The Auswine Forum

Hi all,

For those of you with offsite storage (or keep your wines stored in boxes), how do you go about organising your collection?

Do you sort the bottles into boxes by varietal or by drinking window (or some other measure)?

I have locker style storage and with everything stacked vertically in boxes I'm trying to find the best way to keep things well organised and accessible.

What works best for you?

Labels on the outside of boxes with the shorter sampling dates at the front. I only go there once a year so half an hour sorting does the trick

I've been trying to work out how I am going to approach this myself. At the moment it have tried to keep longer term cellar ing options together but in the interest of space this hasn't always worked, and they haven't all ended up down the back, which is a pain. I need to reorganize but this is also a pain in a smallish crawl space.

Oh well, first world problem

I have often considered an organisation system without success... recently I moved my cellar from a 60dozen space which was effectively full to a 120 dozen space which gives some room to move... I made SOME effort to organise (e.g. all the rockford stuff is now together) but even just with checking the inventory it took like 2 hours to move so its still pretty much random! But it doesnt help I have always been quite happy to buy just 1 or 2 odd bottles and throw them in the cellar, so I probably have 6 or 7 boxes of "mixed nuts"

I have 27 plastic cases that stack together into a cube (1m x 1m x 1m). Each case holds between 14 and 17 bottles lying down depending on the bottle type. Each case is numbered 1-27. I use cellar tracker to track inventory and every year at stocktake I move a few around, but the general rule is the stuff to be drunk last (needing 10-15 years of cellaring) goes into plastic cases numbered 19-27, and the earlier drinking stuff into cases 1-9 and the left overs in the remaining 9.

Whilst not a great system it works for me.

I have 3 cabinets of which each cabinet is divided into 3 sections and can hold 8 cases per section.

Each of the cases is numbered and in my spreadsheet I have a layout of where each case resides by cabinet and section (top, middle, bottom) and then the contents of each case by producer, grape type and vintage.

Not sorted by drinking window so when I need to pull stuff out it can be time consuming grabbing a bottle from here and there. I then try to top that case up with new incoming wine or consolidate once or twice a year - the wife often rings to see if I am alive given how long I spend there at times.

Teisto wrote:the wife often rings to see if I am alive given how long I spend there at times.

Haha - been there done that many times before!

It probably doesn't help that my storage facility is surrounded by massage parlours

Teisto wrote:Whilst not a great system it works for me.

I have 3 cabinets of which each cabinet is divided into 3 sections and can hold 8 cases per section.

Each of the cases is numbered and in my spreadsheet I have a layout of where each case resides by cabinet and section (top, middle, bottom) and then the contents of each case by producer, grape type and vintage.

Not sorted by drinking window so when I need to pull stuff out it can be time consuming grabbing a bottle from here and there. I then try to top that case up with new incoming wine or consolidate once or twice a year - the wife often rings to see if I am alive given how long I spend there at times.

This sounds like my system although I usually can't be bothered moving stuff around so end up keeping drinkable wines near the top/front (or drinking what is there anyay...) or just drinking what is on hand in the wine fridge.... And the wife indeed does wonder where I have gone at times!

Has anyone here had a go at printing out barcode labels from CellarTracker?

You can pick up a label printer from Officeworks for less than $100 along with a USB barcode scanner from Ebay for about $30, which could make for a pretty cost effective way of tracking things...?

Diddy wrote:Has anyone here had a go at printing out barcode labels from CellarTracker?

You can pick up a label printer from Officeworks for less than $100 along with a USB barcode scanner from Ebay for about $30, which could make for a pretty cost effective way of tracking things...?

Yes got half way through doing this. Have purchased the Dymo printer and printed off 1,500+ labels and stuck these to all the bottles in my cellar (massive job! ). Have not got around to purchasing the USB barcode scanner but need to do this. I must admit, the label on the back of the bottle is a good talking point over dinner, especially if it is a bottle you purchased many years ago as it records purchase date, place of purchase, price, etc.

In regards to Cellar Organisation, I am fortunate to have a converted space under the house to cellar my wine. Find it easy to store by varietal by vintage order. Most bottles are in racking which makes access a little bit easier.

So jealous of all that space Andrew!

Have tried many times to organise the chaos that is my cellar. But what do you do with an empty slot after taking out a bottle? Move other bottles in a Rubic's cube manner to fill the void? There is an upside when discovering a forgotten bottle like a 1998 Mildara Coonawarra Cabernet last night.

Carl

Hey Andrew,

love the idea of wines behind locked bars ... guess they are not getting paroled any time soon for good behaviour

maybs wrote:So jealous of all that space Andrew!

You can never have enough space!

Andy.L wrote:Hey Andrew,

love the idea of wines behind locked bars ... guess they are not getting paroled any time soon for good behaviour

Nick named the "Grange Cage". Very useful for when you go down to find a bottle when you have already had a few - it is good insurance so you don't wake up the next morning and find out that you have just drunk your only bottle of 1991 Grange!