Wine tastings via Twitter

A few years ago we wrote about technology-enhanced wine tastings offered by Vinotek and VinoVenue. Now a new Massachusetts-based retailer of off-price wines is taking the technology aspect a step further with wine tastings by Twitter. Bin Ends, which was started up earlier this year, is now gearing up for its second Twitter Taste Live, which will be held this Thursday–the first one was in July. The project aims to give wine enthusiasts around the globe a chance to join the world’s top wine personalities online for tastings via the popular social networking tool Twitter. Users need only set up a free Twitter account and then follow binendswine on the service. In the U.S., they can also order the wines being tasted from Bin Ends three weeks prior to the event, with free shipping across the country (Bin Ends does not ship internationally). Then, equipped with the wines and their Twitter account, users can join the event as it takes place, commenting, asking questions and enjoying back-and-forth interaction with the winemakers in real time. Tastings generally take place the third Thursday of every month at 7 p.m. Eastern U.S. time, and are announced on Twitter, Facebook and Bin Ends’ own website. Besides encouraging sales and trial of newer and lesser-known wines (one might even consider this a mostly paid version of tryvertising!), Bin Ends’ tasting program also offers consumers a generous splash of status skills through their interaction with wine experts. It remains to be seen if Bin Ends will track which tastings consumers participate in and use that to help guide future purchase choices, the way Vinotek and VinoVenue do. Either way, though, this is one to watch–and emulate. Vintners, take note! Spotted by: RK