I am doing some renovation to a home we recently purchased in Western North Carolina adjacent to the Smoky Mountain National Park. Given my age (59) and the likely amount of time we will be there each year I have decided not to add a wine room/cellar there but go with wine refrigerators. I am looking for any experience or recommendations you might have.
In our Boston home we have a couple of wine refrigerators in the basement and I am very disappointed in them. My builder bought them and they are a couple of reasonably solid looking units but they are Chinese made and the shelving in particular is enough to make you scream. Many of them slightly warped/misaligned just enough such that when you pull a drawer open it often drags one or two more open and retrieving wines can be difficult and labels are often scraped severely in the process. I would say I only use about 75% of the capacity due to this “feature”. I definitely don’t want those again.
On our new project the person is recommending 2 Sub-Zero “30” Classic Wine Storage” (Model # BW-30S) which claim to hold 146 bottles each. That is about the right storage amount and given the price I may go with just one. Being Sub-Zero, no price is too high....MSRP is $8,775 per unit.
I was wondering if anyone has other perspectives or experience. I have seen some Euro Cave coolers that look to be about half the price. I am most interested in quality and reliability (we will be in this house only a few months a year max) and am willing PO pay something for that.....but if there is a good option below the Sub Zero price point that would be welcome!!