Wine Cellars Appeal
To Fickle Folks

Ahmet Suer wouldn't dream of storing his "babies" in the basement of his Augusta, Ga., home.

Instead, his 1,500-bottle wine collection is cradled in two free-standing, thermostatically controlled wine coolers that plug into a wall. The oak cabinets cost $3,000 and $1,900 each, and take up prime display space in his kitchen and a spare room.

"They're fantastic," says Mr. Suer, a technical adviser. "They can be switched to different rooms when you feel like it, and you can take them with you when you move. You can't do that with a custom-built cellar."

With more people sipping high-priced wines as the economy remains strong, it has become fashionable to store a supply at home. And since many oenophiles can't spare the time, space or cash to dig their own cellars, some of them are turning toward a more versatile storage option: the free-standing wine-cooling unit. In styles ranging from a minirefrigerator to an armoire with glass windows and interior lighting, these units are being used as additions to bedrooms, kitchens and living rooms.

Sales of free-standing coolers, which are designed to keep wine at the ideal temperature (53 degrees to 57 degrees) and humidity (60% to 70%), have heated up in the past few years. Leading retailers and catalog companies, such as the Wine Enthusiast Cos., Hawthorne, N.Y.; International Wine Accessories, Dallas; and the Wine Appreciation Guild, San Francisco, each report sales increases of at least 30% in 1997. Even the more mainstream retailer Williams-Sonoma Inc., San Francisco, quickly sold out of its 32-bottle and 60-bottle "wine refrigerators" that were introduced as a catalog-only item at Christmas at prices of $875 and $975, respectively.

"They're becoming like the microwave or VCR of the '90s," says Adam Strum, chairman of Wine Enthusiast, a catalog company.

As with any household appliance, electric wine coolers are also available in fully loaded, impress-the-neighbors versions that cost much more than standard models. Robert Hepps, a dentist and wine collector in Hillsborough, Calif., recently bought a $6,000 Vinotheque, made by Nordicorp, San Carlos, Calif. The Vinotheque is considered the Cadillac of coolers, with such fancy trimmings as an extra-quiet motor and olive-ash burl woodwork.

"If it's good enough for the Ritz-Carlton, it's good enough for me," says Mr. Hepps, who bought his stand-alone wine cellar after noticing a similar one at the swanky hotel.

Other popular models include the 264-bottle, French-made Eurocave with a laminated exterior and glass door that retails for about $2,200. The kitchen-friendly, under-the-counter "wine grotto" by Marvel Industries, Richmond, Ind., sells for roughly $695.

Not everyone is impressed. Some wine collectors say it is ludicrous to spend thousands of dollars on units that can hold only a limited number of bottles. "You end up spending more money on storage than the wine you're putting in there," says Michael Boyd, a wine merchant from Corte Madera, Calif. "Serious collectors are better off with a cellar."

But for people who own more than one home, or who invest in wine "futures" -- bottles ordered years ahead of the harvest at a locked-in price -- mobile storage units may be ideal. Michael Goldstein, proprietor of Park Avenue Liquors in New York City, says customers hurriedly bought free-standing coolers earlier this year when the much-anticipated 1995 vintage Bordeaux and Burgundies arrived.

Ed Baum, an operations director in San Francisco, spent $1,700 on a 180-bottle cooler just over a year ago, and recently plunked down another $3,000 for a 600-bottle cooler in thirsty anticipation of his futures. "In 2010, I don't want to tell myself that I don't have enough '95 Bordeaux on hand because I didn't have anywhere to put them in 1998," he says.

Still, the hum of an electric unit somehow doesn't capture the essence of the true cellar. Arthur von Wiesenberger, a consultant from Santa Barbara, Calif., loves the cooler his mother-in-law bought him but admits that something is missing. "It just doesn't capture the romance of drinking your wine at a wooden table in a dark cellar surrounded by all your bottles," he says.

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