North Berkeley Wine

What a gem! A quiet little neighborhood place with an awesome selection.
Employee Evan is as comfortable helping someone who knows a bit about wine (like me) as he is helping someone who «doesn’t really drink wine» but wants to get something for their friend who is shipping out to Afghanistan. ;-) Sooo versitile!

Great selection of some very interesting wines. That said, comparable bottles can be found elsewhere at similar or better prices. What gets me fired up is spending money at a place with rude customer service. David should be kept in the back office somewhere that will minimize customer contact. Go spend your money with nice people which means a few blocks in any direction.

North Berkeley Wine has an excellent, varied selection of wines and the employees to help you navigate it. If the salesperson is busy I’ll go straight to their Staff Pick area and every time their choices are delicious. When I do get help from the staff I usually am in and out within a few minutes because they are so knowledgeable that I don’t have to spend any time browsing.
It’s a great place to go to get a bottle for a special occasion, but they do have a good selection of wines in the $ 20 range as well. Such a great shop!

Great selection and better service. I was able to find many reasonably priced ($ 13 – 18 per bottle) wines here. But I was more impressed with the service. I love wine but I don’t know a lot about it, and I’m not good at articulating what it is I like. The staff spend time with me and helped me choose a case of mixed wines that I am really enjoying. Plus you get 20% off a case, so the price was very reasonable. They even carried it out to my car. Great job!

not a wine expert by any means, but can tell decent from lousy. Have been going to the place for several years, never pay more than 15.00 a bottle, have had many for 10– 12 bucks, and have liked every single one, of course some more than others. These guys understand what I like and make recommendations– they have never steered me wrong once. Now I’m buying cases — and they have incredible deals.

O.k., let’s get it out of the way — not the lowest prices; but it’s unrealistic to expect such things from a small locally owned business. This shop is quite good. Nice selection of mostly Italian and French wines, with some California choices. It’s nice not to find the same olé Chards and Cabs from Cali. Most wines range in price from $ 15 – 30. Staff is knowledgeable, friendly, enthusiastic. Atmoshpere is great. I last went there on a rainy day and felt like hanging out for a while — lots of wood, well-​maintained, clean, jazz playing. Parking is easy. What more can one ask for in a local wine shop? Picked-​up some tasty Sicilian reds.

So I was actually en route to another cellar when I stumbled upon NBW, and what a lovely surprise. Excellent selection of delicious bottles — I think I got two French things — if price is a concern, I the cheapest thing I saw in the store was $ 13, but I was looking a bit above that so I didn’t thoroughly investigate — regardless, very possible to get a delicious bottle for $ 25 – 30. Full disclosure, I know next to nothing abt wine, but David, the master behind picking the vino, was nonjudgemental, friendly, and quite helpful.
Next time the nectar of the wine calls to you, NBW is worth a look — oh, and David used to run wine classes up at CIA (or the other fancy culinary institute, I’m blanking), so clearly he’s on his game.

First time in here and the staff was amazingly helpful for a wine enthusiast with little actual knowledge of what I was looking for. The had a great selection for prices with most between 10 – 75 dollars. Walked out with 4 exciting selections for a little over 60 dollars. Left with two Italian wines, one French, and one domestic. I will definitely come back here the next time I have an extra $ 50-​$ 100 to invest in wine! They were very good about helping to pair wines with specific meals and finding something I would like for the money I had to spend. Having a Groupon for $ 20 off my purchase was just an added bonus! Even though they were extra busy with the Groupon type traffic, they managed to be extremely helpful, patient, and enthusiastic no matter how much or little you were spending.

We had a Living Social deal ($ 20 for $ 40) and came here on strong recommendation of our friends who live in BK. We didn’t know what we really wanted (we always start with 07 Napa Cab), but were talked into a great 04 Bordeux blend.
They seem to specialize in imported French and Italian wines, which is a nice break from Napa every once and awhile. :)
They also have a good variety of pricepoints, so you can definitely find something on your budget.

My husband and I love this place. Their wine clubs are wonderful and the staff is always so nice and helpful. We’re so happy to have found a local wine store we like this much =). Highly recommended!

My wife and I were new to the Bay Area and looking for a friendly wine store that had interesting French and Italian wines. North Berkeley wine definitely deliver on this front. The service has been good the several times we have gone in there and food/​wine paring questions (always a fun test) were definitely well answered.
We have also had solid luck with some of the wines on sale there, including some great values for those not looking to drink $ 50/​bottles nightly. Recommended all around.

I went to find a special gift, for a friend of mine,
a friend who really knows his way around a glass of wine.
North Berkeley Wines was great, for service and for price;
the employees were helpful, patient and quite nice.
They took the time to talk to me about the different wines,
they knew their stuff, but weren’t snooty; I came out feeling fine.
For any bottle, long as your price range ain’t 2-​buck Chuck,
you should stop by. Check out the specials! They’ve brought me good luck.

I am a big fan of this place — certainly wish I lived in the Bay area as this would be one my favorite wine merchants. It is worth getting their newsletter as they often have special NBW cuvées. Their portfolio includes a lot of top notch producers the Rhone Valley (love Clos de Caillou & La Milliere) and some great producers from Burgundy as well.
Staff are very friendly, helpful and knowledgeable. They offer some half case and case discounts — and have a couple of very good sales each year.

Update: NBW started its first «local weekend special» yesterday (September 22, 2006). The special runs through today, Saturday. Here’s what they have:
[All prices for special offer wines are NET.]
2003 Domaine les Hautes Nelles Muscadet — was 10.95, Special 5.95
2003 Verget St. Bris (Sauvignon Blanc) — was 17.95, Special 9.95
2003 Laila Rosso Piceno — was 15.50, Special 8.95
2003 Laila Verdicchio — was 13.95, Special 7.95
2003 Rijckaert Meursault «Les Vireuilles» — was 54.95, Special 19.95
2003 Rijckaert Bourgogne Hautes-​Cotes de Nuits «En Herbeux» — was 19.95, Special 9.95
2001 Milliere Chateauneuf-​du-​Pape 375ml — was 19.95, Special 14.95
2003 Château Pibarnon Bandol «Restanques» — was 33.50, Special 24.95
2000 Laurel Glen Red Wine — was 8.50, Special 4.95
2001 Caillou Cotes du Rhone «Roches Rondes» — was 39.95, Special 29.95 or 26.96 per bottle on a full case purchase! (10% off)
This seems pretty good to me. I stopped by yesterday and got a mixed case. Their plan is apparently to run specials pretty much every weekend this fall.
The people who run this place are friendly, and they’re very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about wine. They maintain a well-​crafted web site that’s chock full of interesting information and can lead to good values. Look at
for a sample. I got this link because NBW has my e-​mail address. I get e-​mail from them rather often; the e-​mail concerns special deals and promotions and wines that are being featured. For example, they ran a great summer white wine special: 3 Italian wines, and 3 French wines, two bottles of each, $ 99 for the case of 12. So you should definitely get on their e-​mail list.
NBW has a lot of French wine, especially Burgundies, but their tastes are pretty eclectic. They have carried wines by JC Cellars, one of my favorite local wineries. Like Kermit Lynch, NBW is an importer as well as a retailer. I’ve seen some of their mid-​range wines sitting in the wine rack at Costco at excellent prices, so keep your eyes open.

We shall cook no wine… Unless by accident
The only wine shop besides Kemit Lynch that ships imported wine in temperature regulated containers. Most outfits ship wine in regular containers that go through drastic temperature changes during the voyage. HOT then cold, then HOT HOT HOT. And you end up with a cooked raisin-​y tasting thing. Blehchh. You can also tell when you see a lot of wine missing from the bottle or if the cork and capsule is stained.
This happened to me once at NB wine. Must have been an accident. I should have returned it.
Staff is good. Some are better with noobies, some are better with consummate wine evaluators. A good test is to name what you’re planning for dinner, and asking them to suggest a wine. Try these for starters–
— Roasted Neck of Orangutan with ginger glaze.
— Antelope Vulva with Cocoa Butter Vinaigrette.
— Chilled Del Monte Canned Peaches with Cap’n Crunch Praline.
Then you find out which employees know their shiznit.

My parents, who are the big wine shoppers, seem to like it a lot. The parking is pretty easy and the employees nice and helpful.

Wine, vino, jesus-​juice, nectar of the gods, life’s blood, etc. etc. etc. Call it whatever you want but don’t call it crap because this one miraculous substance is proof that there is good in the universe and that we are cared for. Drink well.