One of the nicest things we added. I got the GE Monogram and it's been great. If you have very fast turnover, a rack in the kitchen is ok but it's not idea because any room where people live is too hot for wine.

Thanks rococogurl, do you have an undercounter GE Monogram, and if so, what model do you have? I have read about people having problems with their wine bottles not fitting, saying the slats are too close together. Have you found that to be a problem?

Thanks so much!

I have a small stand alone in my basement that holds maybe 20-30 bottles. I don't have space in my kitchen for a nice built-in one. As a wine drinker I think the wine fridge is so good to have. Before we had it we would ruin so many bottles. The temp in our house got very warm in the summer and I can't tell you how many times we opened a treasured bottle and it was ruined. I had a KD trying to fill in a space in my design ask me if I liked wine....he wanted to add a wine rack above the fridge...So I said "yes, that is why I don't want a wine RACK". So whether you put it in your kitchen or not-you should get one if you drink wine.

I do have the undercounter GE Monogram, the one linked below.

There is different spacing between shelves -- more space at the top than the two bottom shelves. Certain Champagne bottles are too thick but not all.

It holds a ton. I think it stacks really easily but you need to get the hang of it -- bottles go in alternating directions in back and front. The shelves also glide easily even when full and are very well made and sturdy.

It's been silent, reliable and survived a power failure which knocked out some of the "fancier" brand appliances.

Was recommended by my appliance person and I haven't ever had a second thought.

Here is a link that might be useful: Monogram wine chiller

I had originally planned to put the Monogram beverage fridge in our new kitchen but after researching it decided to skip it entirely. We drink wine but almost exclusively reds which should be stored at around 55 degrees. I like my soft drinks to be really ice cold. I realized the two could not coexist easily in the same box. We keep a couple of bottles of wine in our kitchen, with the rest stored in a colder part of our basement.

I wound up buying the Electrolux Icon all refrigerator and all freezer units, so I have been OK on space for sodas and seltzer.

We have the KA beverage center with three zones, 42 for soft drinks, 50 for whites, and 60 for reds. It works great and runs pretty quietly with an occasional relay click to start the compressor.

I have the Marvel 6BAR wine/Beverage center. I love it!
It has 2 racks for wine and 2 shelves for beverages. It doesn't get super cold for the beverages, but it's good enough for my Snapple and water. It freed up space in the main fridge, and is the go-to fridge for all drinks.
I got the one with the glass door and wood frame to match my cabinets. It's great!

If we still had the space and the budget for a wine fridge, yes, we'd do it again.

We also have the KA beverage fridge. We chose a beverage fridge over a straight wine fridge to make sure we had maximum versatility over the years. It holds 21 bottles of wine (three racks) and has a rack and a half for beverages. The KA is one of the very few beverage centers that actually does get cold enough for beer and other drinks to be quite cold. It can be set as low as 37 degrees, which is probably what your regular fridge is set at. We keep ours set at 39, 50, 60 for the three compartments and are quite pleased with it.

The beverage fridge was a splurge that we added right before we ordered our cabinets. I had to do a bit of convincing to get DH to agree to it, but he LOVES it now. We put the fridge in the "bar zone" of our kitchen and it's so convenient to be able to serve wine, cocktails and beer from one place.

When we bought this house, it had (has) an 18" Uline wine fridge, replacing what was once probably the garbage compactor. Not something I would have normally thought of getting but I love it. In our new kitchen, we will be replacing it with a a KA beverage center - still holds quite a lot of wine (plus we will move the old wine fridge to the basement) We will have more room for soda and beer, freeing up the fridge a little (DH goes through a LOT of diet coke) :)

Just to clarify, so we're not mixing wine and red bull here, a wine chiller is not as cold as a standard refrigerator. Nor is a "beverage chiller" and it's easy to think it's a fridge -- it sure looks like one -- and then find that sodas and other things don't get cold enough, which means refrigerator-cold.

Check the chilling temps carefully on these.

I would not expect to store wine in the same chiller as other beverages as they need different temps.

This has come up before when folks have posted to complain that they spent $900 or whatever for a fridge that isn't really.

I am looking for a wine chiller/cooler that holds BOTH white and red wine that can be set at two different temps. Any recommendations? Thanks!

Kulagal, Kitchen Aid makes one that has two zones...just went and looked at it and it's nice.

Rococogurl, also just went and looked at the GE Monogram and you're right, it's great. The pull out shelves are FULL EXTENSION, the KA is not. We are going to go with GE Monogram thanks to you!

Kulagal, and anyone else looking for a wine fridge with dual temp zones: I have an Avanti "platinum" that I bought about 2 years ago, free standing, and I LOVE it. It supposedly holds 60ish bottles, but realistically, with odd sizes and shapes, I think 45 is max. Still.......

I got it from the Beverage Factory, based in San Diego, but they ship anywhere. Shipping was expensive, but I looked in every (EVERY) Brick and Mortar place in my area and found nothing that really suited me, and was reasonably priced. Lots of places sell small beverage fridges as wine fridges, and they are just not the same. Other really exclusive places sold these things for $500-700.

The best part was that I got it hugely discounted as a model that had a few scratches on it. They sell their seconds through Ebay. At least they used to. I had to watch for a while to get the perfect one for me, though.

A few years ago we bought a 15-inch wide black Vinotemp wine cooler that was designed to fit in the undercounter space vacated by a trash compactor. We've loved it and are fitting it into our kitchen remodel.

A warning about placement: We have a huge skylight in the middle of our kitchen, and in midsummer the afternoon sun would hit the west-facing wine cooler directly, which seemed to make its temperature control system struggle quite a bit. So my warning would be to try to place the wine cooler where it will not be exposed to strong sunlight, such as across from a west-or south-facing window. In our remodel, the wine cooler will face east, still exposed to a window, but it will be weaker morning light.

I just posted a response to a similar question on the appliances forum. I have a Sub-Zero 24" under-counter model with dual temperature zones.

I find it extremely useful and would hate to be without it. I don't use it for long-term storage, but rather, use it to store a selection of everyday wines that I plan to serve within the next week or two. It saves me from having to run up and down stairs to the wine storage room each time I want a bottle of wine. The Sub-Zero wine refrigerator allows me to keep whites and reds at proper serving temperatures under ideal conditions in the kitchen -- where they're close at hand.

No planning ahead, no rapid chilling in the freezer, and no removing wines from the fridge ahead of time to warm up. I love being able to pull out a bottle on the spur of the moment and have it be at an ideal serving temperature.

You simply can't do this in your primary refrigerator, where temperatures are too cold.

Absolutely. We originally had a free-standing one made by Danby, which turned out to be...um...less than adequate. We recently traded it in for a GE Profile free-standing model. We have no room in our kitchen so it's housed in our den/office. We drink dry reds so dual-temoeratures are not a necessity. One thing I've noticed about many of the dual-temp models is that there is more room for whites than reds in those models. Usually 2/3 of the space is temp-controlled for storing whites, while 1/3 of the space is temp-controlled for reds. If you drink mostly whites, a dual-temp might be worth it. We do keep a couple of bottles of white on hand for guests and cooking, and I find that if kept on the lowest shelf where the temperature is cooler works well. We purchase approximately a case of wine every 2 weeks, so considering the amount of money we spend on wine has determined the importance of proper storage. At least for us.

I have the Marvel 6BAR one like art_teacher describes. We put it in our dining room so put a panel on it. I wanted to mention this option as there are not many refrigerators that do and even then it was difficult to find what pieces I needed to order from Marvel and specs for the panel. The toe kick is slightly different (about 1/2") and does not line up erfectly, but that is that way the door is configured--but at least we don't see the contents of the sodas in our formal dining room and I did not have space for this in the kitchen. I like keeping all my drinks, etc. out of the main refrigerator and it's great for parties as well. One mistake I made with the panel is that I should've put 2 smaller doors to the cabinet on the side as you have to fully open the refrigerator door to be able to slide the shelves in and out and the adjacent knob is in the way. Our workaround is just to open the adjacent cabinet if I want to slide out the wine tray. As I mostly to access soda/water, it's not that big a deal, though wanted to mention it.

Here is a pic of it (center panel):

This does not precisely answer your question ... but we chose not to spend the money on a built-in wine fridge on the new construction we just finished. It certainly was in the plans from the outset to be built into a hutch-style pantry cabinet. But, when all the appliance expenses started mounting, we decided just to continue to use the free-standing wine chiller that we already had. We have a rather large and funky shaped under-stairs closet immediately adjacent to the hutch cabinet, so we decided to stash the freestanding chiller in there and now we jokingly call the closet our "wine cellar." We drink a lot of wine, so having a chiller is a must for us, but we couldn't justify the expense of a built-in model.

Another consideration for us was that we feared a wine chiller may be a dated look. The hutch is a beautiful piece in and of itself and we didn't want 15 years down the road to hear comments like, "Oh, what a shame ... that beautiful cabinet must have been built in the 2000s ... remember when everyone was putting in those wine fridges!"

Good luck with your decision.

We have a Sub Zero dual-zone. Love it and would do it again. Ours is in a bank of cabinets (see pic below). I disagree with a poster above who says the dual-zones have more room for whites than reds. The bottom space of the fridge is larger and that's where we store our reds (that we drink more of). As it is a dual-zone we can make the upper and lower zones fit the temp for the wine we have stored in each zone. It's not mandatory that the whites go in the larger section!

{{!gwi}}

Soonermagic, thanks for the under the stairs tip. I think that would work here :)

MAYDL -- You didn't say if you'd found a solution to your sun problem, but one thing you can do (not highly pretty but should work) is fold or cut a mylar insulating blanket to fit over the wine chiller during the sun months. If it reflects too much light into your kitchen cover the blanket with something white, like a piece of sheeting. If you trim it all up and finish the edges it shouldn't be too ugly :)

I hate my Marvel beverage fridge for $1,100. I would choose a different brand & preferably just a ssteel mini frige (but I guess they don't make those for a built in look) .
Marvel-- not cold enough & door doesn't stay shut if you close it too carelessly. They been out to "repair" it & said too bad for you. My friend's same firdge does not give her the same hassle. Very frusterating.

We just bought the Monogram, too, and I guess I didn't realize it wasn't dual zone (I've been distracted). How does it work for storing both whites and reds? (Sorry to go OT).

Fromflorida, we also were really attracted to the Monogram, but ruled it out b/c it didn't have duel zones. However, all the salespeople told us that with a single zone wine cooler to set it at 50-55 degrees and follow the 20-minute rule: Take reds out of the cooler 20 minutes ahead of time; place whites in your regular fridge for 20 minutes before serving.