As the holiday season nears, consumers are warned to beware of scams  designed to separate them from their money. But it isn’t just consumers who are subject to scam artists — some wine producers have been targeted, too.

Mike Lempriere, who operates his own tiny (his word) winery, Perennial Vintners, in Washington state and also manages Vintners.net, a Web site host for small winery businesses, has been targeted several times.

Each is a slight variation on a similar theme, and in most cases, the e-mail is riddled with misspelled words and poor grammar, and occasionally without any capital letters. In one case the writer identified himself as John, an American living in Seoul, South Korea, who said he received a bottle of Lempriere’s wine as a Christmas gift last year from a friend, and loved it so much he wanted to get “some cases” for his upcoming birthday party.

“I will be making my payment via my American based credit card,” the e-mail said. “I am registered with a shipping agency here in Seoul, which has representatives in USA. So you are not get (sic) the wines shipped but the wines will be picked up at your winery by this licensed shipping agency.”

It sounds like a quick way to sell a few cases of wine and not even have to worry about shipping.

Another one read, “I will love to purchase from you but before i can do that i will like to know whether you can ship product’s to ASIA and to know more about your market and to also know your mode of payment and i can send you my credit card, so please i will be expecting to hear from you soon for me to place my order.”

One that is less obvious involves labels. Lempriere writes that he has received requests from all over the world from people asking for a label, and says HE believes most are collectors who have “huge volumes of international labels stuffed in their shelves.”

But he added, “I’m also betting that the solicitation I got once from China was intended for me to send them a label so as to make it easier for someone to counterfeit my product.”

It’s not only the producers of expensive wine who have to worry about counterfeiting. Lempriere sells his for $14 per bottle.

So, this holiday season, in addition to caveat emptor (let the buyer beware), caveat vintner.