Turning Wine Appreciation Into an App, a Site and a Community

CorkageFee began as a simple side project for crowdsourcing wine data at restaurant, but it ended up growing into a community resource–like Yelp meets Priceline, but for wine. To achieve this growth, the TECKpert team shepherded the project from an initial vision of easily supplying diners with the corkage fees for nearby restaurants to the creation of an app and a companion website rich with content and opportunities for both diners and businesses to supply relevant information.

Because of CorkageFee’s initial popular reception, we knew that we had to think big for their web presence and future positioning. TECKpert built CorkageFee a full website where wine drinkers could engage with the brand while wineries and wine shops could create their own business profiles. The responsive website was built with interactive calls to action to download the app as well as a wine blog and the business admin functionality. The result was the development of the CorkageFee brand beyond a mere information source into a shared experience.

The app created for CorkageFee serves their user by geotargeting their location and allowing them to view restaurants in that corresponding area via a list or map view. Users can also select a different city to view. After picking a restaurant, prospective diners can then view restaurant information and contribute to the wine experience by adding or confirming corkage policies, reviewing the restaurant or adding a helpful tip. The app encourages user engagement through a reward system, where members of the wine community could earn points and badges for completing tasks on the app. Beyond restaurants, users have access to information on wineries and wine shops anywhere in the United States.

As of this writing, CorkageFee holds data for more than 10,000 corkage policies, as well as data for most restaurants in the United States and Canada. The app is available on iOS smartphone devices.

Visit their site at corkagefee.com.

• Consulting
• Design
• Development
• Marketing