Learning to Hate West Ridge Road Liquor

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rochester-NY/West-Ridge-Liquor/106039763651

I have always bought my wine from West Ridge Liquor- I was crushed when Century closed up shop and swore not to bring my business to them. When West Ridge Liquor opened up (it was written up in the D&C) I was excited. The first couple of weeks it was open I dropped several hundred dollars there- replenishing the supplies- but also to let them know they were welcome back in the community.

That's changed. They've changed- and not for the better.

The last few times I've been in there the staff is as helpful as ... well, I can't really describe it properly. Let's relate an incident- I was looking for a wine "Casa", Cab Sauv, which I had bought a week earlier. It wasn't anywhere near the Cabs (where it was supposed to be).

The clerk was useless- he said "I've never heard of that" and went back to doing his IM or texting. The next one said there were 20 bottles in the store, but couldn't say where. Eventually I found them on the wrong shelf- and when I brought one to the clerk he said "Oh, CASA" with the tone that implied had I just said it again he would have known exactly where it was.

Which is why it was hilarious he spent 15 minutes trying to find the unopened case that I bought.

I then spent 2 weeks waiting for the rebate that was supposed to go with the wine. When it did finally show, they kindly included the Cline Winery rebate- but the wrong dates. Several back and forth conversations with various clerks, trying to demand my rebate form to get my 30$ back. All this did was waste air time. Their final comment was "Well, I'm sorry the distributor is out of rebate forms. Sometimes they do this to limit the responses". WTF- you advertised it on your shelf... and you won't make good on your promise?

I even tried to return the wine, but they refused stating there was no returns on wine. It's a great scam, really- offer a huge rebate, 'lose the form', and then tell the customer they're stuck with their purchase.

I passed on the option to charge back the entire amount of the purchase- over 200$- as tempting as it was I was on the road too much for work with not enough time to do the paperwork and chase down managers (none of which ever seemed to be in).

Having written a letter and received no response my next step is to send one off with a return receipt. Jimmy Ren, are you listening?

Because I'm a PITA, I'm also going to use one of the contacts I have at the ABC (Alcohol Beverage Control) to see if there is anything that can be done for false advertising of prices. I'm sure I read about that somewhere.

These two incidents show a marked decline in the quality of the folks working at West Ridge Road Liquor.Thus, I can no longer recommend them as a source... and I'll probably switch to Marketview Liquor. A little further, a little pricier- but saving that 30 cents a bottle doesn't mean much when you get screwed out of 50$.