If you’re a wine enthusiast, buying gifts for wine lovers can be an exciting shopping experience.  For the less experienced wine drinker, you may have a little more trouble trying to decide what to buy.  Whether you know your gift recipient’s taste or not, finding great gifts for wine lovers isn’t so hard if you start your search with a few basic gift ideas.

The Wine Gift Basket

A wine gift basket is not only great because you can give so much extra with one gift, it can also help you out if you aren’t sure what you gift recipient will like.  A wine gift basket can include a few different types of wine along with some cheeses, chocolates, or other savoury treats.  You can also include wine accessories such as glasses and cork screws.

Wine baskets can be purchased premade or you can make your own and wrap it up with some tissue paper, plastic wrap, and ribbons.  If you know your recipient prefers reds you can choose a few different types of red, or if they like white as well, you can make an arrangement of both.  If you have no clue where to start it may be best to stick with lighter tasting wines or ask your local wine retailer for some suggestions.

Wine Furniture

For a more extravagant gift, wine cabinets or credenzas can be very thoughtful gifts for wine lovers.  If you know they have a large collection, a well-made cabinet can be a very useful gift.  Many cabinets and wine holders can be beautiful and elegantly crafted, so you aren’t only giving a piece of furniture but sometimes a work of art as well.  For smaller gifts, single bottle wine holders are available in all shapes and sizes.  Wine holders can come in the form of plastic cartoon characters, women’s heels, or lovable animals holding your wine bottle.

Creative Gifts for Wine Lovers

Some of the best gifts for wine lovers don’t need to include a bottle of wine.  If you don’t know what to get, a wine gift certificate will allow your recipient to pick out their favourite wines themselves.  Paying for a wine tasting tour or a weekend getaway to a local vineyard is a great way to show your wine loving friends you know their interests.  Some other great gifts for wine lovers are wine books or magazines and home wine making kits.  Depending on how well you know your gift recipient’s tastes, finding the perfect wine gift shouldn’t be too hard with just a couple of ideas and a little shopping around.

Aside from the brief mention here and there with regards to the Wine Bug or Bugus Erectus, very little mention has been made as to how versatile a wine holder or wine caddy really can be! At the risk of sounding like an infomercial, I would like to point out why I love wine holders and wine caddies.

A wine holder is a great way to display that single bottle of wine that you want to set apart from the rest of your collection. Maybe you have a bottle of wine that you bought while on your honeymoon in France, or maybe it’s just a bottle from the market, which you think is fabulous, either way wine bottle holders are a better option to simply standing it on the counter. We all know that bottles should not be stood up because the cork can dry out and spoil the wine, so not only does a wine holder display you favourite bottle, but it also does this the correct way!

Some wine holders also double as a wine server, which makes it even more appealing. Aside from just showing off a bottle of wine, wine servers also are a great way to serve that Chardonnay or Merlot at a dinner party. From traditional to a little more eccentric, wine servers are always a conversation piece as well as a fantastic method for displaying and serving wine.

How often have you been invited to dinner and showed up with a bottle of wine in a plastic supermarket shopping bag or a brown paper sack from the liquor store? I know I have done it many times, and always feel a little awkward showing up at a nice dinner with the bottle in a brown bag that makes you look like a bum. Enter the wine caddy! Able to hold from one bottle to a few, a wine caddy is, in my humble opinion, a much better way of transporting wine. Some even hold wine glasses, which is perfect if you are looking to have a lovely picnic in the park (be aware of public drinking laws before doing this, while it might be acceptable in some places, others you could get arrested).

So this is why I love the wine caddy and the wine holder! So many styles and so many uses, I only wish I had written about them sooner!