Monday, August 25, 2008

Everybody needs cataloguing; a LCBO story

Yesterday, I was looking to buy some wine at the LCBO and I asked the staff how the wine was organized. They first said the obvious; it was done by origin (e.g. Canada, France, Italy etc) and that VQA status was another factor. I found this lacking. I asked if the wines were sorted within each of these categories - they seemed confused by my question. Gah!

In my question, I suggested a simple classification scheme (alphabetical by vinter name, then sub-organized by wine name) and they seemed confused. I wish a librarian or some body had organized it properly, according to a meaningful standard. I was looking for a particular type and wasted 10 minutes looking around for it. Wine, just like books, needs both intellectual control (place of origin, in this case) and physical control (tell me how to find bottles on the shelf).

That's Ontario for you. I wonder if wine is better organized elsewhere in Canada or abroad?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Trader Joe's (US) organizes by type (merlot, etc) and country. After that I think they start with the most expensive bottles on the top shelf and work their way down.