Shopping for Wine, Part II

I was not going to write a follow-up to my shopping for wine post. However, recently some wine mega-stores opened up in Tucson, and I wanted to give my experience.

Julie and I needed to do some shopping for wine for Thanksgiving. As a result, decided to give one of the new big wine stores a try. Upon entering the store, the first impression was the shear size of the thing. It was huge -- row after row of nothing but wine. We had our shopping list in hand so we starting down the isles.

The store seemed to be laid out by country first, then varietal, then winery, alphabetically. That was when we ran into our first problem. Recommended by a sommelier friend of ours, we wanted to find an Oregon Pinot Gris. However, looking for the American Pinot Gris section, we could not find it. We wandered all over the store without any luck. Finally, we had to ask someone. As it turned out, they lumped the American Pinot Gris in with the Italian Pinot Grigio, breaking their store layout already. We found that frustrating.

The second issue we had was the way the wines were laid out on the shelves. Unfortunately, the wines in this store were laid out alphabetically. Therein was the problem. Often when we shop for wine, we shop by price point. If I want a $60 Napa Cabernet, I want to look at all the $60 ranged Cabernets all together in an area. However, this store had $6 Cabernets next to $60 Cabernets. One would really have to weed through a lot of wine to get at what they want.

When we decided to talk to somebody about out frustrations, we found a gentleman with a name tag. We told him our plight, outlining the issue exactly as I did above, and this is what he said: "Well our store owner believes that if you spend more than $50 for a wine, you are just showing off." What? First thing, he ignored our comment altogether, and then insulted us to boot, which brings us to the next issue at the store: rude employees. If you want repeat customers, you do not insult their taste in wine.

One thing -- in fact, the only thing -- that the store had going for it was price and selection. You simply could not beat it.

Would I ever shop there again? I'm just not sure. They and good selection and prices, but they took all the fun out of wine shopping. As I mentioned in a previous post, I love shopping for wine. However, shopping for wine at a wine mega-store, I did not love.