Northwest wine shops

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• WINE: Tickets available for 33rd Tri-Cities Wine Festival

  WINE: Tickets available for 33rd Tri-Cities Wine Festival

  Tickets for the 33rd Tri-Cities Wine Festival, among the oldest wine events in the Pacific Northwest, are now available.

  All events will be Nov. 4-5 at the Three Rivers Convention Center in Kennewick. The Tri-Cities Wine Society stages the festival, which is capped by the Saturday night public tasting of the wines judged in the competition. Results from the professional judging of Northwest wines are announced throughout the evening.

  More than 100 wineries and 400 wines are expected to enter in the competition, and most will be poured for the public. It is Washington state's longest-running wine competition. Tickets for the public tasting are $70.

• CONTEST: Prosser Wine and Food Festival art contest under way

  CONTEST: Prosser Wine and Food Festival art contest under way

  PROSSER — Organizers of the Prosser Wine and Food Fair have announced one of the event’s annual harbingers — the artwork contest.

  Each year, those who stage the 31st annual celebration of local food and wine accept submissions for artwork to use in brochures, programs and advertisements, as well as the annual collectible poster.

  The Wine and Food Fair will pay $250 to the selected artist for the rights to the piece.

• These holiday gifts will please wine lovers in your life

  These holiday gifts will please wine lovers in your life

  We are fully engaged in the Christmas season, so now is a great time to start thinking about what to get for that wine lover on your list. You can take the easy way and buy a bottle or two of wine, or you can find something fun, interesting, unusual and Northwest in style.

  No. 1: Float. Westport Winery in Aberdeen has come out with one of the most unusual bottles of wine we've seen. It's called "Float," and it's a fortified dessert wine in a bottle shaped like a Japanese glass float. Cost is $50. Hurry if you want this because the winery is hand-bottling these as fast as it can to keep up with the flood of orders. Call 360-648-2224.

  No. 2: Personalized wine. Northwest Cellars in Kirkland will make a customized wine label for you and put it on its award-winning wines. If you want Northwest Cellars to design the label, there is a one-time $85 setup fee, plus the cost of the wine ($14 to $33 per bottle, depending on the wine). Or you can design your own label and avoid the extra fee. There is no minimum

• Northwest wines place in top 100 for Wine Spectator

  Northwest wines place in top 100 for Wine Spectator

  If the Washington and Oregon wine industries were a political movement, they might be known as Occupy Wine Spectator.

  On the annual list of the top wines from the world's largest wine periodical, Washington and Oregon are the 11 percent.

  The list, which came out Monday, includes 11 wines from the Northwest. As a region, Washington and Oregon make about 5 percent of U.S. wine, and the United States produces about 7 percent of the wine in the world.

• LIQUOR: Big liquor sellers looking for WA locations

  LIQUOR: Big liquor sellers looking for WA locations

  Big liquor retailers are looking for locations in Washington in the wake of the passage of Initiative 1183 that broke the state’s monopoly on the sale of hard liquor.

  An East Coast company calling itself a “wine superstore” has announced plans to open two stores in the Spokane area.

  Total Wine has 78 stores nationwide that sell liquor, wine and beer, The Spokesman-Review reported Friday.