Hotel · supplier · Bordeaux
Wine for your hotel: minibar, bar, room service, VIP
A hotel does not buy wine the way a restaurant does. It needs half bottles for the rooms, a short list that speaks to a foreign guest, a welcome bottle with some style that does not blow the VIP budget. Here is how a Bordeaux wine merchant (négociant) covers these four uses.
Four uses, four logics
Minibar
The 37.5 cl half bottle is the right format: a guest on their own opens it, a couple finishes it. Available formats are confirmed on request, depending on the wine and vintage. One red, one white, one sparkling are enough.
Bar list
Five to eight wines, three of them by the glass, with appellation names a foreign guest recognises. The by-the-glass mark-up calculator sets your prices, wastage included.
Room service
The same wines as the bar, in full bottles, with a white and a sparkling always chilled. Room service sells mostly between 7 pm and 10 pm; it is a question of availability, not choice.
VIP bottle in the room
A Bordeaux at €15 or €25 with a handwritten card makes more of an impression than a €40 fruit basket. For a loyal guest, the wine from their year of birth is the gesture they will talk about. For a rare bottle a guest asks the concierge for, see concierge services and palace hotel concierges.
Banquets, seminars, weddings with accommodation
A hotel that hosts seminars and weddings also buys wine in batches, two or three times a month, with quantities that change with every quote. Sliding-scale prices apply to these volumes, and delivery goes straight to the establishment, by parcel or pallet. The grands crus classés and older vintages in stock mean you can answer a management dinner without searching for three weeks.
If your restaurant has its own list and its own buyer, the wine for restaurants page describes how it works front of house: samples, quotes, wines by the glass.
How it works
You describe your uses: number of rooms, minibar or not, bar, banquet volume. Transvins, a Bordeaux wine merchant since 1986, suggests a short selection with prices excl. and incl. VAT, available formats and shipping costs, within 48 working hours. Samples are possible for the bar wines. Then you order by email or phone, as often as needed, with no annual volume commitment.
Reply within 48 working hours. No commitment.
Do you have half bottles for the minibar?
Some wines come in 37.5 cl, not all, and it varies by vintage. Tell us the number of rooms and the expected turnover; we reply with the formats actually available, without promising stock we do not have.
What to stock at the bar for foreign guests?
Appellations the guest knows by name, a red and a white by the glass, a sparkling. An American or Asian guest orders what they recognise; a hotel bar is not the place for discovery. Five well-chosen wines sell more than fifteen.
How much does a VIP welcome bottle cost?
Between €12 and €25 a bottle at wine merchant prices for a Bordeaux that looks good on a room table, more for a classified growth kept for the guests who really matter. The gesture is in the card and the well-chosen bottle, not the price.
Do you deliver directly to the hotel?
Yes, in mainland France, to the establishment's address, by parcel or pallet. Have someone to receive it and access for the carrier. Costs are shown in the quote.
Two special cases: the minibar, in half bottles, and B&Bs and gîtes, for the table d'hôtes and the welcome bottle.