Sarah Dukes

Hi, I’m Sarah and I started WineClubs.net to share with my friends and family all the great wine I was receiving from the wine clubs I signed up for on a weekend trip to Napa Valley. I didn’t know much about wine back then, but I knew what tasted amazing, so I decided to become a member of three different wine clubs from the wineries I liked the most: Beringer Vineyards, Markham Vineyards and Sinegal Estate Winery. Signing up for those clubs was the best thing I ever did. Every other month I’d get a new shipment from one of the three and each and every time I opened a bottle, I would be instantly transported back to that fantastic weekend in Napa. I soon became so enamored with having wine from my favorites wineries shipped right to my door that I decided to take another trip. This time my friends and I went up to the Russian River Valley where I found two more wineries I loved: Dry Creek Vineyard and Jordan Vineyard & Winery. Sharing pictures of the wine I was getting was fun, but my friends and family weren’t getting to experience the wine with me, so I decided to start having a monthly wine tasting get-together at my house. I wanted a more intimate experience where we all could share a bottle of Pinot Noir or Cabernet Sauvignon or Riesling and reconnect. It was at one of these wine tastings that a friend of mine, a sommelier at a restaurant up in San Francisco, pointed out how some of the wines I had received were exceptional, while others were just so-so. He explained how the weather of the area the wine comes from changes the taste of it from year to year, so that the wine I fell in love with at a winery last year will not taste the same this year. I did more research on it and put this idea to the test and he was right! The Sauvignon Blanc I fell in love with a year ago from the Sinegal Estate Winery, just didn’t taste as good this year. It was still drinkable, but it just wasn’t the same. The weather had changed year over year and with it, so had the wine I received. That’s when I realized that not all wine clubs are created equal. The wine clubs from regional vineyards will always be touch and go year over year. This realization helped me understand why some of the bigger wine clubs, like the Wall Street Journal Wine Club and the California Wine Club, are superior in so many ways to the smaller estate run wine clubs. The bigger, more well known wine clubs have wine tasting professionals that are constantly on the lookout for the best wines there are that year. They travel all over the world, from California to Australia to Italy to France to Oregon and Washington state. Everyday they’re finding new wines and putting them to the test to see which ones truly are the best and worthy of being sent to their members. Being a wine club member of a local winery is neat, but to truly get your hands on the best wines there are, you need to be a member of one of the top 10 best wine clubs. Once I understood that, the rest was history. I cancelled all my wine club subscriptions at the smaller wineries and signed up with all the big ones. Next, I decided to turn WineClubs.net into my personal platform where I can share my experiences with the major wine clubs and the wines I receive. Since then, I’ve put a lot of hard work and time into my website, because I want everyone to know how to choose the best wine club for them. My goal is to bring exceptional advice and knowledge on wine clubs to everyone, so no one accidentally signs up for a wine club that shouldn’t even be in business. If you find my website and the information I share valuable, please share it with your friends and family, the same way I did in the beginning of my wine club journey. Thanks!
 Sarah https://www.wineclubs.net