Helen's Wines Fairfax

"Avoid buying or gifting the membership. I thought I was signing up for cool wines being delivered at my door, but the reality is “your weird wines are ready for pickup 10miles from your house or we’re charging $20 to deliver when you NEED to be at home to receive or we’re canceling your delivery”. Such a pain for such an expensive service. Once I had to change the delivery time since I wouldn’t arrive home on time and they just canceled it - I was expecting the box as a gift to my husband and customer service was inactive for the entire weekend."

"Breaks my heart to write this review, but this is an example of the lack of customer service that has become standard today. I used to see Helen's as a an upscale boutique wine shop, and was willing to pay the higher prices for the customer experience. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. I ordered a gift box and indicated on the form the delivery date. I placed the order over a week in advance, and in the confirmation email (sent by a person, not an auto-confirmation) I was told everything was good to go. Fast forward to the date the gift box should have been received, I reached out to see if it has shipped because I did not receive a tracking notification. No response to my email, but I get a notification the gift box was sent... late. I email two more times to ask why it was late and what could be done. Finally got a response 10 days later that says they ship out of state once a week, and the date on the order form is for in state shipments only. Problem is, none of this was communicated proactively to align expectations or give me the option to send the gift on an earlier shipment. Birthday gift three days late and no accountability on the poor management of the order. Save your money, and spend it where business are grateful for their customers, respond in less than 10 days to order issues, and provide the services and products as confirmed in writing in the order confirmation. Just other sub-par business with mediocre customer service. Nothing more to see here."

"Horrible pick up service. On two separate occasions and orders I have had to fight for the attention of the employees, who have a careless attitude. This is a service based industry, if you can’t connect with customers or help them, please sit at home."

"Wine specialist is nice. She asked what's our price point and what we like and don't like. She chose Bernard Vallette and it was pretty good. We actually wanted to get it from a local store or something and the price is $20. We paid $47 at Helen's place.. although more expensive, i understand that it's business. I still like it regardless."

"The male sommelier was super pretentious, unhelpful and rude. If you go there, be sure to know what you want in advance as he is sure to be of zero help. The somm’s at the Helen’s Brentwood location are far nicer and more helpful than those on Fairfax."