Welcome to Uncorked Ventures.

Thanks for stopping by. Unlike every other online wine club, I’m going to introduce myself.  My name is Mark and this is my small business.

The story here is pretty simple at first glance.  Uncorked Ventures started almost a decade ago, my original business partner was my brother in law, Matt.  We had noticed something, mainly that the quality of wine available varied greatly based on where you lived, no matter how good your local wine shop was.

We took some time to figure that out.  At first, we thought it was the archaic laws which govern alcohol sales in this country.  But, no, even in San Diego and Los Angeles, the quality of wine available was dramatically worse than it was in San Francisco. The wine sales laws in California are actually pretty good considering, so that didn’t make much sense.

So why?

The reason is how wine is made and sold. 

Winemakers often hold a number of winemaking jobs at the same time.  Bigger wineries have huge sales staff, some even have lobbyists. But when a winemaker makes a few hundred cases by himself (yes, unfortunately, I can pretty much use the male part of the term here, that’s something the industry is working on) he has to sell it, where he has the chance.  That’s normally SF. 

So SF, literally has access to more wine and often better wine, than does any other city in America.

That matters.  We’re in the age of algorithm’s (heck, you found this website from one, maybe Google and maybe an internal algorithm on another site).  But, the biggest different between my wine club and their their wine clubs is pretty simple: my inputs are better.  I have access to different and I think, better wine. They might have a better way of marketing themselves, or selling themselves and that’s ok. It’s something I’m working on.

But, what they don’t have is, is access to the 300 case wine’s that are made and sold out of winemakers living rooms.

Really, that’s the question that I hope you ask yourself about every wine of the month club that’s out there.  Sure, we can work toward building a better algorithm.  But, how good can it be, if the inputs are the same?  In this case, I hope you’ll consider your own work or business.  Are you able to access better products, or get more help on a project via email, the phone or in person?

It’s partially human nature for sure and I know it’s a bit old school in many respects, but I think my monthly wine club is better served because I spend time with winemakers, in person, every week.  They’re the ones that really know how the wine industry is changing, they’re the ones best able to steer me toward the most interesting, more unique new offerings for my online wine club. They’re the ones living with the various changes in the wine industry.  

Personally, I don’t think there’s anyone better to guide me toward wine choices which have helped my small business be called one of America’s best wine clubs by many industry and significant news sources.  It doesn’t make for as good of a marketing message I know, but it’s a better way to source wine because no matter who is choosing your wine in your wine club shipment: they can only choose based on the wines which are available to them.  I think my wine of the month club has better wine, because I’m creating a wider number of choices.