In almost all California wineries, when you go wine tasting you\u2019ll find a brochure (or your server will give you one) inviting you to join their wine club.\u00a0 At that very moment, it usually seems like a great idea.\u00a0 The few sips you\u2019ve had so far appeal to you; the room is warm; the server is friendly; and the wine is beginning to lighten your mood.\u00a0 So why not?<\/p>\n
There are some very good reasons to join a wine club and about as many that would lead you to decide not to.\u00a0 Being a member certainly makes a difference to your wine tasting experience, as we have written previously<\/a>.\u00a0 So let\u2019s give some thought as to how you might decide whether to join.<\/p>\n The first question you should ask yourself is whether you like the wine.\u00a0 Even more, do you like it enough to want to receive a case every year? \u00a0If the answer is “yes”, by all means join the club. \u00a0But if not, think twice.\u00a0That\u2019s because by joining\u00a0you are signing up for at least a case annually.\u00a0 A slightly more nuanced question is whether you like all<\/em> of a winery\u2019s production, or just certain (usually the top tier) wines?\u00a0 If you would welcome getting some but not all of their wines, you should follow up with some more questions.<\/p>\n For the most part, wineries select certain wines for you for each shipment and that\u2019s what you get.\u00a0 You may not even be allowed to cancel an order you don\u2019t want.\u00a0 Some, however, will allow you to change their selections to your preferred wines.\u00a0 This is another way of limiting what you get to what you like.<\/p>\n Another reason for you to join a wine club is to have the opportunity for free tastings whenever you visit.\u00a0 So before joining a club, ask yourself whether you like the experience in a particular winery enough to come back.\u00a0 Or put another way, would you like to come this way again repeatedly<\/em>?\u00a0 If you don\u2019t see yourself in that part of Wine Country very often in the future, maybe it\u2019s a good idea to pass on this club.<\/p>\n For some people, a consideration is how often a wine club delivers.\u00a0 One of our clubs send two bottles every two months.\u00a0 That\u2019s six time a year waiting at home for UPS, which can be a drag.\u00a0 The ones we appreciate most have two annual shipments; the norm is four.\u00a0 They usually arrive in spring and fall, since shipping can be tricky in deep winter and wines don\u2019t like cross-country transportation at the height of the summer.<\/p>\n We travel to California for wine tasting every year, so we have certain places where we like the wines a lot, find the tasting rooms and their outdoor areas very inviting and the servers to be congenial and welcoming.\u00a0 So membership makes sense for us.<\/p>\n At a certain point, you may find your wine rack overloading with wines from one or more of your clubs.\u00a0 Maybe the wines appealed more to you on vacation than when you started drinking them at home.\u00a0 Maybe the food you make in your own kitchen isn\u2019t very compatible with the wines you loved so much on that visit two years ago.\u00a0 Maybe enough is just enough.\u00a0 Then quit the club!\u00a0 It\u2019s not a lifetime commitment and you can always join a different wine club and fill out your cellar.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In almost all California wineries, when you go wine tasting you\u2019ll find a brochure (or your server will give you one) inviting you to join their wine club.\u00a0 At that very moment, it usually seems like a great idea.\u00a0 The few sips you\u2019ve had so far appeal to you; the room is warm; the server … Continue reading Joining a Wine Club<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=487"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":511,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions\/511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n