MADE TO ORDER
Wine collector Jeff Smith rescues cluttered cellars
By Chris Rubin

When Jeff Smith enters a collector’s wine cellar for the first time, he always feels a sense of mystery. “I feel like an archaeologist,” says Smith, founder of Carte du Vin, “like Indiana Jones.”

Even though there’s rarely any danger, Smith encounters disarray and confusion. His job is to establish order.

Smith’s Carte du Vin is a service created for collectors who need help keeping track of their collections. Once Smith works his magic, his clients know exactly what bottles they have, where each bottle is located and when each one should be opened.

Smith, who admits to being more of a consumer than a collector, came by his love of wine naturally. His father, Joe Smith, former chairman of Capitol Records, has a cellar that contains more than 6,000 bottles, and Smith grew up in a family where wine was almost always on the dinner table.