The Traveling Steve's

Home for us . . . but not for our vinos

We had a good flight back from Sonoma on USAirways from Sacramento to Orlando (via Phoenix) IMG_3753although it did take a couple days to catch up on the time change and red-eye flight back home.

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I worked home-office this week, which was nice as I didn’t have to fly out somewhere on business for the week, so I could catch up on the time change easier.

We had bought a nice quality 200 bottle Eurocave Wine Cooler on-line from Costco before we left for Sonoma, as our other two smaller coolers were full, and we knew we’d be getting some great wines on this trip, as well as our upcoming Fall Napa trip. 350-665061-847__1Steve (Dos) had confirmed the delivery date for the wine cooler (pictured on left from the Costco site) for Tuesday at 11am (with a four hour window), and the delivery guys were at our house by noon, which was perfect.

Well, as Murphy’s Law would have it, we did get a shipment from Costco.  Unfortunately, they delivered us a huge Flat-Screen TV, instead of a wine cooler!  We, (including the delivery people) were amazed that we received the wrong shipment – not just a wrong model of a similar cooler, but a completely different product in every which way: functionality, size, weight, etc.  After many calls between the delivery company by them, and Costco by us, we realized we are out of luck for who knows how long.  Not very good customer service, considering we payed an extra premium for the ‘white glove’ service which includes shipping, home setup, and removal of product packing.

While I don’t blame the local delivery guys as it originated in New Jersey, I really have to wonder how this got so mixed up.  We found out the TV was actually supposed to go to a guy in Washington D.C.!  We still have not heard where our cooler went; some place between here and New Jersey where it was shipped from I guess.

Now nearly a week later, we still don’t have a delivery date or call/email that the cooler has or when it will be shipped.  While normally a delayed shipment of something wouldn’t be a huge deal as we both travel, (we use Amazon almost weekly and hardly ever have any issues, granted on much smaller items) this is a major inconvenience due to our availability to be home for delivery.  More importantly, however, we brought back two cases of expensive wines from Sonoma, and have several other high quality wine shipments we bought there that will be shipping shortly, which need to be properly stored.  This is not the time of year in Florida for fine wines to be sitting around the house for weeks at a time.  (Ok, rant over.  Costco are you listening?  I really think you could do a much better job with this situation than you have – we use you often, but this is not up to your normal quality standards – it would be nice to expedite this!)

We still have to store the case of wine we had shipped back from our trip to South America in March.  While not nearly as expensive wines, we still want to keep them stored properly.

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Anyway, we moved some wines around our existing coolers, and found room for 8 of the 24 bottles we brought back, so loaded up the $100 + bottles in there first.  Steve very meticulously tags each bottle, and creates a wine-menu about each bottle, explaining the wine varietal, tasting notes, region, price purchased, etc, and the specific location in the coolers.

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Here he is sorting some of the wine purchases, (sorry to disturb your concentration!) and the remaining ones that won’t fit, will go back in the box until our new cooler arrives.

One of the discoveries we made a couple years ago, are these nice wine suitcases that you can actually check as stored luggage on the plane.  They have wheels along with a handle, and are equipped with a hard cardboard box inside, which also contains heavy-duty Styrofoam packing, which is custom made to hold a dozen wine bottles.  IMG_3784When loaded with wine, each case is under the 50 pound weight limit, and so durable you don’t even have to sign an airport breakage waiver to check them in.  We have never had any breakage when using them, and it’s so convenient to bring home wines in, now that you can no longer bring wine aboard the flight as carry-ons.  We bought these previously on one of our Platypus Tours, (which has their logo), but you can buy these at most wineries or wine shops, and reuse them each time you visit the wineries – so very practical indeed.

Now about that cooler, Costco? . . .   Our new vinos are ‘homeless’!

. . .   to be continued.

One thought on “Home for us . . . but not for our vinos

  1. Pingback: Our vino cooler finally arrives | The Traveling Steve's

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