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- Best cellar software?
I'm curious to know what you all are using for cellar software. I'm ready to start shopping! I don't particularly like the UI of CellarTracker, so looking for other suggestions (or why you love CellarTracker so much you could never use anything else!).
I of course want to keep track of my inventory, but also get reminders about what needs to be drunk by when. My hand-written system is getting harder and harder to follow!
I actually think I saw an ad on Snooth for a company and checked them out and like what I saw, but I didn't bookmark it and now I can't find it. Seems like there are lots of offerings out there.
Thanks for any help! :)
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3027 - Reply by Philip, Sep 28.
Have you tried using Snooth for it? If you click on the "interact" button just under the wine image of any wine, you can check "add to cellar", and then type in how many you own, and where they are stored.
You can also manage, and make changes from the myWines section.
See the images to follow:
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- Reply by cookypuss1, Sep 28.
I have tinkered around with that function, but it's a little too basic for what I'm looking to do. I need to have a "drink-by" reminder. Plus, for some reason, a lot of what I review on Snooth isn't in the database, so I have to enter the wine manually first and then review it. Will take a lot of time. Are there any enhancements to Snooth's capabilities in the works? :)
Has anyone tried thewinecurators.com? It's only $50, so I might give it a try.
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1160 - Reply by dmcker, Sep 29.
Well, Philip, does sound like something to aim at for Snooth, and perhaps well within reach once you're able to prioritize it. Though, cookypuss1, unfortunately not now.
Here are the features listed for thewinecurators software, v.3.0, on their website at
http://www.thewinecurators.com/PWCmain.shtml
--Easily Organize All Your Wine Data
--Unique Aging Potential Calculator
--Wine Maturity Tracker
--Quick Data Entry
--Scan or Make Barcodes and Print Labels
--Access PWC Community - Instantly Import Wine Data - Read Notes from Other Users
--Over 7,500 Food and Wine Pairings
--PC and Mac® Compatible
It seems to me that Snooth could have many advantages over a standalone program like this. More and better wine ratings and food pairings, better mobility/portability, a larger community, better forum, etc. Weren't we even talking in another thread about other aspects of cellar portfolio management, including current market value of the cellared wines? The only inherent advantage to the standalone approach might be in the area of security/privacy.
Finally, cookypuss, 'use-by' dates for wine, given on Snooth and elsewhere, are extremely vague and iffy. Many I've seen are, as I know from personal experience, wrong on both ends, meaning the wine is not yet ready in some cases for the 'from' date, and when cellared well is often still in its prime long after the 'to' date. I've had much more success flying by the seat of my pants, going by my gut, whatever, when it comes to best time to drink...
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3027
- Reply by Philip, Sep 29.
This is a very helpful thread for us. I want to continue to bat the concept around for a while, collecting feedback and learning what features are most important to people.
Cooky - where do you live? Its strange to hear we are missing that many wines.
So, what are the key features for an application like this? Here's my list, please help and add to it:
- Ability to track inventory
- Record purchase price, location, drinking windows and other attributes by bottle or lot
- Market valuation of inventory, based on current retail price of bottles
- Ability to sort inventory by what must be drunk first, as well as other sorting in general (quantity of each bottle etc)
- Quick way to deplete inventory as its drunk
I'm sure there are many other items, but let me know what else would be required.
Thanks
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36 - Reply by rar8888, Sep 29.
I agree that snooth currently isn't able to meet my cellar needs. Currently I use a free website manageyourcellar.com. It may not have everything that you are looking for but it does include everything on Philips list as well as a few fun things like a quick way to create a cellar book and your wine drinking statistics.
http://www.manageyourcellar.com/
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331 - Reply by Eric Guido, Sep 29.
Cellar tracker is great for the truly obsessive compulsive wine collector. If you need analysis, reports of anything to do with wine you can think of then Cellar Tracker is for you. It would be hard for me to spell it out in a message like this but after a day or two of using the software I became addicted and now love it.
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1160
- Reply by dmcker, Sep 30.
So as to concentrate more info in this single thread, here are the 'benefits' that Cellar Tracker advertises at http://www.cellartracker.com/intro.asp
* Participate in a vibrant community of wine enthusiasts: 83,478 users with 14,211,087 bottles
* Browse the world's most complete wine database
* Enjoying the world's largest collection of 1,049,697 free wine reviews from real users
* Manage your wine cellar inventory
* Track the value of your collection
* Learn more about wine
* Anytime, anywhere access from a PDA, mobile phone, or the cool Cor.kz iPhone application!
And here are the features they mention:
Cellar Inventory Management
* Report and search by producer, vintage, varietal, drinkability, etc.
* Purchase price and valuation data (locale settable)
* Consumption history
* Barcode support
* Restaurant-quality printed wine lists
* Per-bottle location & bin tracking
* Personal tasting notes
* Uploadable label images
* Wish lists and shopping lists
* Track pending deliveries (a.k.a futures)
* Premium feature: Automatic valuation of your cellar including data from WineBid.com (read more)
* Express import tools for existing spreadsheets (read more)
Tasting Notes
* Record your own notes
* Group a series of notes into tasting events
* Read community tasting notes
* See what others say about wine in your cellar
* Automated integration with Stephen Tanzer's IWC (for co-subscribers)
* Store other professional reviews and scores (in compliance with copyright)
* Community bulletin board
I don't have their software (or any of the others mentioned above), but have referenced some of the tasting notes they post, on web searches of wines I'm thinking of buying but am not all that familiar with. I also look many other places, too ;-)
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3027
- Reply by Philip, Sep 30.
Lots of features there, I'm just wondering what people who use Snooth actually need or want in such a product, if we were to build it?
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- Reply by rar8888, Sep 30.
My suggestion is to check out manageyourcellar.com. It is free and has most of the basic features. I am sure that the functionality could be improved but I think this is a good starting place.
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331
- Reply by Eric Guido, Sep 30.
Thanks dmcker, I was pretty rushed when I left my first message about cellar tracker. Honestly, I think the interface is a bit jarring at first but once you get into it the pros outweigh the cons significantly.
