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Newsletter published by
Fine Vine Wines, LLC
"The Wine Maker's Toy Store™"
1300 N. Interstate 35-E, Suite 106
Carrollton, Texas 75006
July 2008
Volume 6, Issue 7
866-417-1114 (Long Distance)
972-323-7921 (Local)
972-323-7955 (Fax)
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I would like to take this opportunity to welcome you to Fine Vine Wines, LLC, "The Wine Maker's Toy Store". Whether you need home wine making products or just need information, we are here to serve you. I want to extend my thanks again for making The Wine Maker's Toy Store your home for your wine making needs. It continues to be my hope that every time you visit our web site or retail store, you will find something of value.
As a reminder, we continue to add products and content to the web site, therefore, if you have any special requests, please let us know. We like to hear what you have to say about our site, our products and/or our customer service, good or bad. Please send your comments and/or suggestions to winemaster@finevinewines.com.
Don't forget we like you to CALL!
If you have any questions about our products, our service and/or wine making, please call us. We are here to serve you and enjoying assisting you in any way we can. We have an international toll-free line so you WILL call us.
Someone is usually at the store between 9 am and 7 pm, Monday through Saturday. We always try to answer the phone when you call; however, sometimes, we are unable to answer the phone as we are on the other lines or we have customers in the store. If you get the voice mail, please leave your name, number, brief message and a best time to call. We will return your call just as soon as we can. If you don't want to call, just send us an email. We usually answer our emails daily. Please remember, we are a resource and we are here to serve you.
I would like to thank every one of you that has supported us over the first 5 years. You are helping me to achieve my dream of being the best home wine making store, anywhere. We don't want to be the biggest store, just the BEST!
Cheers!
George Cornelius, President
Fine Vine Wines, LLC, The Wine Maker's Toy Store |
Winexpert Limited Releases
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Winexpert is pleased to announce that for a limited time and by pre-order only, you can make and enjoy not one but two wonderfully delicious great seasonal products this year.
Chocolate Raspberry Port
Okanagan Peach Icewine
Both are available for pre-order now with delivery in September 2008. In order to guarantee one of these excellent wine kits, you need to order by August 7, 2008. The Chocolate Raspberry Port was extremely popular last year and I was unable to fulfill orders made after the pre-order date. As a result, if you do want one or more of these kits, your best bet is to pre-order before the deadline. As an aside, we tasted ours at the June 21st bottling party and everybody raved about it.
In addition, we are giving away a 3-gallon plastic Better-Bottle with every purchase of the Okanagan Peach Icewine. When you order this wine kit, we will automatically add 1 3-gallon plastic Better-Bottle to your order and ship it along with your wine kit in September. This offer does not include a stopper or an airlock, so if you need either or both, you will need to add them to your order. The stopper is the #10 Drilled Rubber Gum Stopper, part number 4629.
For those of you that have already ordered the Peach Icewine, we will add this 3-gallon plastic Better-Bottle to your order. If you need the stopper or airlock, please let us know and we will add it to your order, as well.
In addition, Winexpert is adding a new product to their Selection International Line. It is the
Spanish Rosé
This is a limited availability wine kit. It is available now, but it is not a permanent addition to the line, so when the stock is gone, there will not be any more. We expect to receive our first shipment in during the week of July 7th and if you want one, now is the time to order.
You can order one or all of these special wine kits by clicking on the links below:
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Part Number |
Image |
Description |
Price |
Action |
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Chocolate Raspberry Port
Chocolate Raspberry Port is crafted from the finest wine juice available and incorporates only natural flavors and essences. No water added! |
$107.99 |
Add to Cart
Add to Wish List |
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Okanagan Peach Icewine Style
With a Vidal base, this wine has deep floral notes, stone fruit and perfect sweetness, balance with the sun-ripened perfume of a luscious peach. |
$116.99 |
Add to Cart
Add to Wish List |
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Spanish Rose
Made from a blend of red and white varietals including popular Spanish Tempranillo, this exceptional, refreshing, dry, light-medium bodied wine is a must for summer. |
$112.99 |
Add to Cart
Add to Wish List |
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| Online Videos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We have finally created our first video! Is it a 90 minute video of how to make wine using a Mosti Mondiale wine kit. It is in the DVD format and will work on your computer or television if you have a DVD player. The video is divided into segments so you don't have to watch the whole thing to learn about any particular area.
The DVD's are in the process of being burned and we will make them available for ordering, as soon as we have them in stock. They will list at $9.99 for individual purchase or free with the purchase of any Mosti Mondiale wine kit. We have also made the entire video available for online viewing and at the following link:
The Mosti video is first, but we will be adding videos for the other wine kit manufacturers as well as, how to make a fresh fruit wine. We will also be adding videos on how to use most, if not all, of the equipment. Some of the first video will feature stainless steel tanks, bottle fillers and filters.
We hope you enjoy this new feature of our store and if you have any suggestions or requests, please let us know. | |
| WineMaker Magazine Awards
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As I reported in last month's newsletter, we won four medals in the 2008 WineMaker Magazine International Competition. The winners were:
- Silver - 2007 Mosti Mondiale Meglioli Rojo Grande
- Bronze - 2007 Mosti Mondiale Meglioli Chardonnay
- Bronze - 2007 Mosti Mondiale Chile Fresco Cabernet Sauvignon
- Bronze - 2007 Mosti Mondiale LaBodega Port
Part of the competition includes the "Retailer of the Year". When you enter this contest, the form has a blank for you to complete to indicate your retailer. The "Retailer of the Year" is based on the total scores of the wines entered for each retailer. Last year, we finished 6th in the U.S. and 13th overall and I would like to be #1.
When you win an award with a wine kit, the manufacturer will normally give you a free wine kit from the same brand. This is offered as an inducement for you to win awards with their products. If you submit a Mosti Mondiale Original All Juice wine and win an award with it, Mosti will give you a free Mosti Mondiale Original All Juice wine kit as their thanks. At this time, only Winexpert limits the number of free kits to 2. All of the other manufacturer's will reward each winning kit.
Since we want you to enter and WIN, we are going give you a $100 store gift certificate for every award you receive. Win with a wine kit and get a free wine kit and $100 from us. Win with a fresh fruit wine, you don't get a free wine kit, but you do still get the $100. In addition, we will throw in free shipping for each of the free wine kits you receive.
One last note, due to the limitations on shipping wines, sometimes it can be difficult just getting your wine delivered. I have heard that FedEx Ground flagged the WineMaker Magazine address as a "do not deliver" and a lot of the entries were returned to the wine makers. To make this easier on you, feel free to bring your wine to the store or ship them to us and we will send all of them, en masse, to WineMaker Magazine. If we have enough, we will use a pallet, which should not have any problems getting delivered.
The due date of next year's competition will be sometime in March 2009, so start thinking about which wines you want to enter. |
| Wine of the Month
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This month, we are featuring Malbec and Soave. Malbec wines, especially those from Argentina, have become very popular and these wine kits are equally as popular. Soave is the number one table wine in Italy and its principle grape is the Trebbiano. While the Malbec is known for its "earthiness", the Soave is know for its refreshing lemon-lime taste. All of our Malbec and Soave kits are marked down 10% during the month of July 2008. To learn more about these wines, click on the links below:
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Part Number |
Image |
Description |
Brand |
Regular Price |
Current Price |
Order |
| VN50 |
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Soave
Produces Italy's most popular dry white wine. |
Vinifera Noble |
$62.99 |
$55.99 |
Order |
| RE111 |
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Malbec - Chilean
This South American favourite, offers a deep garnet robe. |
Renaissance |
$122.99 |
$110.99 |
Order |
| 3233 |
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Argentine Malbec
This richly purple colored wine carries a velvety texture with long soft flavors. Its firm tannins & mellow acidity allow it to be enjoyed young. |
Winexpert Selection International |
$109.99 |
$99.99 |
Order |
| 3593 |
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Chilean Malbec
The hot dry climate allows the grapes to reach excellent ripeness, and lush fruity characters, making an intense, black wine. A thick-skinned grape full of colour, tannin and flavour, Malbec makes wines of great power and character, with blackberry, plums, tar, red pepper, sweet cherry, spice, licorice and deep bittersweet notes, almost like unsweetened chocolate, or espresso. |
World Vineyard |
$70.99 |
$62.99 |
Order |
| MMS50 |
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Soave
Produces Italy's most popular dry white wine. |
Original All Juice |
$110.99 |
$99.99 |
Order |
Remember with all of our "Wines of the Month", we try to anticipate demand, but may not be 100% successful. If we run out of a special, we will advise you of such and an expected ship date. We appreciate your understanding. |
| DFW AREA HOME WINE MAKING CLUB
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The next meeting will be on July 12, 2008 at 5:30 pm. We will be sending an email to those that have signed up for it. If you would like to be added to this mailing, please let me know by sending me your email address.
Please, don't forget your wine glasses for the tasting! We had 38 wine makers at the last club meeting and almost ran out of wine glasses. You don't want to be left out of the tasting.
We will also be voting on the name for the club.
Hope to see you there. |
Vintner's Reserve 10 liter wine kits
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In response to numerous requests from customers and retailers, Winexpert has increased the size of their Vintner's Reserve Wine Kits from 7.5 liters to 10 liters of concentrate and juice. By adding more juice and making other adjustments to select varieties, comparison accommodate confirmed that wines made with the new Vintners Reserve will deliver an even better quality wine while still pleasing existing Vintners Reserve consumers.
The packaging has changed as well to accommodate the increase in volume of liquid. As a result, we are having to re-arrange all of our shelves and would like to make this change as quickly as possible; therefore, we have decided to reduce the price of the 7.5 liter kits by 15%. To make this easy for you, we have 2 product pages, one for the remaining 7.5 liter kits and one for the new 10 liter kits. As we run out of the old 7.5 liter kits, we will take them off of the old page and move them to the new page. You can use the following links to see which kits are available in each format:
7.5 Liter Kits
The 7.5 liter kits are going fast and we have already sold out of half the kits and only have 1 or 2 left of the rest. If you are interested in this special, place your order now!
As always, we will process the orders on a "first come, first serve" basis. If you order a 7.5 liter kit and we are out, we will contact you to see if you still want the 10 liter kit at the current price.
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| Toy of the Month
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De-gassing is one of the more trying aspects of wine making and we have found that using a Vacu-Vin to create negative pressure in the carboy significantly improves this process; therefore, we are putting this product and the carboy cap on sale this month. To see how to use this product, visit our online videos and watch the "Degassing" segment.
To order one or both of these items, click on the product number below:
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Part Number |
Image |
Description |
Regular Price |
Current Price |
Order |
| 4318 |
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Extra Vacu-Stoppers - for Vacuum Wine Saver Set of 2 |
$5.99 |
$4.99 |
Order |
| 14604 |
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Carboy Cap Universal, one size fits all
Fits 3, 5 & 6 gallon glass carboys! |
$2.69 |
$2.39 |
Order |
| 4317 |
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Vacuum Wine Saver - by Vacu-Vin Comes with 1 stopper |
$11.99 |
$9.99 |
Order |
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| NEW PRODUCTS
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We have added the Wine Wand from Winexpert. This is a new drill mounted stirrer for degassing your wine. It is part number 4670 and we have yet to take a picture. We will try to get a picture on the web site this week.
To see all of the products added during the last 60 days, visit our New Products Page whenever you visit the web site.
If you are looking for a product that I do not carry, my distributors are LD Carlson and Crosby & Baker, Ltd. You can see their complete product list at their public catalogs. If you find anything you would like me to add, please let me know. |
More Inflation
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We received this letter from LD Carlson on June 27, 2008:
Dear Valued Retailer,
It is with regret that we inform our retailer network that the only North American glass carboy manufacturer has ceased producing 3, 5, 6 and 6.5 gallon carboys. The Mexican plant has long supplied the beverage hobby industry with affordable glass carboys under the North American Free Trade Agreement. The only other manufacturer of glass carboys for our industry is in Italy. Our purchasing department has worked with our global vendors to ensure that the transition from the Mexican to the Italian product is smooth and with little disruption to our supply chain. However, disparity in global currencies and increased costs of transporting these products from overseas will have a significant impact on their landed cost, resulting in a sharp price increase.
We anticipate that our inventory of 3, 5 and 6 gallon carboys will be fully maintained with only the possibility of short 'out-of-stock' periods while we adjust to a new receiving schedule. Unfortunately, the Italian manufacturer does not currently have a mold for the 6.5-gallon glass carboy and we anticipate there will be an extended period of time without inventory. They are developing a new mold to accommodate our industry's needs and we will bring those back into our inventory as soon as is possible.
The dimensions and tint of the Italian carboys are slightly different than those that were produced in Mexico. The usage of glass carboys is unique to the hobby beverage industry. From the glass manufacturer's standpoint these are low-margin, low-volume specialty products. The contraction of two global suppliers to one will undoubtedly have a lasting impact on the cost of these products moving forward.
Kind Regards,
The LD Carlson Team
The new prices to us represent a 40-60% increase in the cost of these items. As a result of this announcement, prices for glass carboys will be increasing significantly at all Wine Making Supply Stores in the U.S. and Canada. Since a carboy is included in all of our started packages, the prices of those items will increase as well. As we run out of the carboys on hand, we will adjust the prices on the web site.
It should be noted, as well, that the size of the new 6-gallon carboy is 6.25-gallons. It is basically the same carboy we sold on special several months ago. Since it is slightly larger than the traditional 6-gallon carboy, you will need to plan for more liquid for topping off.
The good news is that the plastic Better-Bottle is now more affordable than ever. The 6-gallon Better-Bottle will be at least $10.00 less than the comparable glass carboy. To see the advantages and disadvantages of both, use the following link:
Glass Carboys vs. Better-Bottles
I recognize this is a significant change, not only in price, but in process, but we have no options. The home beverage making business is a very small niche market and does not offer much in the way of "economies of scale". As such, our purchasing power is nominal, at best. | |
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When you have a question or just want to learn more about wine making, don't forget our forum! We have 1,123 registered members with over 78,000 posts! We have some extremely knowledgeable wine makers with loads of valuable information willing to assist you in your wine making needs. Responses to most posts are made within minutes. We are also known to have an occasional contest available to forum member only with valuable gifts, savings and coupons!
Whether you are an expert or a novice, it is an excellent place to ask questions, exchange ideas and meet other home wine makers. If you haven't logged into the forum, try it sometime. I think you will find it most informative and enjoyable, as well as, a great place to meet fellow wine makers.
DISCOUNTS
The most common discounts are listed below:
CUSTOMER REFERRAL PROGRAM
We have a customer referral program that provides additional discounts to registered users. We will give you a coupon worth 10% of the first order placed by any person that you refer to our web site. The stipulations are as follows:
- You must be a registered user of finevinewines.com,
- The person placing the order must register and provide your full name in the appropriate field on the registration screen, and
- The discount is only good for future orders with finevinewines.com and is not redeemable for cash.
CUSTOMER APPRECIATION PROGRAM - FVW GROWERS CLUB
Please check out our FVW Growers Club. You can get all of the details on our web site, but the bottom line is we want to buy your loyalty! Once you spend $500 with us, you get at least 5% discount on everything you buy from us (10% on orders over $140.00). Find out more on the web site.
REGISTRATION DISCOUNT (FIRST TIME ORDERS)
To receive this 5% off, all you have to do is register with us and place an order for $50.00, or more (excluding shipping and taxes). If your first order is for more than $140.00, we will give you 10% off. When you register, you will also be given the opportunity to sign up for our monthly newsletter, which is the only recurring email we send. We will not blast you with email after email touting our current specials. We encourage you to register to make the ordering process easier on you.
BIRTHDAY CLUB
If you are a registered user and have provided your birth day and month, every year you will receive a coupon good for $5.00 off any order over $25.00. This coupon is in addition to any other discounts in which you may be entitled. These coupons are emailed on the first of the month and are good for your birth month only. To join up, register, go to the My Account section and provide your birth day and month.
CUSTOMER FEEDBACK
We appreciate all of your comments, whether good or bad. To demonstrate our commitment to outstanding customer service, I have created a web page with your feedback. As we receive emails that comment about our service, I will post them on this page:
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Don't forget we like you to CALL!
If you have any questions about our products, our service and/or wine making, please call us. We are here to serve you and enjoying assisting you in any way we can. We have an international toll-free line so you WILL call us. Someone is usually at the store between 9 am and 7 pm, Monday through Saturday. We always try to answer the phone when you call; however, sometimes, we are unable to answer the phone as we are on the other lines or we have customers in the store. If you get the voice mail, please leave your name, number, brief message and a best time to call. We will return your call just as soon as we can. If you don't want to call, just send us an email. We usually answer our emails daily. Please remember, we are a resource and we are here to serve you.
Contact Information
George Cornelius - President
Mark Cornelius - Shipping Manager
Joseph Schuitema - Resident Wine Maker and Technical Creator
phone: 1-866-417-1114 |
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