Bin Ends

A brief intro to wine retail: The wineries work on an intense 12-month cycle, with new vintages and wines being churned into the market as fast as we can drink the stuff. Importers and wholesalers, who move the wine from the vineyard to your glass, strike deals and make educated guesses as to how much wine to buy and where to allocate it. Considering that millions of bottles are changing hands every year in Massachusetts alone, it’s not surprising when a few dozen here and there get left out of the loop.

Maybe a bottle broke, spilling inky red wine all over the case and ruining the other labels; perhaps the wine was discontinued and the remnants aren’t selling; possibly a few bottles were simply forgotten. Due to the system’s inherent inefficiency, there are always bottles up for grabs at “bargain prices” to anyone who wants to sort through warehouse inventory sheets and deal with the loose ends.

Wanting no bottle left behind, John Hafferty and Craig Drollett act as liquid treasure hunters and put together an entire store filled with these “leftovers” or, as they named the shop, bin ends. It operates similarly to Filene’s Basement; the longer a wine remains in stock, the lower its price drops. The wines enter Bin Ends at 25-percent off the retail price and the savings gradually increase for 42 days, climaxing at an incredible 45-percent discount. It’s practically highway robbery.

The bottles at Bin Ends range from cheap $6 sippers to $450 bottles of world-class wine—still considerably marked down at $150 off the retail price. In order to maintain some sort of consistency, the store has a dependable supply of liquid crowd pleasers, but for the majority of the shopping, it’s a first-come-first-serve showdown of wine deals.

While most wines can be bought by the case, there is a “bargain bin” with the stray remnants of larger orders. Although this bin requires picking through, there are tremendous deals to be found. “I saw some 2005 Burgundies back there,” Drollett said with a grin as we headed to the stash and began digging through the sea of bottles.

If cavorting to Braintree isn’t an option, fret not. Bin Ends has a comprehensive website with the latest and greatest deals. They offer free delivery to the Boston area for a 12-bottle case or an order greater than $200. Whether you’re a seasoned pro or an everyday drinker, we suggest stopping by and seeing what they have to offer. Keep your eyes open and your elbows in.

First printed July 2008 in the Weekly Dig