Red Wine of the Month Clubs

Overview: If you're ready to upgrade to a higher quality wine from California and explore what all of the artisanal buzz is about, this should be your first stop. These mostly red wines from the best small wineries typically retail in the $35-90 range but you pay a much lower price to have them delivered. Joining for yourself means variable shipment prices, but if you buy as a pre-paid gift subscription you'll know your price in advance. Hint: Buy yourself a pre-paid gift subscription instead of joining as an ongoing member.

What We Love: We spend a lot of time wine tasting in California and are personally familiar with many of the wineries shipped in Gold Medal's Platinum Series. They ship our favorites and must-try wines like Dilécta GSM from Paso Robles, Volker Eisele Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa, and Frank Family Petite Sirah from Napa to name a few.

Wine Club Gift Info: With elegant gift packaging as an upgrade option, you can make any wine subscription gift really stand out. Send a personalized greeting card ahead or ship it to yourself to present on the big day. When the wine arrives, the first shipment's bottles are wrapped in organza and presented in a beautiful artist-designed gift box.

Overview: Garagiste is a term which describes up-and-coming winemakers who toil away creating artisanal wines in their, well not usually, garages. If you're someone who wants to be up on the latest and greatest future stars of California winemaking, try the mostly red wine selection of Garagiste wines from the Gold Medal Wine Club.

What We Love: We look forward to discovering new wineries from all over California. We know we're getting very good wine at below-retail prices and helping small family businesses grow.

Wine Club Gift Info: With elegant gift packaging as an upgrade option, you can make any wine subscription gift really stand out. Send a personalized greeting card ahead or ship it to yourself to present on the big day. When the wine arrives, the first shipment's bottles are wrapped in organza and presented in a beautiful artist-designed gift box.

Overview: Pinot Noir is one of the most beloved red wine grapes and this Pinot of the month club is the best one for discovering Pinot Noir from California. Discover boutique wineries producing world-class Pinot Noir in Santa Barbara, Sonoma, and other regions around California. Stunning Pinot from Joseph Jewell, Dragonette Cellars, and Kessler-Haak to name a few.

What We Love: We're big fans of California Pinot Noir in general, and we love how Gold Medal sources award-winning selections from small producers we may not have heard of or haven't had access to for purchasing. A membership with the Gold Medal Wine Club Pinot Noir Series takes Pinot lovers on a trip to California for wine tasting without leaving home. Check out their Pinot selection.

Wine Club Gift Info: With elegant gift packaging as an upgrade option, you can make any wine subscription gift really stand out. Send a personalized greeting card ahead or ship it to yourself to present on the big day. When the wine arrives, the first shipment's bottles are wrapped in organza and presented in a beautiful artist-designed gift box.

Overview: We really enjoy this International wine club where each shipment contains six different wines from a single wine region somewhere in the world. Of the many clubs that offer an International selection, most aren't themed for additional wine discovery and education.

What We Love: We received shipments of this wine club for years because it always kept a good variety of food-friendly and affordable wines on hand, we never opened a bottle we were disappointed with, and we feel this club offers a good quality-to-price ratio.

Overview: Among other "journey around the wine world" clubs Wine Awesomness stands out for exceptional educational materials. This is a great wine club for you if you're not sure yet if you're a "wine club" person or if you're looking to give a gift to a young wine-lover who's just starting to discover the world of wine.

What We Love: The level of sophistication in both design and writing of their monthly magazine and how the wine isn't expensive but is a very good value.

Wine Club Gift Info: The Pacific Northwest Series is the perfect wine gift for a Californai wine lover. For an extra $18 you order a pre-wine gift package announcing the gift. Send it to yourself to present in person on the big day or send it directly to your wine lover so they know the wine is coming.

Overview: Our favorite series offered by The International Wine of the Month Club, we really dig the interesting, high-end, European-focused wines that arrive at our door. We've been able to find Italian and French red wines we enjoy courtesy of this wine club, which helps us understand the wine from these countries in a more nuanced way.

What We Love: More than anything, we love surprise factor of these wines. Every time we open a box, we sort of grimace at the prospect of drinking a Rhone red or an Barolo (wines that we typically don't enjoy because of our own palate preferences), but we're always surprised at how the wines are enjoyable anyway, and usually much better than we were expecting.

Wine Club Gift Info: Wine club gifting is an area that this company excels at. They give you the most options of any two-bottle wine club, from when you pay for each shipment, to all of the standard customizations, gift notice options, etc. The first shipment of all gifts includes organza-wrapped bottles for an extra touch.

Overview: This international wine of the month club is delivered quarterly and features wineries you can't buy from any other company in the U.S. Each shipment features a new winery and wine region.

What We Love: Whether you choose just the wine or you upgrade to include the regional gourmet treats with the Adventure Package, this quarterly wine club will take you on your own wine-drinking adventure around the world. Extensive regional and winery information goes out with each shipment, chock full of photos that help you feel like you've gone wine tasting in a far away land.

Wine Club Gift Info: With elegant gift packaging as an upgrade option, you can make any wine subscription gift really stand out. Send a personalized greeting card ahead or ship it to yourself to present on the big day. When the wine arrives, the first shipment's bottles are wrapped in organza and presented in a beautiful artist-designed gift box.

Overview: A six or 12-bottle wine subscription geared toward occasional drinkers who don't want to spend a lot on their wine. An International selection with a good variety of wines and wine regions.

What We Love: There isn't anything Martha Stewart does that isn't beautiful, and the branding and experience of this wine subscription program are no exception to that rule.

Overview: A 12-bottle personalized wine club that begins to get to know your preferences with a six mini-bottle wine tasting kit delivered for $6.95. By signing up for the tasting kit experience you are automatically enrolling in regular wine club shipments, 12 bottles delivered quarterly for $149 plus $19.99 shipping.

What We Love: Their best feature is total control of your account online without having to contact customer service — change the contents of your shipment, change your shipment size, have your next shipment sent exactly when you want it, or even cancel online.

Wine Club Gift Info: They don't talk much about it, but TastingRoom wisely offers a gift version of their wine club — the tasting kit plus 2, 6, or 12 full-size bottles and 1, 2, 4, 6, or 8 shipments for your favorite wine lover to experience. The more you buy, the more you save!

Overview: A personalized wine club that gets to know what kind of wine you like through a wine-preference quiz and the ratings you give for wines from previous shipments. Sends four bottles of wine that match your preferences, monthly.

What We Love: Bright Cellars has amazing customer service and offers a cheese-pairing option as an add-on. We've liked each shipment better than the last, and this corresponds to seeing our Bright Points (accuracy of matching) increase, too.