Walla Walla winery fights back about poor rating from BBB
WALLA WALLA, Wash. — A Walla Walla winery recently received a “F” rating from the Better Business Bureau after multiple complaints alleging orders were not delivered.
According to the BBB, they've received 24 complaints over the past year and two customers reviews about Nocking Point Wines.
According to BBB, consumers reported that they’ve been unable to get a hold of the business to find out about order statuses, get refunds or cancel accounts. The bureau says these customers also reported they’re continuing to be charged subscription fees that are automatically billed to bank accounts or credit cards.
The BBB also says that according to records, Nocking Point Wines never responded to the inquires from customers.
BBB also says they’ve reached out to the owner repeatedly to try to resolve the claims, but have not heard back.
Action News was contacted by Andrew Harding, Co-founder of Nocking Point Wines. Harding claims the situation is not accurate.
Harding tells Action News that they created a new quarantine wine to raise money for COVID-19 response charities. Over the course of several days, Nocking Point Wines raised over $1,000,000 for charity. Harding says Nocking Point delivered this win to over 50,000 customers. Harding says he is disappointed that the Better Business Bureau has decided to give his business an 'F' rating after all the charitable work it has accomplished during the pandemic.
Harding tells Action News the BBB never contacted him.
Harding released the following statement to Action News on Tuesday:
We are very fortunate to have a Walla Walla-based winery with such a large customer base across the country. In April 2020 we decided to produce a wine called “Quarantine” and donate 100% of the profits to COVID-response charities (see full details and charities here: https://nockingpointwines.com/product/quarantine/ ). We received over 50,000 orders for Quarantine Wine from customers across the country. At this same time all of us — businesses and individuals included — were following social distancing and stay-at-home orders across the country. The supply chain was brought to its knees but our commitment to lending a hand, and eventually donating $1 million dollars to frontline charities that protected essential workers and fed families and children in need, didn’t waiver. We called in every favor possible to ship orders as fast as the supply chain would let us. We shipped 7 days a week out of 3 locations in Walla Walla while maintaining social distancing protocol to keep our teams safe. We talked with corporate leadership at FedEx and got them to lift the “200 shipment per day” limit they put on all businesses throughout the Northwest and give us 2 empty long-haul trailers per day to send thousands of orders out every single day. The project was a multi-company, multi-location team effort and at the end of the day we proudly donated $1 million to 4 charities doing the most impactful work against the pandemic and we are beyond proud to have pulled it off.
In the era of Amazon, customers begin to expect their orders from all retailers to show up almost instantly. We knew we were facing an interrupted supply chain when we took on this giant project in April and we proactively provided “Weekly Shipping Update” emails & social media posts to keep all of our customers up to speed on our progress, safety protocols, and to manage expectations in the best way possible. While order delivery was delayed longer than “normal” turnaround times, we got every single order out the door and delivered to every customer who ordered this special wine. The entire project was a total success and something that our team, Walla Walla, and everyone who supported should be incredibly proud to be part of.
In 2020 we’re very fortunate to have nearly 100k direct-to-consumer wine orders placed on our website. We’ve had 18 BBB complaints that result in a “F” rating. That’s 0.00018% of all customers complaining which means our customer happiness rating is 99.99982%and I’ll take that all day long. The vocal minority is once again perceived as the broader consensus but that’s clearly far from true. We will do the right thing and touch base with each customer who complained to be sure they’re satisfied — it’s something that we’re committed to resolving. But, we do know for sure that they got their wine with certainty and we’ll keep doing what we’re doing by using our wine and platform for the greater good of our community, causes, and organizations who are in need of impactful support in the times where we all need to rally and do our best to contribute in every way we can.
