I am unable to post a zero or negative review, but let me say, "Buyer Beware."
I purchased 10's of thousands of dollars of wine from this company many years and finally severed ties this past year. Initially I bought delicious Australian Shiraz. The "owner", Jon Rimmerman, began to expand his horizons and offered esoteric wines from around the world. Some were superb, many were merely mediocre and more and more were just plain weird. So it goes. Palates change. His and mine were no longer calibrated. But then I came to realize just how sloppy their business was. Wines that I purchased and paid for weren't shipped within a few months as promised, but were shipped a year or two or even 4 years later (I'm not sure that I actually received all that I purchased and paid for in the very early years but that water over the dam now - there is now a good record of purchases, but delivery is often painfully slow). And the wine was sitting in their own warehouse. I told you I bought a lot of wine and it's my own fault that I didn't click to the fact that they were sitting on my wine. Add to that the increasing number of duds that Jon was hyping "all in the name of the vinous experiment" to allow consumers to experience what was out there. I can appreciate that and I value that. I even came to appreciate that his palate and mine were very different. But I couldn't appreciate his hyping wines that were pretty straightforward to people who have been tasting wines for decades, like Grand Cru Chablis that turned out to be swill, and later saying that tasting something like that was an experiment in vinous appreciation at $50+ a bottle and not refunding the purchase price when said wine was substituted for a much better vintage that had been purchased, but couldn't be delivered by Garagiste some 2+ years later. Let me re-phrase; I bought $50/bottle Grand Cru Chablis from Garagiste in 2007. The owner (Jon Rimmermann) hyped the wine. It seemed like a pretty good deal. Not a "sure thing", but a good deal. 2+ years later I received a shipper with 3 other bottles of wine than what I ordered with a note saying they couldn't secure the wine wine I bought and paid for over 2 years earlier and were offering these 3 bottles instead. Same producer. Same vineyard, different name due to legal issues and the wine was "The finest ever produced by them." No advance notice of the change, they just sent it along with notes that indicated I was better off with this wine. I accepted it. 2+ years later as I am getting around to cataloging my wine into a cellar, I read reviews of these wines that were substituted by Garagiste. The reviews are appalling. The wine is nothing at all like the hype that the owner of Garagiste heaped upon it when substituting it. Not that it's not as good; the wine is terrible! And the owner of Garagiste (Jon Rimmeramann) comped the reviewer for the bottles. Didn't just refund the bottles and ask for him to send them back, but comped him.
When I just asked for the same consideration, I was rebuffed. I just wanted my money back and was willing to send the bottles in question back. They weren't willing.
So, I'm letting potential other buyers know.
