wine inventory software preferences

I was reading through Amy's responses to her inquiry about wine inventory software and it seems the only software discussed was CellarTracker. I'm curious; has anyone used Vinfolio or Intelliscanner, or any other software? I'm also curious about the scanning capabilities of these different programs. I've never used a scanner in my cellar, and a good percent of my cellar is pre-scanner, however it seems to me that a scanner would be a big time-saver. I'm about to do a full-cellar inventory (over 3000 bottles) and I have not inventoried in over 15 years, so I really want to ask around before I commit to a certain process.
One more question: Why is it that no one is using the scanner. It it just a hassle. Or does it kill the "romance" or what? Mostly, I'm just taking an informal poll on this last question.

Hi, Eva. Welcome to the Forum.

I am using a rather old database system called Multimedia Wine Companion. It was given to me free of charge quite a few years ago. Although it has some restrictions and a few annoying bugs, I have worked around them over the years. So, this product, along with a handy Excel spreadsheet for visually displaying my wine collection, does the job for me.

One of these days I'll likely get around to selecting an upgrade, but right now I have no need to do so. My very strong preference would be for a system that stores my wine database on my PC, not on someone else's web site. I would also require that the SW be able to find wine and winemaker information from the web, so I do not have to do all of that manually. It is possible that CellarTracker can do all of this today; I just have not taken the time to research it.

As for barcodes, ... since all of my data is already in a database, I should not have any difficulty migrating it into a new one down the road. I would, therefore, not really have a need for a barcode system.

-- Clark

I just use Excel. I have entered a few on Cellar Tracker, and will probably eventually get everything over there. But for the time being, Excel works just fine.

: Why is it that no one is using the scanner. It it just a hassle. Or does it kill the "romance" or what? Mostly, I'm just taking an informal poll on this last question.

I use CT and am very pleased with it, but I do not use the scanner function for several reasons, one is the cost of buying the scanner and label printer, another is that I do not have enough bottles or enough movement of bottles to make it a time saving option.

I think on CT there are twoo function sfor the scanner. First is to input to the database details of your wine by using the winery bar cade on the winery label. You remark that many of your wines don'thave bar codes, and I think that not all the wines in the CT database are listed with bar codes anyway, so I think this option will save you little time.

The other -- and I believe -- major use for the scanner is to use the supplied CT function to print your own bar code label to uniquely identify each bottle (rather than the barcode on a wine label that identifies only the type of wine, not the unique bottle). Then as you remove a bottle from your cellar you pass it over the scanner and your record on the CT database is updated.

Looking at CT, it seems that a number of major wine consumers (restaurants*, golf clubs etc) are using CT and I can see how that function would assist them, but for my modest usage a scanner isn't necessary. (that is not to say that I when I first looked at CT the boy in my went 'wow - scan my own bar codea -- I want THAT!!!')

The info on CT bar-codes is here http://www.cellartracker.com/forum/Prin ... 691/tm.htm

and if you want first hand info on CT bar code usage you could post the question on the CT forum.

*Pluckemin Inn in New Jersey has 27,800 bottles listed in CT and if you go to their web site at http://www.pluckemininn.com/winelist.html you can get their wine list -- which is in fact the standard wine list auto generated from the CT database in realtime. How neat is that, to know exactly which wines a restaurant has in stock before you go there?

Looking at Intelliscanner they say

"AutoFill your way to a complete collection with an Internet-enabled database of over 67,000 wines worldwide, growing every day thanks to peer sharing. By simply scanning the barcode, Wine Collector will contact the master database and return automatically entered wine information in seconds."

So basically it does exactly the same as CT, ie. someone else must have entered the wine details and the barcode number into the database first. (because the barcode is just a number, it doesn't itself have the wine name or anything else)

Intelliscanner says "Today, we're at more than 67,000 records", CT has 3.5 million bottles from 468 regions in its database.

Vinfolio seems to be primarily for people who buy their wines from them. You can include wines from other sources but they charge, they say

" For other wine purchases, you can email service@vinfolio.com or fax a copy of the invoice to Customer Service at 415-946-1359 and the wine, cost details, and an invoice image will be imported into your account. The fee is $1.00 per unique wine and invoice scanning is included at no charge. Barcode/Case Labels - Vinfolio purchases are automatically barcoded to facilitate the management of your inventory in VinCellar. For other purchases, bottle barcode labels are $0.35 per label and case labels are $1.00 per label. Labels are mailed every Friday for orders received during the prior 7 days. "