Our London wine shop at No. 3 St James's Street has changed little since it was opened by the Widow Bourne in 1698. It boasts an extensive range of wines and spirits, from around £5 up to £5,000, and a team of knowledgeable yet friendly staff who offer unparalleled expert advice, no matter what your requirements are. The range incorporates a vast selection of wines, including those from Bordeaux, Burgundy, Champagne, Spain and the Rhône, as well as top Italian bottles and New World classics.From roots as a merchant selling provisions, exotic spices, tea and coffee, No.3 ultimately became a fine wine merchant and during the past three centuries many famous visitors have passed through our doors, from Lord Byron to the Aga Khan. The shop is little changed and traces of its history – including important documents and artefacts – are on view. Berry Bros. & Rudd first supplied wine to the British Royal Family during the rein of King George III and has continued to do so to the present day and currently holds two Royal warrants;

for H.M. The Queen and H.R.H The Prince of Wales. Step back in time and learn more about the rich history of No.3, through tales of widows, kings, politicians and coffee. Find out more about any events that are happening in the our London shop over the next few months. Browse our finest reserves room, offering a superlative selection of some of the world’s finest wines. Take a look around our fine Whiskies and Spirits room, featuring rare and independent releases and free tastings of the exclusive range of our own bottlings.best wine festivals usaSome years ago I interviewed the author, humanitarian and former Beirut hostage Terry Waite who explained with enormous relish that he liked red wine, but even more than he liked drinking it, he liked to spend as little as possible on a bottle. wine gift boxes for shipping

He meant that literally. The cheapest bottle from the cheapest shop. I still like to think of those who invited the great man to dinner to be presented with a bottle of gnat’s urine. What did they do with their Terry bottles? Feed them all to him? Pass them on unopened to another dinner host? I expect Terry is horrified by today’s news that 54 per cent of us won't spend more than £6 on a bottle of wine. As a wine critic, my own line on this story is that I don’t care how much a bottle of wine costs – as long as a) it gives me pleasure to drink and b) it is good value for money. best wine to cook withThe happy news is that there are some cracking wines out there for under £6 – you just have to know where to look for them (and the list of six below is a good place to start). best european wine 2015But what do I mean by value? one hope wine whole foods

The first thing is that if condition a) – “pleasure to drink” - is not met then nothing is good value, however cheap it might be. After that, I want any wine I buy or recommend to be competitively priced against other good wines. It’s also worth looking at the “bang for your buck” measure of value – how much of the bottle price is actually going towards the quality of the wine in your glass? The wine importer Bibendum calls this vinonomics and has worked out that: On a £5 bottle 47p is spent on wine. the best bc winesOn a £7.50 bottle £1.61 is spent on wine. great wine quotes friendsOn a £10 bottle £2.87 is spent on wine. wine and beer companyOn a £20 bottle £7.17 is spent on wine. top tens lists best red wine

I’d argue with some of their calculations at the top end of the scale – the cost of logistics (not such good economies of scale) plus packaging (fancier) plus marketing is likely to be higher in a £20 wine. But it’s pretty clear that there’s a sweet spot at around £10 where the actual wine is worth 5x the amount in your £5 bottle, proving that yes, it is worth trading up. It's reassuring news for the (nearly) half of us who do like to spend more than £6 on a bottle of wine from time to time. Although I don’t expect that will convince Terry. SIX OF THE BEST WINES FOR UNDER £6 WHITE The Exquisite Collection Rias Baixas Albarino 2013 (12.5%, Aldi, £5.99) Hello, spring. Peachy-fresh albarino from the Atlantic coast of Spain makes a good aperitif and is delicious with pink prawns or other seafood RED Vin de Pays de l’Ardeche Gamay 2013 France (12%, M&S, £5.49) Light-bodied and pale, this sappy red made from gamay, the beaujolais grape, is good slightly chilled. Simply Garnacha NV Spain (13.5%, Tesco, £4.79) Some of the best cheap wines in the world come from the north-east corner of Spain where there are hillsides covered in garnacha vines whose fruit is used to make this soft, plump red.

Porcupine Ridge Shiraz 2012 South Africa (14.5%, Sainsbury’s, £5.99 down from £7.99 until 8 April) Deep, rich and inky, a real blood and guts of a wine, this is shiraz, grown in Swartland north of Cape Town, and aged in French oak . Mas des Montagnes 2011 Côtes du Roussillon Villages, France (13.5%, Majestic, £5.99 down from £8.99 when you buy two bottles as part of a minimum purchase of six) This spicy, garrigue-and-dried-leaves-scented blend of syrah, carignan and grenache from the Languedoc is a favourite of Telegraph readers. PINK The Exquisite Collection Cote de Provence Rosé 2013 France (12.5%, Aldi, £5.99) Dangerously drinkable pale pink wine made from grenache, cinsault, syrah and mourvedre. • Telegraph Wine from Waitrose: Browse our range of fantastic wines for under £7 Read more: What your wine spend says about youThe 10 Best online wine shops The 10 Best online wine shops Thursday 14 June 2012 23:00 BST In a 2011 report for the Vinexpo in Bordeaux, Laithwaites came third in the world for its web services.

It scored highly on security, ease of use and reliability. 2. Ten Green Bottles This has scored some big clients including Heston Blumenthal's The Fat Duck and Locanda Locatelli. Offers a showcase for lots of smaller producers. The Yapp brothers' operation has been going since 1969, specialising in French wines, many from small vineyards and which you'd be hard pressed to find elsewhere. If you're up north London way, it's worth visiting the store. Online, you can browse by type, country, region or grape and the recommendation section's handy. 5. Berry Brothers & Rudd Wine merchants to the gentry since 1698. Its strength is its range: it has bottles at less than £5 (in 24-bottle cases) and it has bottles at 100 times that. If you are just finding your feet in the world of the grape, this is great. The wines are affordable and the site has a sidebar showing which have been in the press. 7. From Vineyards Direct Not the most user-friendly and its payment system is a little archaic, but these niggles are blasted out of the water by its fantastically priced list of old-world wines.