-good batches. The majority of the ones I have tried though are not bad at all.


 Consistency is what I've found lacking in most bulk wines. I've had a glass of Yellow Tail that was delicious, but never had another one like it. Same thing with the Wine Cube from Target...sometimes OK, other times not so much. It's always hit or miss with the cheaper wines.


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## ibglowin (Jan 17, 2013)

LOL Yea they make it look like a stand out with those numbers don't they.

As other have said consistency is the problem. There is a pretty good Trader Joes wine blog (Jason's). They are always finding out that a wine may be fantastic one year, then the next its just mediocre at best. That's why they use the term "case buy" on a wine that stands out because you better buy a case now if you like it, the next time you are there its all gone or the new vintage is out and its thin and has no structure.



Boatboy24 said:


> Mike,
> 
> Based on that graphic, I'm headed to 7-11 today to pick up some Merlot.


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## Fabiola (Jan 17, 2013)

geek said:


> I got this Groupon in my email, click here.
> 
> $59 for 12 bottles? (free shipping) ?
> that equals to less than $5 a bottle...
> ...



This looks like a club, they get you hooked with a cheap order, and then you have to buy later more wine at a higher price... and also this is not that cheap because at one of my local stores you can buy wine for $1.25 a bottle, the brand is "Oak Leaf", I don't know if it's any good, I never felt tempted to buy wine at this price not even to top up my carboys...


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## geek (Jan 17, 2013)

Fabiola said:


> This looks like a club, they get you hooked with a cheap order, and then you have to buy later more wine at a higher price... and also this is not that cheap because at one of my local stores you can buy wine for $1.25 a bottle, the brand is "Oak Leaf", I don't know if it's any good, I never felt tempted to buy wine at this price not even to top up my carboys...



since this is from Groupon I don't think you have an obligation to buy further, you buy the Groupon and you're done if you don't want more.


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## hobbyiswine (Mar 7, 2013)

I finally got around to ordering my $59 case of wine with the groupon. It arrived FedEx in only a few days. Packaging was awesome. Even still cool! I wanted to pop a bottle right away but put a couple bottles in the chiller. One a New Zealand sav blanc and a California sav blanc for comparison. The wines are great! These wines are NOT the naked wines you see in the store. They are only available through their program which yes is like a mail order wine club. Tell ya what though...if the rest of the case is anything like the first two bottles I will be getting some more. Its good stuff.


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## Noontime (Mar 8, 2013)

hobbyiswine said:


> I finally got around to ordering my $59 case of wine with the groupon. It arrived FedEx in only a few days. Packaging was awesome. Even still cool! I wanted to pop a bottle right away but put a couple bottles in the chiller. One a New Zealand sav blanc and a California sav blanc for comparison. The wines are great! These wines are NOT the naked wines you see in the store. They are only available through their program which yes is like a mail order wine club. Tell ya what though...if the rest of the case is anything like the first two bottles I will be getting some more. Its good stuff.


 Thats fantastic! 

Love your avatar by the way.


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## TonyP (Mar 8, 2013)

The $59 does seem very low to me. Not to say it's a good value because that depends on the wine. But, you can't buy bottles with shipping for less than around $22 and that doesn't include the wine or the added shipping for full bottles.


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## geek (Mar 8, 2013)

wow, look at this offer now, 12 bottles for $25...

http://www.groupon.com/deals/wine-insiders-20-fairfield-county?c=dnb&p=5


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## TonyP (Mar 8, 2013)

geek said:


> wow, look at this offer now, 12 bottles for $25...
> 
> http://www.groupon.com/deals/wine-insiders-20-fairfield-county?c=dnb&p=5



I don't believe it's 12 bottles for $25, just $25 for their $75 worth of high-priced wine. That's, of course, without shipping. Making the two Groupons about equal.


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## geek (Mar 8, 2013)

Tony, that price DOES include shipping...!!!

..


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## geek (Mar 8, 2013)

Hmmmm, after reading closely, this is $25 for a "*$75 worth of wine*".


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## Boatboy24 (Mar 8, 2013)

geek said:


> Hmmmm, after reading closely, this is $25 for a "*$75 worth of wine*".



Yes. Nowhere that I could see, does it tell you what you're actually getting. Reds? Whites? How many bottles? Is this a mystery grab bag of sorts?


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## TahunaJR (Mar 8, 2013)

I believe you are basically buying a $50 off coupon. You would select your choice of wines and when your cart has $75 or more you can use your Groupon and pay $25. If the number of wines you selected were 12+, shipping would be $0.01. I suspect regular shipping rates (?) would be applied if you selected less than 12 bottles. Again, this is just how I am reading it...

Joe


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## TahunaJR (Mar 8, 2013)

This may also help (even though it was from last year)...

http://www.groupon.com/pages/wine-insiders-faq-2012-02


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## jswordy (Mar 8, 2013)

What's all this about buying wine on a winemaking site?  I can't remember the last time I bought a bottle. It's been years. But that is some cheap bought wine, though.


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## Buehler91 (Jan 18, 2014)

The wines that I selected from nakedwines were fantastic. Pricing on my order came out to about $19/Bottle, but they were excellent. 
I got a $50 gift card with a pair of baseball cleats for my daughter. 
I won't be signing up for the subscription but my skepticism of the quality was gone with the first sip.


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## theTheme (Jan 19, 2014)

I'm a big fan as well. They may have redone the website since this thread was created, the website explains will how they do this price wise and what their mission is. I find that once the coupon is used up that the pricing is reasonable for the quality, but it is not an absolute steal.

My favorite part had been interactions with the wine makers. Almost all of them respond to comments about their wines and some of those comments have spun out to other correspondence that had been really helpful at understanding wine and the process of making it.


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## Noontime (Jan 19, 2014)

My wife and I signed up for a while, waiting for our homemade wines to mature. We both found some outstanding wines that we enjoyed immensely. I recommend them to anyone looking for very good wines for a reasonable price. As with any wine, there are going to be ones you don't enjoy as much or even dislike, but the quality of the wines is high. And there are the reviews as well, so that can help.


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## Scott (Jan 20, 2014)

jswordy said:


> What's all this about buying wine on a winemaking site?  I can't remember the last time I bought a bottle. It's been years. But that is some cheap bought wine, though.


 




Must be to get the bottles to reuse!


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## theTheme (Apr 30, 2014)

I thought I would post here again since it has been a while. I cancelled my membership a few months ago. In all I bought 6 cases of wine. Of those I think I found 3 wines that blew me away. One of those, I connected with the wine maker through Naked and then through Facebook and it was a rich and informative exchange. The reason I cancelled is that I just didn't find the wine that good. Here's the pro/con list from my experience.

Pro:
-Wonderful interaction with wine makers. This was almost enough to keep me on the site by itself
-I really like their business model, I like the idea that I'm helping other wine makers realize their dreams
-There were some wines that I found exceptional not just in their categories, but overall
-There are unique and interesting blends that I have not been able to find anywhere else

Con:
-Most wines I tried are average or below
-The review system suffers the same peril as Yelp/Trip It/etc.. namely, it's difficult to determine where the reviewers are coming from and what their experience was up to that point (frame of reference). Moreover, you have to wade though hundred of one sentence reviews to get to some meat, it feels like work
-Referent pricing...this one drives me nuts. There is no such thing as the list price that they X out before showing you your "discounted" price. This wine is not for sale anywhere else, therefore, the price Naked sells it for IS the de facto list price. This may be more a personal irk, but I find it ridiculous
-From what I gather there are 2 warehouses in the US so a wine that you loved might be listed as "sold out" but what that really means is that it isn't in the warehouse that serves your part of the country, but may be available to the other half
-Wines are sometimes such small runs or so popular that by the time you have ordered a few bottles, realized that you love them and go to re-order, they are sold out already

All in all, I think Naked was a really great experience. Getting to interact with wine makers is awesome and you can see them grow and experiment from vintage to vintage. It just wasn't for me, there was too much average wine to hold out and keep trying for those lightning strikes.


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## Noontime (May 1, 2014)

theTheme said:


> I thought I would post here again since it has been a while. I cancelled my membership a few months ago. In all I bought 6 cases of wine. Of those I think I found 3 wines that blew me away. One of those, I connected with the wine maker through Naked and then through Facebook and it was a rich and informative exchange. The reason I cancelled is that I just didn't find the wine that good. Here's the pro/con list from my experience.
> 
> Pro:
> -Wonderful interaction with wine makers. This was almost enough to keep me on the site by itself
> ...



Completely agree with everything you wrote, although I think we may have enjoyed a few more wines that you did. There were some interesting blends and varietals we'd never seen before, and a few that were REALLY outstanding. Supporting the small wineries is a great idea, but like you said...if you find something you really like chances are you'll only be able to get it that one time before being sold out. It was fun though!


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## hobbyiswine (May 1, 2014)

I have had a naked wines subscription for about a year or maybe more. We put money into our account every month and then every couple months order a case or more. We love it. Yes some wines are not fantastic but those are generally the wines under $10 which is to be expected. Some of the wines have been AMAZING and a great value. The selection does change often so it can be hard to go back and get the same wines again but we order the wines more to change it up from our everyday drinking wines we can get here at the store. There are wines from all over the world with a lot of variety and we enjoy ordering the ones we know little about to try something new. As for the reviews I generally don't read them because everyones likes/dislikes are so subjective. Free shipping to your door via FedEx is great too. Just try to be home because you have to sign for delivery. We love our naked wines and plan to keep our subscription. It works great for us but can see where it might not for others.


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