Print this story

Share this story

Email a friend

Your name

Your email address

Recipients’ email addresses (Up to ten, separated by commas.)

digg

del.icio.us

When I was much younger, I read every book written by the Science Fiction master, Robert Heinlein. I loved the way that he breathed life into his characters … and what a bunch of characters they were! My favorite was Lazarus Long who, through a combination of very well developed survival skills and the fortune of inheriting of good genes, found himself the senior human: the oldest person alive. Much of the book is filled with the many life stories of Lazarus, and we get a good read on what has kept him going for so long. He flies a flag over his home that reads “T.I.N.S.T.A.A.F.L.”, which stands for: There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. I like that kind of simple honesty.

Many people, no matter how many times they’ve been burned by one scheme or another, still keep on looking for that Free Lunch. It’s what keeps the lights of Las Vegas burning bright, keeps the Lotteries making millions, and what keeps con artists in business. My old friend Faye, who grew up with her family of “Carnies”, or carnival workers, called them “marks”: people who were there to be separated from their money. Fay might be upset with me for writing this article, because she always repeated the line she was brought up with: “Never smarten up a mark”.

I don’t think that I’d have made a good Carny. Too much of the “Do unto others” may have been drilled into me by the Dominican Sisters and Christian Brothers to let me think of people as marks. So, since I haven’t been brought up swearing never to smarten up anyone, I’m going to talk a bit about how to avoid that costly “Free Lunch”, at least when it comes to buying wine.

Have you seen the one where you “Buy Twelve, Get One Free”? The pitch goes something like: “since we give a discount on a case of twelve already, this way you get it without having to buy twelve bottles all at once.” Sounds logical, right? Every wine shop that I have ever seen running this … uh, “promotion”, charges more per bottle that I do, and it’s usually more that the 8.3% that you “save” when you get your “free” bottle. Yes, the math simply doesn’t work out in your favor if it costs you 12% to save 8%, does it? Now figure in things like service: are they really helpful? Can they match a wine with the food you’re going to have it with? Do they try to “upsell” you to a more expensive bottle every time? Do they deliver? That 8% keeps getting more expensive, doesn’t it?

How about the “Three Dollar Doug”, or “Four Bill Jill”... or whatever they want to call their promotion wine? First of all, you get told that “That’s the California price. It costs more here because we have to truck it in, etc.” It only seems to be in stock once in a blue moon, so it’s never in stock when you go shopping for it. Lastly, just how drinkable do you think a wine IS if it sells for two, three or four dollars? I’ve tasted plenty of these bargain basement wines, and they taste lousy. Be real, now. Do you really want to put something that cheap into your mouth, or serve to your friends? I simply will not sell a wine that my staff and I don’t like well enough to drink ourselves. If it doesn’t taste good, it’s not a bargain. Period.

Hear about the “famous maker” of their “private label” wine? It’s really a scam that pretends that you know a bit about wine, and plays on that, pretending to share some inside information. “Now, we can’t tell you where the grapes come from, but you have heard of (insert name of famous $100 per bottle wine here), haven’t you? Well, I’m not allowed to tell you that the grapes come from there, but … And you know who (fill in this blank with the name of a famous $100 per bottle wine maker) is, right? I really can not tell you that he made this wine”. They might as well as call you “Rube” when they play that one on you. They can’t tell you, because it would be an outright lie! Yet there are wine shops, including some well-known ones that play that game on their marks... I mean customers. Customers. Right. If it’s so good, why are they afraid to tell you who made it? With my house brand, Brooklyn Wine Company “Feliz Red” and “Feliz White”, we brag right on the label who our wine maker is. No “we can’t tell you”, or “we’re not allowed to say”. No, it’s right there, on the label, where it should be.

I’d like to think that I am an honorable man. I am honest in my personal as well as business dealings. I have spent more that twenty years in the wine trade, and I have a very good reputation. I would rather take the time to bring you a very good wine at great price than to find some way to pass off a mediocre wine for more than it is worth. It takes time to develop trust, and trust is a priceless virtue. Be very careful of deals that sound too good to be true, and remember, There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch!

©2007 The Brooklyn Paper