Greater number of Bordeaux brands sign up négociants
With every passing year, an increasing number of brands from Italy, the US, New Zealand, Australia, Spain, and even Hungary announce that they will be represented by négociant houses in Bordeaux.
The number of wines now being offered each autumn and spring is well over 100 – up from 70 as recently as last year.
Yet alongside the Super Tuscans, Andean icons and cult Napa Cabs is the growing number of Bordeaux wineries using these autumn and spring release periods to offer new and library stock of their own.
A decade ago Château Latour led the way, quitting the traditional en primeur system to offer bottle-aged wines instead. Its routine is now to offer new vintages each spring and a library release in the autumn. The 2010 vintage was offered on 13 September.
In September 2020, Château Palmer also launched a late-release programme called N-10. The estate had been holding back half of its production since 2010 to have sufficient stocks to supply the initiative. The 2012 vintage came out on 22 September.
These are two of the most obvious examples, but others, such as Château Ausone and Valandraud, also use the autumn to release collection cases and ex-cellar stock of mature vintages.
BORDEAUX WHITES
Alongside the release of new and old red wines is the emerging use of autumn and spring as a new sales period for the region’s dry and sweet white wines.
The Sauternes 50 is traditionally the weakest sub-index of the Bordeaux 500. Since 2004 it has risen by just 23.2%, whereas all the other indices have grown by triple figures.
However, its performance more recently has been better. It rose by 1.1% in August, the only sub-index besides the Right Bank 50 (2.0%) to show positive gains.
It is also the third best-performing sub-index of the Bordeaux 500 index in the year to date, up by 3.9%.
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In a collecting and secondary market already strongly geared towards dry, red wines, the added problems of sweet wines falling out of fashion and some difficult vintages has seen Sauternes and Barsac being put under serious pressure.
As a result, estates seem to be migrating their releases away from the summer’s en primeur campaign, where they risk passing largely unnoticed amid the attention around the reds.
In February of this year, Château d’Yquem said that it would move its releases to the spring of 2023. It had been offering its dry wine (Y de Yquem) in September but it will now be offered in March, alongside the grand vin. Library stock of Yquem 2016 was released last month.
Domaine Barons de Rothschild has also moved the release date of its own Sauternes estate (Château Rieussec) to the autumn. The 2020 vintage of Rieussec, and R de Rieussec 2021 were released on 31 August.
Another Sauternes estate, Château Suduiraut, is debuting a dry white this autumn. Extremely limited quantities of the Vieilles Vignes 2020 were released on 15 September.
Finally, Château Cheval Blanc’s white wine, Le Petit Cheval Blanc, is also offered each autumn. The 2020 vintage came to the market on 19 September.
While attention largely focuses on the growing number of ‘global icons’ that are joining La Place, its increasing role as a continued vehicle for distributing Bordeaux wines outside of en primeur should not be overlooked.
Brands are turning to La Place as a means to reposition their offering in a changing and increasingly global market for fine wine. This change is having as much of an effect on the wines of Bordeaux as it is elsewhere.
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