On August 1, we ordered two cases of wine in the store, to be sent to a friend in Washington, DC. On September 13, that friend still had not received the wine. On September 14, I called Three Lakes Winery (TLW) at the number listed on the receipt (715-388-7434), and a recorded message told me that this number was not programmed to receive calls. I then found a different number on the Internet (715-490-5938) and called it. I had to leave a message; about 10 minutes later, a woman named Carol called back and asked how she could help me. I told her the problem and asked her where the wine was and what TLW was going to do to fix this problem. Carol had a hard time finding the order. When she did, she stated that she was not directly involved in the sale but had heard about this order's problem - had heard someone say that TLW does not ship chocolate wine because they do not make it. She also read a note on the order that TLW had called us on August 3 and left a message. I stated that we'd received no messages from TLW on August 3: our first contact with them since August 1 was my phone call to them on September 14.
Carol said she'd have Emily call us back "right away" to give us more details and work out the problem. I waited for that call for more than 3 hours and then had to finish some other work. This afternoon (September 15), almost 24 hours later, I called TLW and asked to speak to Emily. She stated the same things that Carol had said: TLW does not ship chocolate wine, and they'd called us on August 3 and left a message. She also stated that, on August 7, TLW refunded to us the money we'd paid for the ordered wine because they hadn't heard back from us. Emily asked whether I'd received the refund, and I said, "I don't know. I'll have to check my credit card statement because we've been waiting for that wine since August 1." I reiterated that we had received no messages from them on August 3. I also asked her why no one from TLW had called us again on, for example, August 7 or 10, given that they had not heard from us in about a week. I noted that, with businesses with whom I've dealt, those businesses will call again if they haven't heard from us in 5 to 7 days; and this was what I did at work. By not calling us again and reputedly issuing a refund, TLW had taken the choice away from us to change the order or order again. I asked Emily what TLW was going to do to make their name good with us again, emphasizing the fact that we like the TLW wine, look forward to going to TLW when we are in the area (we come from near Washington, DC), and were so much looking forward to sharing this wine with our friend. I asked, "If TLW doesn't ship chocolate wine, why didn't somebody tell us this when we paid for the wine?" Emily apologized for this mistake.
I noted to Emily that I'd already told my husband about this problem and he'd said to just cancel the order. (I have since found out that, yes, TLW has refunded the money for the wine ordered.) After apologizing for the mix-up with messages and lack of communication about chocolate wine, Emily said that, if I wanted to re-order the wine, I could do so online, as that is the best place to find out which wines they can and cannot ship. I stated I would have to talk to my husband about that and would have a hard time convincing him to even go into Three Lakes Winery again: he did not like being treated like a second-hand set of clothes. Emily said, "I'm sorry for that. Customers are number one with us, and we don't want you to feel that way."
My husband does not want to order from Three Lakes Winery again. In fact, he said he could care less if he ever goes there again. What a shame. We both looked forward to going there, to helping support a local business by buying their good wine - and now we see that they treat customers no better than a "big-box" store in a big city.
Three Lakes Winery has some administrative problems they must fix. One - they need to make more than one effort to contact a customer, if they don't hear from the customer in a few days. Two - they need to keep their word about calling people back "right away." Three - if they can't ship wine, they need to ensure that their staff knows this and tells the customer; they also should post signs to that effect, where the wine is. Four - the phone numbers written on the receipts must work.
There are two good things to note: TLW did refund the money for the wine ordered (although it is apparent from the receipt that they under-refunded by about $22), and the employees in the shop are very nice and helpful.
Three Lakes Winery needs to expend the true effort to contact us (and not the other way around) to prove that they mean what they say - "Customers are number one with us." We will see what happens. read more