Here's an interesting new site for Ontario wine buyers. WineAlign.com can search across wines available at the LCBO (and your local store or stores) and links available wines with professional and user ratings and reviews.
I've only taken a cursory look at the site but I'm very impressed. You need to sign up and register to see reviews but the pros include Robert Parker/The Wine Advocate and several local reviewers. Until the community grows (substantially), the user reviews don't seem very helpful (the Arrowood I posted on early has a 90pt and 70pt rating for example - quite a range).
There's an iPhone interface as well which I haven't tried, but that would be super convenient while shopping.
UPDATE: There's a mobile version of the site but it is not optimized for the iPhone. It's disingenuous to claim iPhone support in the press release if you ask me as the mobile version is basically unusable (everything is rendered microscopically small).
Currently, subscription is free for a limited time (my subscription will expire in March).
As impressed as I am, I'm left with two questions.
1. Why isn't this the LCBO's online storefront? The design is clean and simple and provides the services that LCBO customers are looking for.
2. Will I be willing to pay for this service once the trial expires? At this point, I'd probably pass given that I think that this is the type of website that the LCBO should be funding with the excessive taxes applied to wine sales in the province.
cheers!
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