Bright Cellars

Brightcellers implies that it's easy to cancel the service, and what that *should* mean in the online world is clicks, not phone calls. To cancel you do have to manage to get a hold of them between the hours of 9 to 5 central time, M - F (so, while most people are working). Either be upfront that canceling isn't easy and customers are put through a sales pitch or simply make it possible to cancel online like EVERY SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE.

I've really enjoyed the wine but won't be using the company again or recommending it to friends because I find these tactics deceitful.

While I am perfectly happy with the wine my one star review comes from the misleading nature of the subscription service. I subscribed in August and received my shipment. As I was out of town the majority of the month I have not even touched my first order. I then received notice that I have another shipment on the way without so much as "hey guess what you have more wine coming" email. I checked the website to see if I could cancel. At the top of the account page it lists that they are available for account changes M-F seeing that I didn't receive my shipping notification until Saturday I waited patiently until Monday and called during business hours. I was dutifully notified by a very sorry customer service agent that there was nothing to be done and they can only make changes to a shipment within 24 hours of the email notification. Considering that I am calling during first available hours as you are not open Sunday I was shocked to learn that I was out of luck. In conclusion NOTIFY your customers of upcoming shipments and UPDATE your hours online. It was rather annoying learn that Bright Cellars is staffed during the weekend and the M-F hours are a formality. Will not use again.

The basics: Pay $60 a month for 4 unique winds from around the world.

THE WINE: The most important part! The wines are literally from all over - California, Chile, Spain, France, Italy, Washington, South Africa... so many places. I love seeing what I get each month, as they're always things I could never find at the grocery store. And at $60 for 4, they come out to be $15 each. For unique finds that aren't at Vons or Ralphs, that's worth it to me! Plus, anytime I don't enjoy a wine I review it, and I never get that wine again.

You give feedback, they listen: Each month, I review my wines. The company really uses this feedback; some wines I've loved end up in a box a few months later, which I like. They also give you good options for reds vs whites, or if you like a mix.

Need help: They are still a small company run by real PEOPLE, so someone always responds personally if I reach out. They will happily skip the month for you, or put your account on hold as long as you ask.

Rewards: Every time you review you wines, you rack up "points". These points can add up to a free bottle of wine, a wine opener, a t-shirt, glasses, etc... I am saving up for the cheese box, personally:)

I'm surprised reading a lot of these reviews - I have never seen shady ads, or felt pressured to buy something extra, or anything weird like that. I really enjoy this service, have been using it for about a year and a half now, and happily recommend it to anyone who wants to try new things :)

Received Bright Cellars as a gift, delivery was quick from their Illinois warehouse with cool neat packaging. Wines were super and high end. Highly recommend

I really enjoy Bright Cellars. I was a little hesitant at first, but after my first few orders I'm really into it. In my first order, I only got two bottles that I really liked. The next order I got three I liked, and since then I've enjoyed almost all of them. And then when I don't like a certain wine, I just cork it and bring it to a party where it gets happily drank.

A big thing is that I started by drinking mostly reds, because that's what I thought I was supposed to do. But I kept enjoying whites more than the reds, and now I almost exclusively drink white wine. Idk, maybe it's a body thing or dryness thing. Or maybe I just prefer citrus to other fruit flavors. Or maybe I just don't like leather and dirt flavors.

The biggest hassle for Bright Cellars is the delivery, having to be present to sign for a package since it's booze. But they gave me a great solution to this. There is a FedEx just a couple blocks outside of my commute home, so I just stop by when the package arrives and pick it up. And they hold it for like a week so I don't even need to get it any certain day.

Bright Cellars is great, it helped me expand my wine palate, and when I don't like a wine, someone else almost always does. Recommend.

So I tried brightcellars after getting a discount code for my first order. I liked the selections of wine I got a lot but couldn't continue the subscription due to hard times from covid 19. They were very good with canceling my acount, but I was late with the email in the month and got billed for the wine. I expressed this and I received a full refund. However, the wine had already shipped and I recieved it, with the refund. I called to pay for my order, as I did not feel comfortable keeping 6 bottles of wine, but they acknowledge the miscommunication on their part and let me keep the wine. I've been very pleased with the quality of wine overall as well.

So, I signed up for this wine club after seeing an ad online. After I signed up I checked the reviews and was horrified with what I saw. I even went so far as to look at employee reviews of what it was like to work for this company and what I found shocked me- the way this company makes money is by people forgetting to cancel their memberships, employees are reprimanded if they allow members to cancel, etc. I immediately decided to cancel my membership (or at least try- based on other reviews cancelling with this company is next to impossible). I sent an email to cancel, since I placed an order on April 9th and and as of April 20th I had still not received a shipment notification. There is no way to cancel the membership yourself online which is a big red flag. The email response I got on April 20th was- hello, your order is expected to ship out within the next 24 hours! I told him that I was not satisfied with the service since I placed my order on April 9th and it still had not shipped. To my surprise he followed what I asked for and cancelled my my membership on April 21st. I am not sure if they are being more lenient due to the coronavirus pandemic but I'll take what I can get. I got lucky and was able to get out my membership with this shady business- but I still had not received any tracking info for my shipment I paid for. I did not receive a tracking email until April 24th! 3 days after the wine concierge told me my order would ship out within the next 24 hours. They clearly lied to try and keep my business. Stay away from this company- they are extremely shady and manipulative.

I've callled 5 times now to cancel this service. I've expressly told them I will refuse delivery and dispute charges. I even canceled the card associated with this account and they still managed to change me again on an inactive card and because they 'prequthorize' 5! Days in advance of charging you, there is no way to get away from this service. I've called, emailed, left messages. Currently they are 'on a corporate retreat ' and won't be responding to calls. Shocker. Having an online service and not being able to cancel online is rediculous. I will also lodge a complaint with bbb.

Even with attroricous customer service, they back it up with mediocre wines and lie about their price point. I know wine and what they send me doesn't even match the taste profiles I filled out. Don't waste your time or money on this subpar service. They tote MIT grads as founders. Shouldn't they be able to build a basic functioning service and website with online cancelation?!

STAY AWAY!

So I haven't ordered yet because I did research, and I'm here to share my research because it seems to me that people should know what they're paying for. I can't find anywhere else to post this, so here we go. I never take a business at face value when they say they're saving me money. I googled each wine they suggested for me and noticed a few strange things about the "wineries" that offered these wines.

First of all: there was no actual address or names given in the contact section of each winery's site. A real winery will proudly display where they are at, and who to contact.

Second: Every website for each wine looked nearly identical. Even the price was identical, with free shipping on 6+ bottles of wine.

And third: The privacy policy listed an address at the very bottom of each winery's page, and it was the exact same address as Bright Cellars.

That's right. Bright Cellars is pretending to sell you hand picked wines from different wineries, but really it's just their wine with a different label and website. As a wine enthusiast, it seems to me that this is cheating the consumer out of the true experience of wine: history, authenticity, and diversity.

Furthermore: If you take them up on their offer of 5 wines for $38, that drops the price of each bottle down to $7.60. Sure, once in a while you can get good wines for that price. The undiscovered underdogs tilling away in their vineyards alongside family to make a mark in the world based on passion alone. To produce good wine. These are the guys who surprise you with their bottle of $8 wine in the grocery store.

Bright Cellars? We don't know where the grapes come from, who the vintner is, or even what kind of barrel was used. It doesn't seem like that big of a leap to me to assume that their wine, at $7.60 a bottle, won't be that good, and I can see the other reviewers who forked over their hard earned cash tend to agree.

The wines were decent - probably mildly more expensive than they were worth, but overall, the convenience factor was pretty nice and I liked the wines.

However, I'll be traveling for 4+ months soon, so I don't want to send wine to my empty apartment (logical, eh?), so I tried to find a cancellation option.

First off, I couldn't find information *anywhere* on their website or on my account dashboard for how to do that. I had to Google search and find the right email to send my request to. After emailing them, saying I'd like to cancel, they said they couldn't do that unless I give a tentative "reactivation date" where they will automatically start sending me wine again.

Genuinely, I wouldn't have written this review had it not been for the wildly scammy notion that they would hold my account hostage and not let me cancel a subscription.

I'm rooting for a better, more customer-centric company outcompete these guys! Until then, just go to Trader Joe's or sign up for Winc (much better wine anyway).