Get into The Waves.
A new natural wine site delivers a personalized cellar from The Four Horseman's Billy Smith and an all-star team.
I’ve been getting more into natural wines lately, learning from folks like Toussaint Stackhouse at &Holiday, and Joe Campanale at LaLou. So I was excited to learn about The Waves, a new natural wine e-commerce and editorial site that lets you personalize your home wine cellar (or in my case, my fridge) like never before. (Think: Spotify for responsibly made wines.)
Unlike a typical wine club, where they pick the wines they send you each month, at The Waves, you pick your wines from their collection of organically farmed, small-production bottles, all personally chosen and tasted by partners Rajat Parr, three-time James Beard award winner, celebrated sommelier, and wine author-turned natural winemaker; and Billy Smith, their Chief Wine Officer, formerly of The Four Horsemen.
The website also breaks down barriers — it offers reasonably-priced wines with national access so everyone can enjoy wines made from organically farmed grapes with zero synthetic additives, fermented with native yeasts.
Your monthly subscription offers options of 2 bottles ($70), 6 bottles ($200), and 12 bottles ($400), and your “cellar” is personalized to your tastes. Also of note: unlike buying from a traditional wine shop's e-commerce site, at The Waves, you can't search by grape varietal or producers, which kind of forces you to explore and learn about wines outside your comfort zone.
Their game-changing recommendation system—built using Raj and Billy’s friendly voice — offers categories like “Lean Refreshing Bubbles,” “Wild Whites,” “Minerally Whites,” “Boogie Down Wines,” “The Host with the Most,” “Deep Oranges,” “Earthy, Balanced Reds,” “Funky Rosés,” and the like. The site is designed to demystify wine, making a complex topic more approachable, relevant, and fun. It’s like having the world’s leading wine experts’ favorited on your cell phone.
The Waves also has some great editorial content led by Editor-in-Chief Kat Odell, a journalist and author with over a decade of experience in lifestyle, food, and beverage media, and an industry-leading advocate for transparency to empower consumer choice. She’s spotlighting issues critical to today’s conscious wine drinkers, including transparency in wine production and marketing; regenerative farming practices; and equity in the wine industry. You’ll find a piece on how natural winemakers farm and manage their vines, written by Christina Rasmusen of Little Wine in London, and this piece up now by Rajat Parr, on why natural wine is important and critical to our future.
The Waves team also includes Co-Founder and CEO Gaurav Tiwari, an accomplished leader in tech and innovation who spent nearly a decade at Amazon; and Andy Comer, Co-Founder and President, who served as GQ’s first-ever digital editor before diving into hospitality as the founding Wine Director of Tomo in Seattle—earning the restaurant a 2022 James Beard Award nomination for Outstanding Wine Program. So, yeah, the team is solid.
You can let The Waves help stock your summer weekend house with natural wines, or just make sure your fridge always has something natural and delicious for drinks in your backyard, on your fire escape, or your comfy couch. Check it out and let me know how it goes!