In wine that is. I'm sure many of us would like to be a few years younger, but when it comes to fine wine youth is rarely a virtue.
I was asked recently about 'en primeur' wines and personally I think the concept is overrated these days. In the past buying en primeur (wine still in barrel at the winery) afforded an opportunity to buy fine wines at a relatively low cost before market forces started pushing up prices.
These days there are a number of fundamental problems with this proposition. First, I have seen prices steadily rising for en primeur wines as merchants try to make a decent margin on these sales. Combine this with the fact that wine prices have stagnated recently - and it's hard to see the benefit of buying young and parting with your cash early.
Second, when you do finally receive your wines in the UK (this can be up to 2 years later) you have to pay Duty, VAT and shipping at prevailing rates - all of which are steadily rising.
Third, you then have to store your wines for a number of years before they reach their peak.
It seems to me that this arrangement suits merchants much more than wine drinkers as they get their money up front and still make a healthy margin.
I guess the Holy Grail of fine wine is:
- Great quality
- Great price
- Ready now
And I think I might have found the answer. In my travels buying wines for my business I have occasionally come across producers who quietly retain small quantities of back-vintages, which they keep in perfect cellar conditions at the winery. The surprising thing is they don't always charge a big premium for these older vintages. I suppose in the end it's unsold stock and they want to sell it.
As an importer I am in a great position to offer these wines to my customers when the opportunity arises. Older vintages are not always available and you need to know a bit about vintage variation to buy the right wines.
So when people ask me whether they should throw their money at the latest en primeur release I think I will point them at some of my older vintage stocks and do them a favour.
