I made a purchase from Kogan.com and was sent a “gift” of a $100 wine voucher. I attempted to use the voucher but my order for over $100 worth of their wines would not process. I then read the “fine print” and saw that the voucher would only be honoured if I purchased at least 12 bottles of wine. When I complained, I was told that my order would be honoured if I spent $17 more in the order. I then again went back to the fine print and saw that the other condition was that the order had to be for more than $155.88. This is misleading and deceptive. The fine print says you have to purchase 12 bottles AND spend more than that amount but when you make a complaint, you are given conflicting information. More to the point, the voucher describes itself as a “gift”. It isn’t a gift if it’s conditional. This is a conditional discount and that should be made clear in the large print, not just the small print. The voucher should not be allowed to describe itself as a “gift” because it isn’t a gift, it is a closely calculated conditional discount on overpriced bottles of wine which ensures the company still makes a profit. It’s a very old deception - raise the price then claim that you’re “discounting” it. My real objection is to having “fine print” conditions in 2019 - but having looked closer (with my reading glasses) the actual objection is to the claim they are giving a “gift” when it is nothing of the sort. I think both Kogan and Naked Wines are at fault.
Welcome to the Choice Community Forum Mackin Oz 
Unfortunately this type of dodgy misrepresentation is all too common these days, I blame the marketing people who decided to call these vouchers ‘gifts’, when they are nothing of the sort.
Naked Wines routinely send out discount vouchers to entice new customers, no purchase required for the voucher, but with the required minimum purchase.
Indeed, we have received them slipped in with online orders for various foods from several different companies, so they have certainly spread them far and wide. After looking at what they required to redeem it the first time, they go straight into the paper recycling.
Yep… I’m with you on that Gordon. Used once & never again. I wasn’t overly impressed with the wines either.
I received a similar ‘gift’ voucher after an order from Kogan. After reading the ‘gift voucher’ conditions it was filed in the rubbish bin where it belonged. Funnily enough, I wasn’t at all grateful to Kogan for my ‘gift’.
I received one yesterday and I also filed it in the rubbish bin.
I received mine from an online pet store that I usually bulk buy pet food from and have received them from other online retailers (including Kogan) in the past. Curious about the return on these kinds of dodgy schemes.
The entire wine industry appears to be nothing more than one giant scam.
Every man and his dog are emailing half price offers for a dozen bottles of wine, ranging from the likes of Qantas and Kogan to Dan Murphy and First Choice Liquor.
It seems to have about as much credibility as the sale prices at Robin’s Kitchen and Strandbags.
Just think of the public service they perform in generating enough outrage to replace 45 minutes of cardiovascular exercise daily.
Mass produced wine is very cheap, before taxes or packaging costs and all the other adds ons.
Some say these online bargain wines simply takes chateau cardboard quality wine and upgrade the container to glass. Appears there is nothing misleading in all this. It is after all “quality bottled” wine. 
Those of us who drink a sufficient amount of wine to be ‘good customers’ have learnt that there are some excellent bargains, just not the bargains they spruik.
When one sees RRP $150 on sale for $25 you usually get a solid bottle of $25 wine 
My favs don’t come from the mass merchants but between the vineyard wine club and a local shop irregular special, I usually get 20-30% off. As @mark_m opined more than a few of the labels from those specials are labels, not vineyards, but regardless some are reliably good and a great many are reliably quite ordinary or variable.
Such is life in the wine game.
Naked Wines are not “mass produced”, but the product of often small individual winemakers.
I think some of you guys are being precious, not to mention a little bit ignorant about wine. Naked Wines does a real service to small wineries who might otherwise have difficulty reaching a viable marketplace. The quality is generally good…certainly better than a similarly priced random dozen picked from Dan Murphy.
Yes there are some dodgy online wine vendors out there but Naked Wines is not one of them.
In the forty years I have been buying either online or through mail subscription, only two have provided ultra reliable service in terms of price and quality. One is Naked Wines. The other is The Australian wine club or whatever they call it. I despise The Australian newspaper for its despicable politics, but the associated wine club is very very good. I hate buying from Tories but there you have it.
The only real alternative is to move to Europe where decent wine can be had for one quarter of the price we pay here.
Cheers
Firstly, welcome to the forum, and secondly thank you for your input and comment.
All views respectfully offered are welcomed.
Sometimes it is useful to follow through the discussion from the opening of a topic. The principle comments at the beginning of the topic were not about the quality of the wines produced by Naked Wines. They were a discussion and critique of the marketing tactics.
It may be useful to add if you have some greater knowledge or opinions whether the marketing tactics discussed are fair or reasonable?
In respect of quality the discussion in my view has offered some broader comments on the quality of wines offered through direct marketing. My specific comment did not specify any particular producer or reseller. An often repeated comment used to support the apparent massive discounts (Not real discounts in many instances),
Many wines produced both in volume and smaller producers are released as cleanskin, blended or retailer branded products. The quality does vary. In difference often to the asking price.
No judgment of any particular wine maker intended. Branded or otherwise. Sometimes good quality wine is sold at great discounts to clear cellars, or for cashflow.
Perhaps “Naked Wines” needs to reconsider seriously who it partners with and how it promotes it’s deals?
Welcome to the forum. Your comment suggests the crux of the matter beyond what @mark_m already posted. Those of us who drink and appreciate wine do not grab ‘random dozens’ from any vendor. We are generally discerning and often try new labels.
While Naked Wines is an outlet for small vineyards, unfortunately wine has become a business of labels more than vineyards, and the two are not congruent concepts. I buy some wine from Cellarmasters (Woolies) that are labels not vineyards, but the wine is well priced and often very high quality by any measure excepting true pedigree.
I also occasionally buy from other mass merchandisers but most often direct from known vineyards. That Naked Wines tries to put small vineyards into my lens of ‘known’ vineyards is commendable, but once again the point of the topic is how they do it - some of their partners portray it as a gift when it is nothing more than a discount to become a customer, and available from more sources than many of us can keep track of.
BTW, after having spent a few weeks in Germany and Ireland recently, I was not impressed with most of the wines on offer in restaurants. The offers were mostly ordinary, limited, but as you noted could be comparatively cheap but were not always so.
Each of us has our own preferences and value systems for most everything, including wine, and no disparagement was intended toward Naked Wines nor their small vineyard clientele beyond the marketing program.
Thank you guys for your thoughtful replies.
Wherever you source your wine, I trust that you enjoy it.
Regarding Europe …yes I drank a fair bit of ordinary wine purchased in restaurants. Generally the wine we purchased from stores at around 5 euros was surprisingly good for the price.
As for sale tactics, you are all probably right that Naked Wines has partnered poorly with marketing outfits…it would be a pity if this discouraged people from trying their product and service, which I think is pretty good
Cheers
Just an update. This issue on this thread is the illegal misuse of the word “gift”. It’s as simple as an issue could be - a “gift” is not a “gift” if there are any conditions. You don’t tell your kids they have to do all their chores on Christmas morning before they get to open any presents.
I’ve made a complaint to the ACCC in regard to the “misleading and deceptive conduct” clauses of the Trade Practices Act. They replied that they have taken note of the complaint but they don’t handle individual complaints. So now I’m going off to my state MP to complain to the NSW consumer protection agency (they keep changing it’s name - politicians generally are owned by people who sell stuff and have scant interest in the opinions of people who buy stuff) but I know how to push their buttons.
I will update in due course. It won’t be soon - bureaucracies create work by making sure things happen as slowly as possible - but there will be a result. I’m hoping to have the word “gift” legally defined by legislation in NSW (if it isn’t already - I haven’t checked yet) to make sure ratbag companies who want to try this scam pay for it big time.
The moral of the story? If you want to antagonise people, try to make sure they aren’t lawyers…
Many gifts or products called gifts have conditions. A good example is say gift cards where the retailer can impose conditions in relation to their use, here is one example.
Gifts can also be conditional through things like eligible precipitants (where the gift can be conditional based on the characteristics of the recipient - such as all children under the age of 12 for a free gift by a retailer/service provider when a product or service is used/purchased), for redeeming (e.g. a free gift comes when a product is purchased) and there are many other examples where gifts are conditional.
If the voucher said that Naked Wines did not have terms and conditions and the voucher stated that it would provide $100 cash to anyone redeeming the voucher …and on redeeming the voucher Naked Wines then said that the $100 cash is conditional and only off an case of 12 wines, then this would be definitely misleading and deceptive conduct.
The ACCC also acknowledges that gifts, including gift cards and discount vouchers can have terms and conditions. Information from the ACCC on these is outlined on their website:
As the Naked Wines voucher had attached terms and conditions, and as the ACCC states:
Before you purchase or use a discount voucher, read the terms and conditions carefully. You may only be able to get the discount or gift if you buy:
- from specified businesses
- another particular product or service from the business
- at certain times or on certain days
- before the offer expires or stocks run out.
Interesting business model, and guess what, it is a multinational or at least operates in AU, the US, and UK. A wikipedia page needing work has them starting in the UK in 2008 and being bought by Majestic Wines in 2015. They have a lot of generally positive press but whether it is driven by their customers or marketing arm will never be known.
Google returned what appears to be a US infomercial style ‘interview’.
and shades of Auspost’s marketing arm, a few years later.
Each region has the discount voucher program for first time customers and none suggest it is a gift. Is giving someone a discount voucher a ‘gift’? Could be so since anyone can give anyone anything they wish as a ‘gift’.
This makes me wonder if the topic banner should not be about Naked Wines, but about Kogan marketing, or categorising this are routine marketing puffery. I am inclined to put it in the last bin since we are subjected to such ‘ads’ day in and day out and not just for wines, although the discount programs are usually not called ‘gifts’ when put in our delivery boxes.
I think you are right - it should be about Kogan as much or more than Naked Wines.
And people are being precious for sure. The card is a gift - what you do with it is up to you. Throw it away or read it, then use what it offers or not. You didn’t make your original purchase because of the “gift” so it didn’t influence you. No harm done.
I think it’s poor marketing too, but just get over it. It’s certainly not worth an official complaint.
