We are committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy, together with our Cookie Policy, explains how we process your personal information and the choices you have. By proceeding to use this site, you are accepting and consenting to the terms of this Privacy Policy and to the way we process your personal information.
SUMMARY
- We take your privacy very seriously indeed. If you don’t want us to contact you for promotional purposes, we won’t (we will, of course, communicate with you in connection with any order you place, including order confirmation e-mails about that order).
- We collect information to allow you to place orders with us and to improve your experience using our website. In particular, we diligently collect, track and interpret all data, including your personal information, which help to reveal what users generally, and you specifically, like and don’t like about our website, content and advertising.
- We may share data with strategic, trusted partners (who may be located outside of the European Economic Area) so that we can better understand and improve the visitor experience, and cater to your preferences.
- You can always find out what information we hold about you, and you can always opt-out, anytime.
- If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please get in touch.
WHAT INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?
- register to use our website or create an account;
- place an order;
- search for a product;
- subscribe to any update service;
- participate in social media functions on our website;
- login using your social media profile;
- submit a review or enter other information on our website;
- specifically registering your interest to receive marketing or promotional news or specific product information from us;
- contact us by phone or email; or
- participate in a lottery, auction, prize draw, competition or promotion.
This information may include your date of birth, name, email address, phone number, and social media profile details; transaction details, purchase history, and items saved in your basket; payment information and bank details such as your credit or debit card number and other payment card information, as well as billing and shipping details; and any other information you provide in connection with promotional offers or other marketing activities.
Information we collect using cookies and other tracking technologies relating to your use of our website and to your experience using our website (including the full URL clickstream to, through and from our site, download errors, methods used to browse away from each page, any phone number used to call our customer service number, device information, IP address, usage and location data). In basic terms, we will collect as much information about your use of our website as we possibly can. In our experience, this is the best way of improving the experience of visitors to the website. Oh, and just because other websites don’t tell you that they do this, doesn’t mean that they don’t! The tools which we use to monitor the functioning of our website collect certain data which users enter when interacting with that website, including personal data such as IP addresses, even if those users do not complete a purchase, post a comment, submit a review, enter a lottery or competition, bid in an auction or interact in any other way with our website. We will never record passwords or plain/raw credit card details in this way.
Information we receive from other sources, such as when somebody buys a gift for you on our website, when you login using your social media profile facilitated by a third party, and from partners we jointly offer services with or from advertisers, about your interactions with them. This may comprise your name, geographic location, age, shopping habits, user-generated content (such as blogs and social media postings), social media username or other social media profile information (such as number of followers), in each case as permitted by law. We ensure that we have a lawful basis for processing this information before we receive that information for processing, which could be by way of consent, legitimate interest, and/or necessary for the performance of contractual obligation. Where you have given consent to a third party to process your information, such processing and further details of that party’s processing will be subject to the third party privacy statements of each of the websites you interact with.
HOW DO WE USE YOUR INFORMATION?
- process any order that you make and make sure you have a great experience using our services;
- administer our site and improve your browsing experience, including tailoring content offered to you;
- provide customer service and support and to respond to your queries and requests. With regards to incoming and outgoing telephone conversations with our customers and other third parties, we keep recordings of these conversations securely and in confidence for 6 months after the date of the relevant conversation. We do this for the purposes of crime prevention, training, and quality monitoring purposes, all in a way which is consistent with and permitted by law. We reserve the right to share telephone records with law enforcement agencies should it become necessary;
- notify you that you have been selected as a winner of a contest or sweepstake (or to confirm your entry to future competitions or events);
- protect and prevent against fraud and to keep our site safe and secure;
- defend our rights or property and to protect the rights and interests of our consumers and users;
- enable us to conduct data analysis to help us improve our services and advertising, including showing you our adverts as you browse the web. We also anonymise and aggregate personal information (so that it does not identify you) and use it for purposes including testing our IT systems, research, data analysis, improving our site and app, and developing new products and services;
- send locally hashed data to trusted third parties (including but not limited to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Snapchat, etc.) in order to send you personalised advertising on those platforms that you are already a member of and to help us create so-called “lookalike audiences” and/or “custom audiences” which will help us send relevant advertising to existing users of those platforms who may have similar taste in drinks and spirits;
- keep you updated on our latest announcements or send you marketing information about us and our products. If you would like to change your communication preferences or if you no longer want to be part of our mailing list, please either log into your account or contact us to let us know. If you are an existing customer of ours who have placed an order with us in the past and have not opted-out to marketing communications when prompted, we may reach out to you with marketing and promotional information about products or services which are similar to your past purchase – of course, you can always opt-out. Where reasonable upon our assessment and in good faith, we may reach out to you with marketing and promotional information about us or our products that we think might interest or benefit you on the lawful basis of legitimate interest – of course, you can always opt-out. We use Optimizely Data Platform as our marketing automation platform. Information transferred to Optimizely for processing will be processed in accordance with their Privacy Policy and their Terms; and
- with respect to information we receive from other sources, to combine it with information you give to us and information we collect about you for the purposes set out above (depending on the types of information we receive). These are companies approved by you, such as social media sites.
In accordance with the law, we will only retain your personal information for the period necessary to accomplish the purpose for which it was provided. We keep this data under periodic review to ensure it is still necessary for us to retain it. If reasonably necessary or required to meet legal or regulatory requirements, resolve disputes, prevent fraud and abuse, or enforce our terms and conditions, we may also keep hold of some of your information as required, even after you have closed your account or it is no longer needed to provide the services to you.
HOW DO WE SHARE YOUR INFORMATION?
SHARING INFORMATION OVERSEAS
SECURITY OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
YOUR RIGHTS (AND HOW TO EXERCISE THEM!)
If you wish to exercise any of your statutory rights relating to data we hold about you, please get in touch by filling out this form. We use the OneTrust portal to help us deal with all data-related requests so that we can deal with your query as thoroughly and promptly as possible. The form includes all of the information we require in order to deal with your request and includes a section where you can also add any other details or questions you may have for us. Once we receive the form, you will receive an automated response from OneTrust. Thereafter, rest assured that we will be handling your request personally and we will let you know when we have completed the request.
Once we get all of the information we need to process your request, your request will be investigated by our Data Protection Officer and progressed accordingly.
If you have any questions about filling out the form or encounter problems submitting it, please drop us a line at [email protected] and we will be happy to help.
In certain circumstances, you have (amongst other rights) a right to:
- request that we delete or remove your personal information (note that we are legally entitled to hold some of your personal information, for example, if you have made online purchases on our website, we may need to keep some parts of the information from your order for tax reporting purposes);
- object to certain processing of your personal information;
- require us to update or correct any inaccurate personal information which we hold; and
- require that we stop processing your personal information for the purposes of sending you direct marketing communications.
We promise to deal fairly and promptly with your request. However, if you remain dissatisfied after we have processed your request, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office.
CONTACT US
CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY
Cookie Policy
We use cookies and similar technologies to personalise and improve your experience when you use our website, including:
- keeping track of your shopping basket;
- allowing you to login to your account;
- remembering your preferences;
- customising the website to be more relevant to you (like displaying prices in your country’s currency); and
- helping us make our website better by telling us what users like and don’t like.
This document explains what these technologies are, why we use them and your rights to control our use of them. This Cookie Policy is incorporated into our Privacy Policy. If you continue to browse the site without changing your settings, we’ll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies. However, you can change your cookie settings at any time by clicking here.
1. What are cookies?
A “cookie” is a small text file that’s stored on your device when you visit a website. All of your devices have different cookie settings. Cookies cannot be used to run programs or deliver viruses to your device.
Some cookies are deleted when you close down your browser. Others remain on your device until they expire or you delete them from your cache. These enable us to remember things about you as a returning visitor.
For more information about cookies, please visit www.allaboutcookies.org. Alternatively, you can search the internet for other independent information on cookies.
Cookies can be set by us (“first party cookies”) or by selected other companies who place cookies on our site to enable features or functionality to be provided on or through the website you are using, such as advertising, interactive content and analytics (“third party cookies”). The third parties that set these third party cookies can recognise your device both when it visits our website and also when it visits certain other websites or services. These service providers are subject to confidentiality provisions with us to restrict their use and collection of any personal data. However, please note that we do not control these third party cookies and we suggest you read the third parties’ privacy policies to make sure you are happy.
2. Why do we use cookies and other tracking technologies?
We use cookies and third party cookies for several reasons. Some cookies are required for technical reasons in order for our website to operate, and we refer to these as “strictly necessary” cookies. Other cookies enable us and the third parties we work with to track and target the interests of visitors to our website, and we refer to these as “performance” and “functionality” cookies. For example, we use cookies to tailor content and information that we may send or display to you and otherwise personalize your experience while interacting with our website and to otherwise improve the functionality of our services. Finally, third parties serve cookies through our website for advertising, analytics, and other purposes. This is described in more detail below.
3. What categories of cookies may be used?
The specific types of first and third party cookies served through our website and the purposes they perform are described in further detail below:
Strictly necessary cookies
We need to use these cookies to make the website work and allow you to use some of its features, such as tracking page navigation to assist with linking back to different sections, signing up to a newsletter and enhancing security on site when submitting forms.
You can set your browser to block or alert you about these (or any other) cookies, but some or all of the site won’t work.
If you really hate cookies this much, it’s probably best you close the website and clear all your cookies. In fact, the web probably isn’t for you… Physical shops still exist, and you can be confident of your privacy there. Well, apart from people recognising you. And Security cameras. Lots of security cameras. But apart from that you’re all good.
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
Performance cookies
These cookies are all about tracking site performance – we use them to do stuff like count visits, provide debugging information and see where visitors are coming from.
Typically these cookies just contain a unique ID which allows us and third party services to recognise you as you move about the site and interact with it. We (and third party services) record all those interactions and tie them together using the unique IDs in these cookies.
If you turn these cookies off it’ll hamper our efforts, but nothing critical to you using the site should break.
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
Functional cookies
These cookies are used to deliver enhanced functionality and features which we think are jolly valuable, but aren’t absolutely critical to making the website work (as in, you should still be able to buy stuff with these turned off), and they’re set both by us and third party service we use.
You can turn these off, but some things won’t work or won’t work as well.
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
Targeting cookies
Ok, these are the “bad” cookies everyone’s talking about. They’re set by us and our advertising partners to help deliver targeted ads.
They may be used by us and our partners to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.
But, before you click “deactivate” faster than a bourbon lover hitting “add to basket” when we get more Buffalo Trace Antique Collection into stock, just think about it for a moment – you’re not going to get less advertising, it’s just going to be less targeted – for which read “less relevant” – for which read “less useful”.
No one really likes advertising, and while we’d all prefer less of it, it’s a tough sell to say that it would be better for it to be less relevant.
That’s our pitch, now feel free to turn them off 🙂
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
Social Media cookies
These cookies are set by social media services which appear on the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit.
If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
Other tracking technologies
We and our third party partners may use other, similar technologies from time to time like web beacons, pixels (or “clear gifs”) and other tracking technologies. These are tiny graphics files that contain a unique identifier that enable us to recognise when someone has visited our website or, in the case of web beacons, opened an e-mail that we have sent them. This allows us, for example, to monitor the traffic patterns of users within our website, to understand whether you have come to our website from an online advertisement displayed on a third-party website, to serve targeted advertisements to you and others like you, to improve site performance, and to measure the success of marketing campaigns. While you may not have the ability to specifically reject or disable these tracking technologies, in many instances these technologies are reliant on cookies to function properly; accordingly, in those instances, declining cookies will impair functioning of these technologies.
Finally, please note that third parties (including providers of external services like web traffic analysis services) may also use cookies. Google also places and reads cookies on the browsers of users of our website (and may also use web beacons and similar technologies) to collect information relevant to the Google Certified Shops Programme. We have no control over these third parties.
For a list of the cookies used on our site which fall under this category, click here.
4. How can I control cookies?
You have the right to decide whether to accept or reject cookies.
Website cookie preference tool: You can exercise preferences about what cookies are served on our website by clicking here.
Browser controls: You can set or amend your web browser controls to accept or refuse cookies. If you choose to reject cookies, you may still use our website though your access to some functionality and areas of our website may be restricted. Please click below for detailed information on how to disable and delete cookies in some commonly used browsers:
Disabling most Interest Based Advertising: Most advertising networks offer you a way to opt out of Interest Based Advertising. If you would like to find out more information, please visit www.youronlinechoices.eu.
Mobile Advertising: You can opt out of having your mobile advertising identifiers used for certain types of Interest Based Advertising, including those performed by us, by accessing the settings in your Apple or Android mobile device and following the most recent published instructions. If you opt out, we will remove all data about you and no further data collection or tracking will occur. The random ID we (or our third party partners) had previously assigned to you will also be removed. This means that if at a later stage, you decide to opt-in, we will not be able to continue and track you using the same ID as before, and you will for all practical purposes be a new user to our system
5. Changes to our Cookie Policy
This Cookie Policy was last updated on 10 November 2023. We may update it from time to time in order to reflect changes to the cookies we use or for other operational, legal or regulatory reasons. Please re-visit this Cookie Policy regularly to stay informed about our use of cookies and related technologies.