The Auswine Forum

Nah...I hope grandad drinks them.
Cheers Craig

Reposting l:

Admin pls remove this if inappropriate.
Good day everyone. I want to alert this community to a serious break-in at National Storage, Klemzig (SA), （Wine Ark） where a number of wine vaults were compromised — reportedly at least 10 — resulting in the loss of many rare and fine wines. It’s understood to have occurred over Wednesday and Thursday.

A police report has been lodged. National Storage has not yet issued a statement.

I’d also urge everyone to watch for suspicious fine wines appearing on the grey/secondary market, and to flag anything that looks off.

Thank you, and have a lovely weekend.

No cameras?

Mynameislucluc wrote: ↑Sat Jul 25, 2026 1:58 pm Reposting l:

Admin pls remove this if inappropriate.
Good day everyone. I want to alert this community to a serious break-in at National Storage, Klemzig (SA), （Wine Ark） where a number of wine vaults were compromised — reportedly at least 10 — resulting in the loss of many rare and fine wines. It’s understood to have occurred over Wednesday and Thursday.

A police report has been lodged. National Storage has not yet issued a statement.

I’d also urge everyone to watch for suspicious fine wines appearing on the grey/secondary market, and to flag anything that looks off.

Thank you, and have a lovely weekend.

Thanks for that. I just ducked out for a quick look (just as the Mighty Blues won their game over the Suns!). No-one else there in the original section, no sign of any damage and my lockers were ok.

Yes Thanks Luc
Touched base with MJS.
If it's not hard enough to stump up the monthly fees, you have fuckers who have key pad access and a set of bolt cutters. Had a chat to staff on site today and it appears that locks were cut, then replaced with new locks. Thieves revisited the following day with matching keys to new locks. Then a punter turns up and wonders why their keys don't fit. Apparently 10 or so lockers affected. SAPOL notified, CC vision provided.
Thankfully I'm in the new section and unaffected. That said, very unnerving.
Cheers Craig

Extraordinary. How do people get access so easy?

JamieAdelaide wrote: ↑Sun Jul 26, 2026 1:53 am Extraordinary. How do people get access so easy?

Good question, one that the police and national storage can sort out.
Cheers Craig

It’s always been a nightmare of mine and I sympathise with those affected.

I’m elsewhere and I reckon if burgled the facility would wipe their hands clean and ask if you’d taken out the exorbitant insurance charged. Police I wouldn’t have faith they’d crack the case with limited resources and secondary market purveyors, yeah well, not so sure. I’m sure the wine would be moved!

I posted a few photos of rare wines a few years ago on FB and was contacted by a bloke asking where I’d got them from as his holiday house in SA burgled and the cellar taken. He was nice about it and said police asked him to keep a look out himself.

I won’t publicly divulge but I’ve take a few measures myself protect my cellar.

I was really pissed off last month. Left my ladder out in a secure wine storage area accidentally and someone pinched it. I was surprised staff didn’t take a bit more CCTV interest. It was ( once ) a very honest place and I’d returned stuff people accidentally left out including wine! My cellar next to the late Mark Wickman’s.

Yes I'm aware people use extra security... additional hidden cameras or air tag set ups. I'm tempted to get a texta or pocket knife and write on/score every label...haha. Making it an absolutely hopeless proposition if some arsehole wants to shift bottles on the second hand market.
We'll see what develops this week.
Cheers Craig

phillisc wrote: ↑Sun Jul 26, 2026 10:58 am Yes I'm aware people use extra security... additional hidden cameras or air tag set ups. I'm tempted to get a texta or pocket knife and write on/score every label...haha. Making it an absolutely hopeless proposition if some arsehole wants to shift bottles on the second hand market.
We'll see what develops this week.
Cheers Craig

reminds me back in the day that dessertspoons and other cutlery at Sigalas Cafe in Rundle St (pre-mall) were all engraved with "Stolen from Sigalas". My uncle may have brought one or two home to our joint when he was a younger man!

Jamie - your storage may or may not be the same, but NS and Kennards when I used them previously, both have an entry code for every person who stores wine. Codes are reasonably secure in my view and hard for someone to crack. If you have one you can easily enter the storage area and have access to all lockers, which are generally padlocked. So, someone's either got hold of a code or it's an inside job from an existing customer. At entry, I expect the code will be noted on the system at the time, which is one thing and I assume there will be cctv as well. We will see if anything becomes public.

Wow that's a blast from the past. Sigalas Cafe in what was then Rundle St. Used to pop down after school in the 1970s.
Cheers Craig

Hi Malcom,

Yes two levels of entry access. One to the facility and one to the wine area plus CCTV. Can only be an inside job.

The heist would want to be with that effort? Or perhaps security at National Storage is lax and an easy target?

All in all it’s fascinating how this plays out for a number of reasons.

Checked mine yesterday and thankfully nothing taken. A mate checked his later yesterday afternoon and bumped into a guy who had only just realised he'd been broken into. It was a walk-in locker with a large wine/whiskey collection. They had cherry picked the most valuable items. No cutting of the locks with this one. Managed to jimmy the door open at the bottom corner and release the drop bolt. Cameras were covered by the thieves while this was in progress. Cops rocked up to check it out.

Pretty poor form from National Storage. Multiple reports of zero communication about this to paying customers.

Yes the people on the ground are quite good. Head office in Qld less so. If a door can be jemmied then this means units need a second lock to stop this. Going on past form, communication will be scant at best.
I am going to see if this can be arranged.
These events are going to speed up my exit.
Cheers Craig

jminas wrote: ↑Mon Jul 27, 2026 8:54 am Checked mine yesterday and thankfully nothing taken. A mate checked his later yesterday afternoon and bumped into a guy who had only just realised he'd been broken into. It was a walk-in locker with a large wine/whiskey collection. They had cherry picked the most valuable items. No cutting of the locks with this one. Managed to jimmy the door open at the bottom corner and release the drop bolt. Cameras were covered by the thieves while this was in progress. Cops rocked up to check it out.

Pretty poor form from National Storage. Multiple reports of zero communication about this to paying customers.

Wow! Should be headlines in The Advertiser. Quite an appealing and newsworthy crime. Wealthy boomers having their luxury wine stolen won’t garner much sympathy the way the country’s been driven into division .

This is very scary news to hear for anyone who uses offsite wine storage...

sjw_11 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 27, 2026 9:02 pm This is very scary news to hear for anyone who uses offsite wine storage...

Indeed. Speaking to operations manager later today re what they are doing in regards to beefing up security. NS confirm everything that has been mentioned here.
Cheers Craig

Not sure if it's related, but just received yesterday a phone app from National Storage that opens the key panels via Bluetooth. Not sure that it's any more secure, might even be less secure if you're a tech wiz, but it does seem a less fiddly way of opening the three locks to get in and two locks to get out.

I mentioned above that I didn't have any issues with my lockers, perhaps fortunately all three are at the higher level that requires a mobile platform to access properly, so perhaps not that attractive to potential theft, nor are they that easy to access

I'm on the wait list for a walk-in, I might pause that

mjs wrote: ↑Wed Jul 29, 2026 10:43 pm Not sure if it's related, but just received yesterday a phone app from National Storage that opens the key panels via Bluetooth. Not sure that it's any more secure, might even be less secure if you're a tech wiz, but it does seem a less fiddly way of opening the three locks to get in and two locks to get out.

I mentioned above that I didn't have any issues with my lockers, perhaps fortunately all three are at the higher level that requires a mobile platform to access properly, so perhaps not that attractive to potential theft, nor are they that easy to access

I'm on the wait list for a walk-in, I might pause that

Got this email a while ago and downloaded but couldn't work out if it had been implemented at Klemzig yet. Were you able to get it working?

Appreciate the updates folks.

Why the gag order? Thought this would be a newsworthy story?

Where the heist ends up depends on the quality of the loot. The good stuff will go abroad I reckon. Thousands of purveyors abroad.

JamieAdelaide wrote: ↑Thu Jul 30, 2026 10:12 am Appreciate the updates folks.

Why the gag order? Thought this would be a newsworthy story?

Where the heist ends up depends on the quality of the loot. The good stuff will go abroad I reckon. Thousands of purveyors abroad.

Jamie, not sure its the content, that I would appreciate on the front page of The Tiser, might attract more rats.
But I get where you are coming from in terms of transparency.
I spoke to the SA Ops manager yesterday and he was rather cagey about what is in the works. This means two things, nothing will be done or that there will be covert implementation that the customer base will know nothing about. I suggested any more thefts would be reputation damaging for the business, but as we all know, refrigerated wine storage in Adelaide is a two horse race, so unfortunately, for many, not many options to consider.

I'm old school, couldn't give a toss about an app, potentially leads to more security issues.
Should be a straight forward approach on a daily basis to stack up all visits with all codes and then do an audit.
We'll see what happens
Cheers Craig

So you don’t know if they are doing anything at all?

Straight to The Advertiser if it were me. With pictures of the cellar and wine values and rarities- no sympathy expected- but it would drive change and protection from “inside jobs”.

Brand protection so often comes first in the corporate world. I’ve worked for airlines who bragged they could “afford” a crash. Create your own storm or the corporates will treat you like a mug.

jminas wrote: ↑Thu Jul 30, 2026 9:28 am

mjs wrote: ↑Wed Jul 29, 2026 10:43 pm Not sure if it's related, but just received yesterday a phone app from National Storage that opens the key panels via Bluetooth. Not sure that it's any more secure, might even be less secure if you're a tech wiz, but it does seem a less fiddly way of opening the three locks to get in and two locks to get out.

I mentioned above that I didn't have any issues with my lockers, perhaps fortunately all three are at the higher level that requires a mobile platform to access properly, so perhaps not that attractive to potential theft, nor are they that easy to access

I'm on the wait list for a walk-in, I might pause that

Got this email a while ago and downloaded but couldn't work out if it had been implemented at Klemzig yet. Were you able to get it working?

haven't tried it yet, might get the chance tomorrow

Big article in today’s Australian. The wine heists were over National Storage facilities in three states with many collectors losing 100K worth of wine.

I’d be seriously looking at moving as that’s an inside job across multiple facilities. The article claimed National Storage has “abandoned” its customers over this.

JamieAdelaide wrote: ↑Thu Sep 03, 2026 1:28 pm Big article in today’s Australian. The wine heists were over National Storage facilities in three states with many collectors losing 100K worth of wine.

I’d be seriously looking at moving as that’s an inside job across multiple facilities. The article claimed National Storage has “abandoned” its customers over this.

Well Jamie, someone had bigger ones than me...article also replicated in The Tiser.
The irony with having been with this out fit for 25+ years is that the on the ground staff are generally pretty good. The problem is the dills higher up the chain, you can never speak to someone and are asked to fill in an inquiry form. Yes certainly thinking of getting out of there.
Cheers Craig

South Australian Police said this week they had arrested two men from Victoria for unlawful possession and theft.

“As a result of an ongoing investigation on Thursday 20 August, police arrested a 38-year-old man and 37-year-old man, both of Victoria, for unlawful possession and theft,” the police said.

“It will be alleged during a search a significant quantity of wine, power tools, clothing and sneakers were recovered by police.

“The items are believed to have been stolen from break-ins and thefts from a number of storage units in Adelaide.

“The men were charged with serious criminal trespass and unlawful possession, and their bail was refused.”



Somebody’s been caught! From wine business magazine.

Good news

“Another alleged victim told WBM she had lost bottles of Penfolds G3, G4, G5 and Penfolds V Yattarna Chardonnay – as well as other bottles.” From Wine Business Magazine.

You don’t have to engrave those bottles as they’re numbered. Wonder how these guys were going to offload them? Perhaps they approached a Melbourne auction house and were caught this way?

Might just go out again this weekend and double check that my stash is ok and whether the app works for entry.

When out there last time, I did think that the door panels are a bit flimsy and could be jemmied

I had a chat with my storage facility manager about security. Some very elemental security practices were not the operating procedures don’t appear to be consistent in the wine storage game. Although the procedures wouldn’t stop a determined “diamond heist” level of criminal professionalism, they’d probably deter the amateurs caught out in the Adelaide heist.