You should never drink (or buy) alone

: Image via Wikipedia

Group buying has been all the rage for quite some time. Evidenced by the $250 million valuation for “Collective Buying Site”, Groupon. If you are still one of the uninitiated, like I was this past spring, the idea behind group buying sites is quite simple. Each day the site presents an unbeatable offer if you and a few hundred of your closest friends go in on the deal. OK, you don’t even need to know these people as long as the minimum threshold is reached. Brilliant idea, in fact. I love it. However, I have yet to find anything that tickles my fancy. Spa treatments are nice but don’t qualify for my lax list of needs. I don’t necessarily care how much I’m saving if it’s for something that I wasn’t necessarily looking for in the first place.

Which brings me to something that I am passionate about, buy often and frequently share my purchases with friends.

Wine!

Go into any quality wine shop and you are presented with volume discounts; 10-15% for 6 bottles or even up to 20% for a case of 12 bottles. I would even bet that your local wine shop would also be willing to offer volume discounts if you asked nice enough (Caveat being if the margin afforded to them by their wholesaler can support it). It would appear on the surface that the retail wine industry is already conditioned for a “group buying” business model.

Why hasn’t someone done this already, you ask?

(wine.woot.com is trying but I am told that their legality is questionable and they can’t offer deals to certain states — MA being one. And at least for me, it offers the same unappealing products as Groupon.)

For many reasons but primarily because federal and state liquor laws (shipping across state lines) makes them unattractive and sufficiently burdensome for the seasoned business person or investor looking for simple, uncomplicated businesses with minimal (known) barriers that will scale. I know because I have spoken to dozens of entrepreneurs, investors and wine merchants over this past year and they tell me as much. But when I speak to would-be consumers, they love the idea and would sign up tomorrow if possible.

So, how do we make the improbable, available?

I have many ideas. None of which scale necessarily but all are definitely replicable for particular locales.

I am looking for help/interest from producers, importers, wholesalers, and/or retailers. You can reach me at rodneygagnon [at] me [dot] com. Reach out and I’d be happy to tell you more. And please tell me if someone has solved this conundrum. I’d love to hear about it and work with them.