Rhône fine wine: Slow and steady wins the race?
The Rhône Valley’s status as a producer of fine wines has never really been in doubt but for decades its performance relative to peer regions in France and beyond has been poor. With signs that it’s gaining traction in the secondary market, however, is the Rhône’s steady perseverance starting to pay off?
As Liv-ex laid out in a recent report, the Rhône is a “paradox in the fine wine world” and a region that has remained in the shadows, “despite having many of the attributes that should make it shine on the secondary market – quality, diversity, history and stories”.
Its vintage quality is high and consistent, its top wines have excellent critical scores (Robert Parker was much more of a Rhône than a Bordeaux one), the wines for the most part are accessibly priced and while it has complex soils and terroirs it’s a much easier proposition than, say Burgundy, to get to grips with.
That said, consistency can dull the edge of urgency, if every vintage is good, there’s no need to rush to buy one over another. Parker’s preference for more robust iterations meanwhile had its critics at the time and has proved a less than enduring legacy with winemakers now seeking fresher, less alcoholic expressions in their cuvées.
But with fresher styles emerging, scores remaining high and buyers going beyond claret and Vosne for their cellars there’s been a steady uptick in activity for the Rhône on the secondary market.
Liv-ex notes that there’s been a 660% increase in the number of wines traded over the past decade as buyers seek more than just the labels Parker favoured.
Activity is split pretty equally between wines from the northern slopes and southern plains and both indices are up 23% over the past decade, but the wines from the former, on average, cost twice as much as the latter.
Although its performance has been slow and certainly less flashy than other liv-ex indices it’s not to say that there hasn’t been progress for the Rhône.
The Rhône 100 index is up 95% since it was created in 2003. This certainly pales against the 210% performance of the Fine Wine 100 over the same period, chockfull of first growths and grand cru Burgundy and the like but prices have also been far less volatile for the Rhône which has suffered far fewer high peaks and troughs during times of global turbulence.
Furthermore, over the past three years the tempo of the Rhône’s rise has been much faster and it has performed better than several other indices in this time, including the Bordeaux 500.
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On the year-to-date it is up 2.8%, the best-performing index behind only the Italy 100 (4.7%) and Champagne 50 (6.8%) which have both had record years.
Part of the appeal is the accessibility of the region price-wise. As Liv-ex pointed out, the region provides one of the cheapest entry points into fine wine.
Not only are the wines of the southern Rhône less keen than those of the north but two cases of the very top-priced wines cost the same as one case of a Super Tuscan, while five cost the same as just one dozen of something like Penfolds Grange or a Bordeaux first growth.
even the northern Rhône is good value against peer and near-to-peer fine wines, the finest Syrah is as much as 7.5 times cheaper than a leading Burgundian cuvée.
The US has long had a taste for Rhône wines – likewise for Italy – and buyers there continue to make up 55% of sales in 2020, while the UK accounts for just 30%.
It has not hurt the Rhône either that any wines above 14% alcohol – looking at you Châteauneuf-du-Pape – do not qualify for the 25% US tariff, while in the north the likes of Chave, Guigal, Allemand, Clape and Voge have built up strong followings among US buyers, spurred on (no doubt) by dedicated critics such as Jeb Dunnuck.
Liv-ex concluded by saying that: “It’s certainly a stretch to suggest that the Rhone is heading for a Burgundy-style market surge any time soon, but there are indications that eyes are turning to the region as customers look for value beyond other classic regions. Though its market share remains small, both the number of transactions and the number of wines trading have increased significantly over the past decade, a trend that has gathered pace in recent years.”
Plugging away quietly for decades, the signs are that the Rhône’s innate qualities are starting to work in its favour.
