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In the UK a standard wine attracts duty of £2.17+20% vat (from memory). Then there is the vat on the price of the wine itself. Consider the cost of the bottle a
by jimnotgym 9y ago
In the UK a standard wine attracts duty of £2.17+20% vat (from memory). Then there is the vat on the price of the wine itself. Consider the cost of the bottle and shipping from France and you will see that the wine in a cheap say £6.99 bottle is worth less than 1 euro!!!! In a £12 bottle the wine itself could be worth 5 times as much! A classic fixed vs variable cost problem. Then take a £24 bottle, the wine itself is only around 2 times more expensive. So yes there can be a real sweet spot (in the UK £12-15). I don't know anything about US taxes to translate, but the point is still valid.
- cascom 9y agoSee this article/thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17078319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17078319 Basically in the US a $100 wine in a restaurant retails for $50, Wholesales for $33, and the winery sells it for $19, and it costs them ~$14.25 to make it (all pre-sales tax)
- dx034 9y agoDon't restaurants buy at wholesale or wineries directly?
- cascom 9y agoYes - restaurants typically buy at that $33 wholesale price - hence the rule of thumb is restaurant prices are 3x wholesale and 2x retail. Generally, I don’t believe restaurants can but direct from the winery as a result of absurdly complex tiered distribution laws
- realusername 9y agoYes, that's why I'll pay around 5/6 euros for a drinkable bottle in France but I advise not going below 9 pounds in the UK, otherwise the quality might be hazardous.
- dx034 9y agoIf you drink a lot of wine, drive to France/Germany and buy it there. A £6 bottle in the UK can cost as little as €3 on the continent and while the UK is in the EU there aren't really any restrictions as long as you only buy for yourself.