Team C&J
Sometimes a really good wine calls for a really great food pairing, and unless your day job includes the title ‘world-class restaurant chef,’ not all of us are equipped to bring out the best in the bottles of wine, we’re holding onto in our cellars. That’s where corkage comes in! Because bringing a great bottle from your personal collection to one of your favorite restaurants is one of the greatest joys a wine lover can experience.
The other benefit to corkage is that it allows you to enjoy a standout wine for a fraction of the cost that it is listed at on a wine list. Depending on the bottle, that could translate into hundreds of dollars in savings.
To better understand corkage, how it works, and what you should expect if you BYOB your own wine, we’ve put together some of the most common questions about corkage and a few FAQs to ask before you arrive at the restaurant.
We have recently launched our corkage site. That can be accessed by clicking on the corkage button on the top right of the screen or by visiting corkandjourney.com. We have thousands of different restaurants, and their corkage rate is listed there.
Corkage is a fee charged by a restaurant when a customer brings their own bottle of wine to enjoy with their meal. Essentially, charging for corkage allows a restaurant to make up part of the revenue they would have earned from selling the customer a bottle of wine from their own wine list. The corkage fee can vary from restaurant to restaurant and is typically charged per bottle.
If you’re newer to the wine scene, you may be wondering what a corkage fee is for. And why does the restaurant care if I bring my own wine?
Restaurants have a few revenue streams that come from a mix of food sales, alcohol sales, and retail elements. Food margins have historically been razor thin, so a significant portion of a restaurant’s revenue actually comes from alcohol sales.
Alcohol markups usually sit somewhere around 2-4x the wholesale cost, which means if the restaurant purchases a bottle for $25 on the wine list, it will be priced between $50 to $100. With margins that robust, every time a diner who would otherwise purchase a bottle from the list brings their own, the restaurant loses considerable profit.
To sum up, having a corkage fee in place encourages diners to purchase from the house list rather than bringing their own bottles.
Corkage fees vary by restaurant, city, and state, but recently the price hike in corkage fees has been a point of contention between diners and restaurant owners. There’s a great article in the San Francisco Chronicle that takes a deeper dive into the issues at stake, but in a nutshell, corkage fees are on the rise, and to many who have been bringing their own bottles of wine to restaurants for years, feel the industry is taking advantage of a post-pandemic world where prices continue to be inflated, and everything just seems more expensive.
Using a site like corkandjourney.com is a sure way to guarantee you have the most up-to-date information on how much a restaurant’s corkage fees are and if they even allow corkage.
It’s also worth noting that in a handful of states, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Illinois, and Massachusetts among them, it is illegal for a customer to bring their own bottle of wine, or any alcoholic beverage, for that matter, into a restaurant.
Most wine lovers make a point of taking a look at a restaurant’s wine list before dining, especially if they’re celebrating a special occasion dinner like a birthday or anniversary.
Some restaurants take great pains to curate a list that features a bottle in every price point and every style of wine and include a diverse mix of wine regions and grape varieties. These establishments have well-thought-out wine programs and put tremendous effort into having something for everyone.
Others, as seasoned wine aficionados, discover when dining out, have lackluster selections that are unappealing to diners who have developed their palates, and know the producers, varieties, and styles of wine they like – and are willing to spend money on.
If a diner truly finds that a wine list is stacked with selections they’re just not that interested in, paying a corkage is absolutely worth it. Likewise, if you have a bottle of 2015 Gaja Barbaresco Nebbiolo at home, and you paid the retail price of $279, and the restaurant is charging almost $700 on the list, then paying the corkage is a good call.
The biggest deterrent for a consumer not to pay the corkage is when a restaurant charges such an obscene amount per bottle – imagine $100+. In this situation, it might be a better bet to just purchase from the list or perhaps choose a different restaurant.
Even if corkage is legal in the state you’re dining in, the restaurant may still prohibit diners from bringing their own bottle. If you’ve planned your dining experience around a special bottle, you will absolutely want to verify the corkage with the restaurant before dining.
Corkage fees vary by restaurant. If you’re planning on bringing more than one bottle, be aware that most restaurants will charge one price for the first bottle, say $25, and more for the second bottle, say $50.
Restaurants typically place a limit on the number of bottles a customer can bring with them. Diners can usually bring no more than 2 bottles to a restaurant.
Some restaurants will allow large parties to bring their own wine and be perfectly happy charging you a corkage for each bottle you bring. You may even get a little extra wiggle room on this if you’re reserving a space during “off hours,” which may not be as busy. Say a corporate holiday lunch, for example. Other restaurants will prohibit large parties from bringing their own bottles, regardless.
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