inexpensive (cheap!) wine in London
 

We are taking a cruise that departs from Southampton - we are allowed to bring 2 bottles of wine onboard. I have not been to London in years - I'm more a fan of Italy and have taken several crusies that departed from the port that Rome uses. In Rome I can purchase some, ahem, delightful wine in a box for about 2E - so far my impressinon of London is that it is much more expensive than Rome - how much can I expect to find some inexpensive wine for in that city?

Wine is taxed in UK.
Any middle of the road supermarket Tescos, Sainsbury's, Morrisons or Asda will have box wine expect to pay £8-10 ish

Wine in a box (in the UK) is generally not 'delightful'.

Agree, check out the Tescos, Waitrose, Sainsbury's, M&S, or Nicholas wine shops. I find wine very afforadable in London!

Although not in a box! Dont buy that in London! But you can get decent wine for about £5-10. I always buy the £10 - 12 bottles that are on sale 50%!

When they say you can only bring two bottles, do they mean magnums?

I know it's not what you meant, but I can assure you they sell wine in Southampton as well!

<i>Wine in a box (in the UK) is generally not 'delightful'.</i>

I seriously doubt that €2 wine in a box in Italy is, either.

thank you for your replies - yes I figured there was wine in Southampton but did not know how convenient it would be to where our ship is docked.

I'm a "two buck chuck" girl and have encountered few house wines thruout my travels in Italy that were not drinkkable.

i am assuming that the limit is 2 bottles or the equivalent (1.5 l)- not two boxes or a box that, for example, equals three bottles.

the floor price of a mostly drinkable .75l bottle of wine in the uk has gone up over the last year or so but the lower limit is now about £4 to £4.50 per bottle as a conservative estimate. most of it will be drinkable (especially red).

on a side note (and with respect to the OP), i believe your question is simple - how much is a bottle of wine in London? talking about boxes of wine in italy confuses people and leads to the many irrelevant posts you see here.

How convenient to where you are docked is a fair question, and really depends on how you were getting from London to Southampton.

If by taxi/car you might ask the driver to pop into the Tesco at junction 9 of the M3 at Winchester. Literally just off the motorway. You are almost certainly correct in finding it easier to buy in London

As far as wine in Italy is concerned, I have bought some superb stuff at Vini Sfuzi shops in Lucca and Siena for < €2 for a litre. Admittedly it is hit and miss, but I have never bought anything undrinkable.

My tip for a cheap but drinkable wine is an Italian red like Valpolicella.

walkinaround is quite correct, we have muddied the waters with discussions of Italian wines.

So in summary about half of the price of a "cheap" wine is tax in the UK which is why it is so expensive. You should be able to get perfectly drinkable stuff for £5 a bottle

The docks are not convenient for any kind of shopping. We found the wine on the Queen Mary 2 to be priced from quite reasonable ( $10.00 a bottle to very expensive. I think if you take your own bottle to the dining room they charge corkage, so buying on board might come out to ner the same.