White wines shine at Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges auction as red sees slight ‘adjustment’
The 65th Hospices de Nuits auction, which raised €1,526,000 for charity on Sunday (8 March), saw strong demand for white wines, although reds dipped slightly, with the organisers hailing the “resilience” of prices in a period of “unprecedented instability”.
The auction saw all 79 pièces (228-litre barrels) and the one feuillette (half-barrel) wine sell, raising €1,526,000 (£1.3m or $1.7m USD) for the Hospices Civils de Beaune (which groups together the Beaune medical centre, the hospitals of Arnay-le-Duc, Seurre and Nuits-St-Georges, and the training institute for nurses and auxiliaries).
This marked a 91.7% increase on last year’s total of €860,000, but falls short of the €2,281,500 (£1.94m) raised in 2024 for the 2023 harvest, although this was largely determined by yields in the respective vintages.
The 2025 vintage produced 80.5 pièces, below the average of 100-150 barrels but higher than the historically low-yielding 2024 vintage – the smallest harvest in over sixty years which saw only 36 barrels produced.
The 2025 vintage was unable to match the impressive average barrel hammer price of €22,422 seen last year, which had risen 41.5% year-on-year to a fraction below the all-time record set in 2022 (€22,807).
This year saw a slight dip in the average price of the red wines however to €18,595 per pièce (which included 18 out of 19 cuvées produced for the auction) compared to last year’s €22,147 (which included 14 out of 15 cuvées produced for the auction). The average price for the premier cru reds (there are nine premier crus included in the sale, along with eight village level Nuits Saint Georges, and one barrel from Gevrey-Chambertin) was €23,386 this year, down from €28,815 last year.
Demand remained strong for the whites however, which account for just 5% of the appellation’s total production, with the average price per piece rising to €38,000. The Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru Les Terres Blanches, fetched €34,000 (up 26% from last year’s figure of €27,000), with the half-barrel selling for €23,000 (up from €16,000 last year).
“Following the particularly high average bottle prices recorded last year, there was a slight adjustment in price for red wines, while the scarcity of white wines
sparked some remarkable bidding,” iDealwine said.
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The auction’s highest prices were €47,000 each for a Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru Les Saint-Georges Cuvée Georges Faiveley and a Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru Les Saint-Georges Cuvée Hugues Perdrizet. This marked a decline from last year’s highest achieving lot, the Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru Cuvée des Sires de Vergy, which achieved €55,000.
Charity barrel
A further €59,500 as raised for local animal assisted therapy charity, Ani’nomad by the sale of the charity barrel – the Cuvée des Bienfaiteurs. The single lot of Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru is a blend of the estate’s nine Premier Crus which is offered by subscription, with all 290 bottles sold.
Cyrille Jomand, auctioneer and CEO of iDealwine, which took over running the auction last year, welcomed the results, saying they confirmed the resilience of prices despite slightly higher volumes, “in a context of unprecedented instability,”, and reflecting the the high quality of the vintage.
Guillaume Koch, Director of the Hospices Civils de Beaune, added that he was pleased with the results given this year’s relatively modest harvest. “Certain wine once again confirmed their appeal among Burgundy enthusiasts, achieving prices usually reserved for Grand Crus” he said, adding that it was ” a fitting tribute to Jean Marc Moron and his 36 years of service to the estate.”
Special vintage
The 2025 vintage was the last vintage to be vinified by outgoing technical director Jean-Marc Moron, who has now retired after 36 harvests at the estate. Moron, who officially handed over the running of the estate to Laurence Danel at the end of the auction itself, called the 2025 an “incomparable” if “atypical” vintage. It lived up to “the usual reputation of years ending in a ‘5′,” he said, being “structured, elegant, and atypical: combining the characteristics of a warm year with the hallmarks of a cool vintage”.
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