Sandra Silfven: Wine

State's vintners, fans connect via clubs

Join the club.

Visitors to Michigan wineries have another option to driving to tasting rooms for purchases. They can enroll in a winery's wine club and get instant VIP treatment -- discounts that build over time, newsletters, free tastings and first dibs on new releases, and small-batch and rare wines.

Members of Larry Mawby's Bubbleheads club snapped up all the bottles of his first release of 2002 Mille last year.

When the Leelanau vintner releases more bottles of his luxury sparkling wine this year, he'll again offer them first to club members.

There's a charge for shipping, but for customers and vintners, it's a way to connect.

"People like to be active participants at the winery. And those people are the ambassadors for your products," says Chris Lopez, who runs the largest wine club in the state at the Winery at Black Star Farms in Suttons Bay.

The club has upward of 900 members.

The rules and perks vary at each winery, but basically customers sign up for a shipment (or they can pick it up to save on shipping charges) four times a year.

Some wineries give people a choice of wines, others, like Black Star, send surprises -- but in the customer's choice of dry, sweet or mixed styles.

Black Star's June shipment, for example, of dry wines includes the 2008 Arcturos Dry Riesling and the first release of a new Pinot Noir -- the 2007 A Capella.

The cost with shipping is $50.

Jennifer Antel and husband Ray of Wayland, Mich., in Allegan County, have been members of Black Star's wine club for the last five years.

"I like the surprise of getting the different wines Lee Lutes (winemaker) has chosen. We get notification on special events. They treat you special when you go there -- they know you by name," Antel says.

Clubs usually offer various levels of participation, based on price or quantity.

Depending on the purchase, members get a 10 percent to 25 percent discount on everything they buy at the tasting room.

St. Julian, the state's biggest winery, in large part created the Braganini Reserve line to offer to wine club members, said president David Braganini.

His club members are the first to get new wines, sometimes months before they are available in tasting rooms.

Kristy McClellan runs the club at Bowers Harbor Vineyards on Old Mission Peninsula.

"We have about a hundred members and offer shipments of two, six and 12 bottles sent quarterly," she said.

Customers pretty much dictate which wines they want. And besides tasting-room discounts, members get a free glass of wine with cheese and crackers when they pay a visit.

Wine clubs are a form of "relationship" marketing that works on both ends -- customers become "insiders" with special privileges, and wineries build an alliance of faithful customers.

ssilfven@detnews.com (313) 222-2440