Based on what I’ve reading, I now realize I need to buy and drink some aged wines, to know what to put in my soon to be completed cellar. In addition, ideally, I would like to laddder the cellar with young wines, partially aged wines (still needing some cellar time) and fully aged wines that are ready to drink, but that could still stay in the cellar for a while.
I checked and Winebid will not ship to Arkansas. At this point, most companies ship to AR, but not all, as like many states, things are in flux after the SCOTUS ruling a few years ago.
So, I need a good/safe source to buy some fully/partially aged wines. Little Rock and Memphis are options, both being about two hours or a bit more away, or other online sources (most will ship to Arkansas right now).
While shops with “bargains” would be a bonus, more important is making sure if I try a 10-20 year old bottle and don’t like it, that I’m not trying to figure out if I didn’t like the wine or it was improperly stored and has turned.
Billy, your new cellar will look empty but please resist the urge to fill it asap. There is nothing worse than waking up one day to realize there are thousands of dollars worth of bottles in your cellar that are past their prime or are wines that you don’t particularly care to drink anymore.
Sourcing aged wines is always problematic nomatter the source. My hit rate was about 50% even though I did buy mostly from the types of sources named above. Eventually I decided the cost was too great and that it was better to buy on release and just wait for them to age.
The other thing you have to do is match your cellar inventory to your drinking habits. For example if you drink one California Pinot per week, you need at most 100 bottles in your cellar. If you put 200 bottles in there, then four or five years from now you’ll find most of them are past their prime.
On the other hand if you drink one bottle of Bordeaux per week with an average age of ten years, then you’ll need 500 bottles of Bordeaux. Don’t rush out and buy 500 bottles tomorrow, you’ll have plenty of time to bring them in. Maybe buy 100 bottles in a good year and zero bottles in a lousy year. Sure try buying some aged wines now for current consumption but don’t go hog wild…there’s always more wine out there to buy.
Another thing to keep in mind is that buying wine is part of the fun, in fact for many of us it’s an addiction. If you fill the cellar too soon you’ll have to give up buying wine, or build an addition to your cellar to hold more wine you’ll likely never drink!!
Benchmark deals in primarily back vintage wines and is one of the few, if not only, retailers that offers a Provenance Guarantee to protect you against bottles that have been improperly stored. Click Here to read more on how we do our homework regarding provenance. Delivery to Arkansas is not a problem.
You can browse our stock in real-time at www.benchmarkwine.com, or I’m happy to put you in contact with our sales team if you would like more personalized service. Good luck and have fun stocking your new cellar!
I definitely hear what you are saying and will work to resist the temptation to buy too much, too fast.
The big thing I am looking for right now is to get some aged wines to better gauge my wife’s tastes. I travel to Europe 5-6 times a year, mostly Germany & Switzerland, but also UK, Italy and others, and we usually have wine with dinner and we try all different types, so my tastes are much wider than my wife’s right now.
I’m trying to get a sense for where she’s currently at, so that even when I buy young wines, I’ll be getting wines she will like when they are ready to drink.
That said, my tastes, especially for reds, has changed dramatically over the years, so her’s may very well do the same. At the moment, her go to red wines are Malbec and Rioja, but she also likes Merlot and Zinfandel and a few others. To date, most of the California Cabs and Pinot Noir’s she has not liked (I do) and there has only been one Bordeux she has liked (would have to try and find notes to see if I jotted down which one) and I think there has been a Rhone or two she’s liked.
Early on my focus will be getting some variety, beyond what we’ve been drinking, to see where our tastes are, so we know what to buy both for short term and long term drinking.