International Exhibition Co-operative Wine Society Limited, trading as The Wine Society, is a British consumer co-operative retailing wine and related services to its members. It is the oldest such wine retailer in the UK, and, according to the Consumers' Association, the best. The society sells only to its members, and each member of the society holds one share in the co-operative, having paid a one-off joining fee. Founded in 1874 after there was a surplus of wine remaining after an international exhibition at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the society now operates out of a purpose-built warehouse and headquarters in Stevenage, 30 miles north of London.
History
Early years
The foundation of the Wine Society followed the last of the Annual International Exhibitions held at the Royal Albert Hall in London from 1871 to 1874. Various countries had sent large quantities of wine to the exhibition: there were wines from Australia, Austria-Hungary, California, France, Greece, Italy, Russia, Serbia and Spain, but the country sending the most was Portugal. When the 1874 exhibition opened (admission one shilling) a supplementary charge of sixpence was made for admission to the extensive cellars, where the wines were on display, but that was quickly waived. Visitors were invited to taste different wines and buy bottles of those they liked. The Portuguese wines occupied an entire cellar, and a large quantity remained unconsumed after the exhibition closed. Having gone to considerable trouble and expense to ship the wines to London, the producers asked the Portuguese government to appeal to the British Foreign Office on their behalf. The British government said that it could not intervene directly, and instead it instigated an unofficial solution to the surplus of unsold Portuguese wine. The government arranged with Major-General Henry Scott – co-architect of the Albert Hall and secretary to the Great Exhibition Commissioners – that he would host a series of large luncheon parties at the hall, serving surplus wines from the cellars. Scott enlisted the help of two other prominent Victorian citizens: George Scrivenor – a senior Customs and Excise official – and R. Brudenell Carter – a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons and ophthalmic surgeon at St George's Hospital. Between them, the three chose the wines for the various courses of the first lunch. The wines impressed, and Carter recalled:
From the outset the policy of the society was to supply wines and spirits to its members at the lowest possible prices that necessary working expenses would allow. The capital required at the start was lent by members on debentures, which were paid off during the society's first decades. The first wine offered to members was Portuguese: Bucellas (now spelled "Bucelas"), a wine popularised in Britain by the Duke of Wellington, who had encountered it during the Peninsular War. The wine, described as medium-dry "Portuguese Hock", sold at 1s 7d (8p in decimal coinage) a bottle. The society followed this with eight different Spanish wines and a range of Madeiras and sherries. By the following year the society offered a total of 63 items, comprising ports, sherries, claret, burgundy, German wine, champagnes and spirits.
Growth Scott became ill and stood down as treasurer of the society; he was succeeded by Carter, who in 1895 became society's second chairman. He remained a member of the managing committee until his death at the age of 90. More than anyone else, according to a successor, Edmund Penning-Rowsell, he was responsible for the supervision and conduct of the society during its first forty years. The society's first cellars, arranged by Carter, were under the Medical Society of London in Covent Garden, after which premises were leased in Mayfair and then at Hills Place, near Oxford Circus in 1902. When the London Palladium was built over the top of the Hills Place cellars in 1910 it raised the average temperatures in the vaults below, and the society successfully sought compensation with a reduction in the rent and an extension of the lease. Cellars were also acquired at Joiner Street (under London Bridge Station) and St James's Bond in Rotherhithe.
For many years the membership of the society was small. The first annual general meeting, held in the Queen's Room of the Albert Hall in February 1875, was attended by 23 members. In the next few years the average number of new members was not more than 80 a year, and the membership did not reach 1,000 until 1882, when the turnover was £12,187. A turnover of more than £20,000 was not reached until 1916–17, when the value of the stock stood at £15,543 and the number of members at 3,311. The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 led the committee to ask members to restrict their orders "to 3 dozen wine and brandy and 1 dozen of Champagne at one time", but no more stringent requirements became necessary until the British government imposed extensive restrictions on imports in 1917, at which point the society closed its application list for new membership. In same year the committee took what it considered the patriotic step of disposing of the society's entire stock of German wines. When peace returned in 1918, the application list was reopened, but the committee did not rush to replenish the society's German stocks and did not do so until the later part of 1921 – just in time, Penning-Rowsell comments, for the greatest German wine vintage of the century. The inter-war period was one of strong growth for the society: membership increased from 5,000 in 1922 to 10,000 in 1932. The Great Depression caused a drastic drop in worldwide demand for fine wine, and those who could still afford it could get spectacular bargains. The Wine Society paid £12 5s (£12.25) a barrique for 50 barriques of Château Beychevelle from 1934, the finest vintage of the decade, according to the wine expert Michael Broadbent. The Second World War caused much greater disruption to the society's activities than had the First. The application lists for membership were closed for seven years: even a king – Haakon of Norway, exiled in London – was denied membership.
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