Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

ScottHarveyWines wrote:I really like Michigan wines and have even made some. The specs look good. The Riesling would be considered "Medium Dry" on the International Rieslng Foundation Scale. I'm in.

Coincidentally, we had a bottle of '07 Jana Leelanau Peninsula Riesling 2 days ago with pierogi and kielbasa. Absolutely delightful. That was more toward dry than this one, if I understand the scale correctly. For us, Scott Harvey recommendation = autobuy.

losthighwayz wrote:Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

That's been the rule for years, but most people "overlook" it.

losthighwayz wrote:Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

The answer to that question is always, "I have none".

losthighwayz wrote:Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

Your kidding right!?!???

Current numbers (updated each minute)
First sucker: rjquillin
Speed to first woot: 1m 16.447s
Last wooter to woot: cynthylee

These sound like some very nice spring/summer wines. Since spring has arrived two months early in Minnesota, that must mean drink now! It's always good to see one of our favorite makers pop in with happy comments, providing us with that little extra push to say "I want one!" or two. Cheers!

slm9951 wrote:Where's Mschauber?

I'm here...

Go Blue!

What's up?

natalieug wrote:I need more wine-drinking friends! My wine "cellar" is at capacity and I'm not allowed to buy any more until there's room again. I really want to get this - it's a deal and it looks like a great wine for spring and summer and I'm curious about Michigan wine.

I'm in the same boat. But this deal may be too good to pass up. I must read the rest of the thread and see what people have said ;)

bsevern wrote:That's been the rule for years, but most people "overlook" it.

Damn you're polite.. Overlook, hah, that gave me a good chuckle

"None"

ddeuddeg wrote:For us, Scott Harvey recommendation = autobuy.

That's a pretty good rule of thumb.

losthighwayz wrote:Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

Does the winery not have to collect and remit sales tax in conjunction with retaining it's permits to ship wine into the state?? I can't imagine that the state would require a winery to register and receive permission to ship wine into the state, collect and remit all applicable state alcohol taxes, and not also require that applicable sales tax also be collected and remitted.

In WA state, my receipts from wine country say that the price includes all applicable sales tax.

Want to pull the trigger, but I'm waiting for mudman's input on a non-California wine.

Not really - went in for one several hours ago.

mschauber wrote:I'm here...

Go Blue!

What's up?

Hi! I was just surprised you were not on the boards at 12:01 when this Mi wine came up!!!!! Wondering where you were!!!!

mschauber wrote:I'm in the same boat. But this deal may be too good to pass up. I must read the rest of the thread and see what people have said ;)

Wine always makes a nice gift for others...enjoy what you like and gift the others to some friends!

slm9951 wrote:Hi! I was just surprised you were not on the boards at 12:01 when this Mi wine came up!!!!! Wondering where you were!!!!

I was trying my hardest to fall asleep without staying up for the early morning (1am) woot deal change over... I failed Sort of like I'm failing to not pull the trigger on this offer. I have soooo much more wine than I have space for and than I can drink. Yet MI wines, argh..

Valverdes blown save makes it even tougher to say no though... He and Mo both had bad SOs...

misswinegirl wrote:Wine always makes a nice gift for others...enjoy what you like and gift the others to some friends!

The problem is that the friends I do have that drink wine want my best stuff, the exact stuff I save for my selfish self ;)

misswinegirl wrote:Wine always makes a nice gift for others...enjoy what you like and gift the others to some friends!

It also makes a great last minute "nuts, I have been invited to this party and should bring the host something" thing.

Not that I've ... yeah, we all have.

mschauber wrote:The problem is that the friends I do have that drink wine want my best stuff, the exact stuff I save for my selfish self ;)

I know, really ticks me off!!! Its hard when you are known for wine excellence!!!!

Thanks for listening and doing a Michigan Reisling! I miss my Michigan wines now that I'm down here in Texas. They look at me like I'm nuts whenever I ask at a store if they carry Michigan wines

bsevern wrote:Here's a Gary Vaynerchuk double blind tasting on St Julian Riesling:


Double Blind, Other 46 Tasting. – Episode #607

This is one of the funniest videos I have ever seen. He has great ways of describing wines.. (Mr. Clean, bizarro, transgendered... Worth the view for the humor.)

mschauber wrote:This is one of the funniest videos I have ever seen. He has great ways of describing wines.. (Mr. Clean, bizarro, transgendered... Worth the view for the humor.)

I love the guy!! Ahem...in a non, err, well you know!

He's a great wine blogger. I've learned a LOT watching his videos, they've enticed me to try wines I never thought about, and to appreciate wines from different perspectives.

It's a shame he no longer does his wine blog videos.

North316 wrote:The answer to that question is always, "I have none".

I'd be pretty careful with that response. As I understand things, states get paid their alcohol tax any time wine is shipped in from out of state and so they know that you've bought from out-of-state. Sales tax may or may not have been paid on that shipment. I've started watching whether sales tax was paid on my wine buys.

misswinegirl wrote:Hey all,
This is Nancie, St. Julian's winemaker!

A winemaker with a black woot square?! AWESOME!!!!

tytiger58 wrote:Your kidding right!?!???

HAHAHA!!!!!

I have not had this particular year but have had St. Julian's PG & Riesling. Love this stuff. This deal is pretty great!

-From a person that is a Michigander at heart but lives in Chicago-land...

And yes, I have stopped at the winery along 94 and picked up several other wines. Love St. Julian wine and grape vodka.

jwayner wrote:I'd be pretty careful with that response. As I understand things, states get paid their alcohol tax any time wine is shipped in from out of state and so they know that you've bought from out-of-state. Sales tax may or may not have been paid on that shipment. I've started watching whether sales tax was paid on my wine buys.

Considering you pay taxes based on your SS# and/or EIN, either of which do Woot or the wineries have, that's a pretty big leap for the states to make from a shipping list to your personal taxes. I happen to have a cousin with the same name as mine and an address in the same city I live in. There would be no way for the state to differentiate who bought the wine.

Alcohol tax is definitely different than standards sales tax, but as a reseller, I have a NYS sales tax # and pay quarterly sales taxes to NYS. But when I sell items people in states I don't have a sales tax ID # in, it's their responsibility to report it. I have a hard time believing that wineries have to pay the tax if shipping out of state, therefore the states may know total sales, but beyond that, not much. Like I said, this may be different for alcohol.

IMHO, it's no different than buying from mail order in NJ. There's no NJ tax and technically I'm responsible for paying the NYS sales tax, but 'yah, right...' You hear that NYS dept of taxation!!! Don't come knocking on my door, unless you want a glass of wine ;)

losthighwayz wrote:Im from CA and my tax guy asked for all purchases i made online that were not taxed. I guess the golden years are over! I will have to take Tax into account from now on. Anyone else in CA experience this?

California wants their 10% cut of all purchases made by citizens of their state. They don't care if many internet companies have no brick and mortar presence in-state, they want you to pay sales tax on everything you buy. They won't raise income taxes, the politicians know they won't get re-elected if they do, but they have no problem nickel and dime-ing everyone via ever higher sales taxes, parcel taxes, fees, and tolls to make up deficits in their income and budgets.

I'm pretty sure many other states also would like a chunk of income tax from internet sales, too. Supporting income tax increase is a career suicide move for any professional politician so it's easy to see why they want Amazon, et al to give them their 'rightful' due.

I too am from Michigan (Go Green!) and live 20 min from their tasting room.

This Riesling is one of my staple wines and this price is a steal of a deal! I love having spicy Asian food with it, but it can also stand on its own as an apéritif.

Go for two!!

mschauber wrote:Like I said, this may be different for alcohol.

The difference is that if you ship alcohol into a state, you need to register with a state agency and get approval to do so. That's how the state ensures they get their alcohol taxes. I just can't imagine that a state agency that has a prime mission of collecting taxes due from out of state vendors shipping product into the state would require sellers to remit alcohol taxes but not sales taxes.

noslensj wrote:The difference is that if you ship alcohol into a state, you need to register with a state agency and get approval to do so. That's how the state ensures they get their alcohol taxes. I just can't imagine that a state agency that has a prime mission of collecting taxes due from out of state vendors shipping product into the state would require sellers to remit alcohol taxes but not sales taxes.

If that's the case, then why has wine.woot never charged me tax? The other woot sites do charge me tax. Actually, there has only been one non-NY winery that has charged me tax and none of the wine.woot type places have.

If I understand you correctly, you're saying that a winery or wine seller in CA must pay an alcohol tax to NYS when they ship to NYS?

I almost didn't buy the wine that I ended up buying from the one winery that did charge me NYS tax because once you add 8.875% onto the cost of wine plus shipping, even good QPRs are often not good QPRs anymore. I always look at the total cost per bottle, not the sale/list price. I do all my online shopping that way because it doesn't matter whose hands the money is going into, it's how much that leaving mine which matters, lol.

mschauber wrote:Considering you pay taxes based on your SS# and/or EIN, either of which do Woot or the wineries have, that's a pretty big leap for the states to make from a shipping list to your personal taxes. I happen to have a cousin with the same name as mine and an address in the same city I live in. There would be no way for the state to differentiate who bought the wine.

Alcohol tax is definitely different than standards sales tax, but as a reseller, I have a NYS sales tax # and pay quarterly sales taxes to NYS. But when I sell items people in states I don't have a sales tax ID # in, it's their responsibility to report it. I have a hard time believing that wineries have to pay the tax if shipping out of state, therefore the states may know total sales, but beyond that, not much. Like I said, this may be different for alcohol.

IMHO, it's no different than buying from mail order in NJ. There's no NJ tax and technically I'm responsible for paying the NYS sales tax, but 'yah, right...' You hear that NYS dept of taxation!!! Don't come knocking on my door, unless you want a glass of wine ;)

It is different than mail order because the state appears to be getting reports with names and addresses and correlating those back to taxpayers and in the case of Wisconsin, sending out hundreds of audit letters, each with an individual case ID corresponding to an open case. I don't have any idea what other states are doing, if anything.

jwayner wrote:It is different than mail order because the state appears to be getting reports with names and addresses and correlating those back to taxpayers and in the case of Wisconsin, sending out hundreds of audit letters, each with an individual case ID corresponding to an open case. I don't have any idea what other states are doing, if anything.

But that's similar to the early days of red light cameras where they took pictures of the license plate but not the driver and sent a moving violation ticket to the registered owner of the car. That's a leap which wouldn't stand up in court. If states want to do that, they need to require wineries that they license to ship to their states to collect a TIN. Not to mention that wine.woot would have to stop printing on their packing slips that the price includes, "Sales tax where applicable."

If WI or any other state is sending out such letters then it's a scare tactic and they expect most people to just pay up to avoid an 'audit.' There's a legal term for that, it's "coercion" and it's very illegal, regardless whether it's a government agency doing it or the head of the Gotti crime family.

jwayner wrote:It is different than mail order because the state appears to be getting reports with names and addresses and correlating those back to taxpayers and in the case of Wisconsin, sending out hundreds of audit letters, each with an individual case ID corresponding to an open case. I don't have any idea what other states are doing, if anything.

Not being an attorney and not knowing anything about taxes, I think that's absurd! What if you move or what if someone shares your name or you send wine to a friend to hold it for you or or or...

Edit: what he said ^^^!

Let's burn this mother to the ground!!!!

kylemittskus wrote:
Let's burn this mother to the ground!!!!

And drink a low price, high QPR, tax FREE bottle of wine while we watch it burn

mschauber wrote:"

If WI or any other state is sending out such letters then it's a scare tactic and they expect most people to just pay up to avoid an 'audit.' There's a legal term for that, it's "coercion" and it's very illegal, regardless whether it's a government agency doing it or the head of the Gotti crime family.

It's more than a scare tactic. They do have records for purchases made and can reference a specific purchase - winery and date, so they are not just fishing. Amazing what you can do with computers these days...

Enough tax talk - I want to see what they're growing across the lake. In for one.

Gotta support the a Midwest offering when it comes up.

We'll look forward to trying this and may see if we can swing by the winery this summer.

jwayner wrote:Enough tax talk - I want to see what they're growing across the lake. In for one.

Hah! I like your spirit. Be sure to check back in when you get it and let us know what you think.

Was just about to be in for one but then saw CT wooters can't make this purchase. Why we can buy some and not others escapes me.