Yep, I said moolah. Money, dough, cash, Benjamins, clams, greenbacks, bread, cheddar…ooh, bread and cheddar… goes with wine! And full circle, we are back to one of my favorite topics. I do love a nice glass of wine in the evening, however, it can be a pricey treat. Now, I don’t know where you stand on the current political situation. Is it is driving you to drink (more)? I also don’t know if you have been paying attention to the economy lately as it circles the drain. Perhaps you are blissfully happy and would like to crack open a nice bottle to celebrate your recent ascension to oligarch status. Looking at you, Bezos. How about a nice Cabernet, Zuck? Sparkling for you, Elon? Anyhow, I digress. Whoever you are and for whatever reason that you enjoy a little vino, we all like to save some money, even if we’re worth 268 billion.
As my net worth is substantially less than the above number, I have a couple of hacks for buying wine. These are not revolutionary, they are just a little common sense to help stretch your dollar. As with so many things in life, this involves planning. Now most of this column will relate to those of us in the Western US. You can Google your local stores though and use the same principles for your area. My boyfriend and I know that we are going to run through a few bottles each week. We also know that wine doesn’t go bad (within limits). Using that logic, it stands to reason that I buy by the case. You are less likely to run out that way and you save money.
I always use a credit card (thus racking up miles, hotels points, whatever card benefit I’m exploiting that month) and I submit my receipts on the Fetch app (which rewards you with points that you turn into gift cards), and finally, there is the actual discount that I received from the store. In effect, I make my wine purchases give me an assist on THREE levels. Heck, even four if I receive discounts at Safeway on gasoline. What I do is I try out single bottles and see if I find an affordable wine that I like. Then I go back and buy a bunch of it. For places that run through their wines fairly quickly (think Grocery Outlet or BevMo) I may even taste test in the parking lot and then walk back in and purchase more. If you do this, be sure the corked open bottles are in your trunk, just in case you get pulled over. That’s the rule in California. You may have different laws in your state. I drink enough wine and know the industry well enough that I rarely need to double-check these days. If you are just learning then tasting first is the best way to go. I also try when possible to select family owned and local wineries so that my dollars go back into my community. Most of the stores that I frequent run daily deals: buy six or more bottles save 10%, that sort of thing. Sometimes there is a stackable special that ups the discount to 20% and then I buy more.
Here is a run down on what buying in at least six bottle increments looks like at my local chains:
- Lucky Grocery Stores- six or more bottles saves 10% (it used to be four or more, but times are tough), regularly runs a 20% off special
- Safeway Grocery Stores- six or more bottles saves 10%
- Grocery Outlet- save 10% on two or more CASES (They have the distinction of sometimes carrying VERY good wines at a severe discount. I recently bought two cases of a usually $35 wine for $7.99 a bottle minus 10% on top of that. This is a parking lot tasting situation.)
- BevMo- daily six or more bottles saves 10% and they also regularly run BOGO for 5 cents
- Whole Foods- same six bottles deal
- Total Wine- Mix 6 again saves 10%
Stores that do NOT offer any of these types of deals: Trader Joe’s and Costco.
Obviously if you can find a wine on sale and then also use the volume discount on top of the sale price then that is the ideal score. Have fun and if you find any other good discounts please share them in the comments. Slainte!
