Cellar sommelier: Selara Sommelier, the sommelier for your wine cellar

Selara Sommelier has acquired cellarsommelier.app. We picked it up so that anyone looking for a cellar sommelier lands on Selara Sommelier. cellarsommelier.app takes you to Selara Sommelier.

That's the whole announcement. The more interesting question is what a cellar sommelier should do for you, so the rest of this post answers it.

What a sommelier does

In a good restaurant, the sommelier knows the cellar. They know what's on the racks and how many bottles are left, which wines are drinking well now and which need more time, and what will go with the food on the table. They write the list and keep it current. When a bottle leaves the cellar, it comes off the books.

Most private cellars don't have anyone doing that job. The collector does it in their head, on a spreadsheet, or not at all. A cellar sommelier app should take that job on.

A cellar somm that knows every bottle

Selara Sommelier starts by learning what you own. Drag in the spreadsheet you already keep. It reads .csv, .tsv, .tab, .txt, .xlsx, .xls, .json, .numbers and .xml files, matches your columns to its fields, and marks anything you should check. You see a preview before anything is added. Photograph a label and it reads the details for you to approve, even in dim light or from a faded handwritten label. Drop in a merchant invoice or auction settlement and pick the lines you want.

From there, every bottle has a place in your cellar book, with its producer, vintage, appellation, size, quantity, what you paid and where it's stored. You choose the columns and the sort order. Every plan includes two familiar layouts. Restaurant Wine List groups by color, country and region. Auction House uses collector categories like Red Bordeaux, White Burgundy, Champagne and Port.

Storage locations are part of the record too. Grand Cru tracks up to three locations with nested storage such as Room, then Rack, then Slot. Grand Cru Exceptionnel has unlimited locations and spatial bins, a visual map of each location that shows where your wines sit in the room.

It knows when each bottle will be ready

A sommelier's most useful advice is often "not yet" or "open it now." Selara Sommelier gives each wine a drinking window curve that shows where the bottle sits today and how its window opens and closes over time. The estimate comes from the wine's details, such as color, region, grape, producer, appellation, classification and vintage. On Grand Cru and above, it uses GrapeMinds drinking-window data when that's available.

Each bottle carries a readiness label, from Early through In prime to Drink now, and you can sort and filter by it. Your dashboard lists what's ready now and what you should open soon. You can also turn on emails about your collection, such as notices about bottles approaching their drinking window.

A window is an estimate. Storage, bottle variation and your own taste all count, and the final call is yours. When to drink wine explains how windows work.

Ask it anything about your cellar

This is where it's most like having a sommelier on hand. Selara Sommelier's assistant knows your cellar, so you can ask in plain language.

• What in my cellar is ready to drink?
• Are there bottles I should open soon, before they pass their prime?
• What pairs well with tonight's meal?
• How many magnums do I have?
• What should I add to my collection?

It can also do the housekeeping. Ask it to fix a producer's spelling or reorganize the whole cellar. It asks you to confirm before it changes anything. Premier Cru includes 8 AI uses a month, Grand Cru includes a generous allowance, and Grand Cru Exceptionnel is unlimited.

It helps you plan the evening

When people are coming over, stage the bottles you might open. They stay in your cellar record and show up in a staged list. Afterward, one click moves each bottle you opened into your history, where you can keep tasting notes, and the rest go back. If you want to hand your guests a list, put one together from your cellar and print it or save it as a PDF.

It keeps the books

A good sommelier also keeps an eye on the cellar's books. On Grand Cru and Grand Cru Exceptionnel, Selara Sommelier's market value shows your cellar's estimated total, your most valuable holdings and your top gains against what you paid, with retail prices and critic scores from wineapi.io. The figures refresh periodically and show the date they were last updated. They're estimates for your own planning, not an appraisal, insurance valuation or tax advice.

If you sell, the sell ledger on Grand Cru and above tracks bottles through to-sell and sold, with proceeds and realized gains, and exports to CSV and PDF. On Grand Cru Exceptionnel, household sharing lets you bring in delegates to help look after the collection.

Your sommelier, wherever you are

Selara Sommelier runs on iPhone and on the web, so your cellar comes with you to the shop, the auction preview or a friend's dinner. It's available in English, French, Spanish, Italian and German. Your data is encrypted in transit and at rest.

Try your cellar sommelier

Selara Sommelier is in the final stages of beta testing, and every user is invited to use the free Beta tier, which has everything in Grand Cru Exceptionnel. Premier Cru is free for up to 100 bottles in one location. Selara Sommelier plans explained has the details, and track your cellar with Selara Sommelier is the full tour.

Whether you came in through cellarsommelier.app or straight to selarasommelier.com, you're in the right place. Bring in your spreadsheet, photograph a few labels, and ask your cellar what to open tonight.

Start with Selara Sommelier