A corkage fee is a charge a restaurant places for opening and serving a wine the patron brings in to enjoy with their meal. This fee is also supposed to cover the cost of glassware breakage/rental and any loss revenue from not selling a wine that is on the wine list of that restaurant. The problem is that wine is a major mark-up for restaurants. Food is often marked up about 40% but wine can be marked up as much as 10 times that amount. Because of this, many people like to bring in their own wine, especially in today’s economy. 

On average, corkage fees usually run approximately $10.00- 75.00. Often restaurants will charge a fee equivalent to their cheapest wine on the wine list. However, if the cheapest wine is $45.00 dollars and you bring in a $30 dollar bottle of wine the cost of your meal has just increased almost a hundred dollars. I have heard, although I’ve not experienced it, that because of the recession there are restaurants that offer corkage-free days, scaled corkage fees (depending on the type of wine you bring in) or even a waiver on corkage fees in general with a meal. 

It has been said that restaurants can’t survive on food profits alone, therefore they charge corkage fees to help offset the loss of income of not selling wine. I don’t know if I totally agree with that because there are many successful restaurants out there that don’t serve alcohol at all and still manage to stay in business. To me, if a couple is in a nice restaurant and spend upwards of $200.00 on a meal and they choose to bring in a bottle of wine that they would like to enjoy with that meal then there really shouldn’t be a corkage fee added to their final bill.

My husband and I decided to go to one of our favorite restaurants in Beverly Hills and our meal came to well over $200.00, just for the two us, and the restaurant had the audacity to charge us a $30.00 corkage fee for a bottle of wine that we brought in. I thought this was absolutely ridiculous. I have since learned that there are some rules that you should adhere to when you want to bring in your own bottle of wine to a restaurant. 

The rules are as follows:

1. First you should call the restaurant and let them know you are bring in your own wine…(red flag to alert them to automatically add additional money to your bill)
2. Next, you should inquire abut the corkage fee. Some restaurants charge you based on the type of wine you bring in.
3. The next rule states that you should not bring in cheap wine. By what scale is this measured??? What might be cheap to one might be a very expensive bottle to another. 
4. The fourth rule states you should always offer the waiter or sommelier a taste of what you bring in. What the heck for??? Do you offer them a taste of the bottle they pull out of the restaurant cellar? This is ludicrous. 
5. Another rule is that  you should buy at least one bottle of the restaurants wine for every bottle you bring in. Again I say, what the heck for?  At the restaurant I mentioned, we have only found one wine on the list that we actually enjoy. However, on the restaurants list this wine goes for $45.00. In our local Beverages & More (BevMo) the wine goes for $19.00. Why would we want to pay the restaurant’s prices???
6. Finally, you shouldn’t bring a wine that is on the restaurants wine list. Again, see my response on answer 5.

I really feel that when I go to a nice restaurant it is to enjoy exquisite food. I can buy a bottle of wine from a local wine shop, winery, heck even the Internet and get the same taste that I get in the restaurant. The food, however, I might not be able to re-create so I take a trip to that restaurant for that experience. Because of that, I really feel that corkage fees are entirely insane. 

For there to be rules on what kind of wine you should be allowed to bring into a restaurant is ridiculous. If you search most sites on the Internet today regarding this topic you will find that they say you should only bring “special wines” to a restaurant. The definition of a “special wine” is one that is an older wine that isn’t easily available. “Special wines” are also categorized as those that are received as a gift or wines that are unusual. Again, I must say this is absurd. A special wine is just that…something that is special to an individual or couple. So if you served Two Buck Chuck at your wedding and now it’s your 1 year anniversary and you want to drink that with your meal, whose to say it’s not special to you. 

When it’s all said and done, I feel corkage fees are an absolute rip off by restaurants and even though it’s only illegal in some states I would like to see it illegal in all. I would really love any opinion you have on this subject. Please send in comments to this post and let me know what your take is on this.

As always, please drink responsibly.  

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