Reddit post on collecting wine

Read this post on collecting wine and thought posting it here might spark some good debate. https://www.reddit.com/r/wine/comments/f4x300/collecting_wine_dont_be_a_chump/

What do people here think?

I think I’m not his target audience. In fact, I can’t imagine being in his target audience.

That’s what I think.

I think he gives some clues as to why some types of very good wines might be mispriced (on the low side). Some of it isn’t logical though. Just because a collector doesn’t want certain bottles (e.g. because they don’t meet a set of generic criteria) doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not excellent wine. Sure, it’s important and one would want to know if it’s been stored well. But, “if it’s on sale, it’s on sale for a reason and you should probably skip it unless you’re going to drink it that week or that month,” is a ridiculous general statement to any straight-thinking person.

Anyway, for people who want to drink and have no intention of selling–like me–the post is helpful.

I agree with all the points.

I would add too points:

  1. check wine-searcher.com to learn more about the availability of a wine (older vintages) and the price difference to the newly offered wines as well as historic price performance. This gives you a better idea about the future price development. In that sense: it is true that sweet wines don’t really have a lot of price appreciation but it might be still worth cellaring Yquem.

  2. If you really wanna make profits with selling wine, do as much research as possible. The more you know about the wines, the higher the likelihood that you don’t buy crap or lame ducks. Even though I don’t sell wines (roughly 2.5% of my cellar are in the “sell” category but because I don’t want them anymore), I do a lot of research (my Bordeaux research tracks 14 critics, weighs them, looks at availability, past price performance, past wine performance, absolute and relative pricing, etc. etc.). This is a lot of fun, you learn a lot, save money (or spend less stupid money) and drink better wine in the end and it helps predicting the future price development more accurately (I made a back-testing for the 2015 vintage recently, and my choices outperformed a broader top 60 wines portfolio by more than 30%).

I don’t think I am the target audience either.

It sounds like some reasonably good advice for the “my cellar shows off how much money I have even though I don’t actually like wine” crowd. These same people are whom I blame for classic muscle car prices skyrocketing into the stratosphere.

My life philosophy: drink it if you like it, and drive it like you stole it.

With this advice I’d have to get rid of all my wines from obscure regions because those won’t appreciate in value. Bullsh*t. I’ll keep them in my cellar and enjoy them at my leisure when they are fully mature.

One last note, since I’m feeling chippy this morning. The author has a cellar full of German Riesling that he doesn’t think will apprciate? He obviously isn’t drinking at the top end of the riesling scale since the secondary market on top riesling is nuts!

TW

or realize you’re collecting a cellar that has more than a thousand bottles—which means you or your family will sell it

Honestly, he lost me here. A thousand bottles may be a lot for some people but for others that’s maybe only three years worth of wine. Having a thousand bottles or even two thousand doesn’t guarantee that someone will be selling wine in the future.

I agree with some of the concepts in the post.

I think my situation is common here, though. I’m not really buying for resale purposes but the vast majority of my cellar is burgundy/champagne with a little Barolo and northern Rhône which will likely appreciate pretty well. Drinkers are <10% of the cellar and even those may age well and appreciate, like ldh/LRA Rioja. Not sure about the domestic stuff like bedrock/Carlisle but it will certainly be good to drink.

Ain’t that the truth, I’m guessing most people here either have more than 1000 or are building to have more than that. A retirement cellar of mature wines for be consumed at a moderate pace requires more than a 1000. I certainly have wines in my cellar that will never appreciate, my daily drinkers, Chinons, Zins, Beaujolais, etc., but those are for regular weekly consumption. If it turns out I end up not liking something, I normally pass it along to others that might. My really good stuff, that I know has appreciated, some stupidly, those will be consumed, good health willing.

I’m glad that I’m not a collector. Just a drinker. The goal for me is simple: buy the wines I like to drink, controlling the storage conditions so that I own the provenance. Pop them when I think they are ready, and some to enjoy during their long evolution. Wish I had started doing that much much earlier.

Now that said, I have some friends with 1000+ of super premium Cabs adorning beautiful glass door cellars, and some of those wines seem to move at a glacial pace off of their racking. Some are from those new pop-up California winners that are hot for a few years then sorta melt away into obscurity, and I wonder about all those.

This one makes perfect sense to me. While a few super high end wines have gone through the roof and received a lot of press, the number that have is minuscule. The vast majority of even top quality Rieslings do not appreciate in price much (unless you happen to have been collecting for long enough to have original cases of '59s or some such) and are challenging to sell at all, let alone for a profit. Not that most of us who love and buy Riesling are looking for a profit. No one who truly has a “cellar full of Riesling” has a cellar full of those very few bottlings anyway - there aren’t enough of them made and access is almost impossible, even with a lot of money.

I bought some Gonon St. Joseph on sale for $29.00 once…I guess I’ll take it back, I had no idea it was dumb move.

I agree with all the point he made, it’s just that most of us here have or are building a cellar for their personal consumption and not as an investment. Money we put is expenditure not an investment we hope will generate a financial profit.

I do think about re-sell value and secondary market if I’m going to buy from a winemaker I couldn’t taste yet or enter in a new region. It’s not one of the main purchasing criteria but it’s just more reassuring to know that if I feel that my new case of Gonon is not to my taste or that I can find better value I’ll be able to re-sell it. Or that if I end up not liking wines from let’s say Piemont there is a market for it to at least break-even.

I say that but I’ve yet to taste Gonon, I started the wine game after he got absurdly expensive in France and elsewhere :frowning:

Great advice for investors and speculators, not for drinkers.

I can understand his perspective as someone whose job has him frequently appraising cellars being liquidated as part of an estate. But of those who cellar wine to drink, how many think of it as a significant financial component of their estate? Maybe a vinous asset to pass on to your children if you know they are into wine.

I think in general it is one of the best pieces on wine as an investment I have read in some years. That being said, it is a smallish market and getting smaller. Much of the current speculation depended on a buoyant Chinese market, and that is beginning to fall apart.

Already hearing about some dumping onto the UK market.

that '16 produttori barbaresco is a drinker and should appreciate in value…esp mags.

I think much of the advice in the post seems sensible, except that as an asset class, wine strikes me as a pretty poor choice to begin with. I think the correct starting point is probably to buy what you think you are going to drink and to put your investment dollars elsewhere.
A

My cellar is for my own personal consumption. I have yet to sell any bottles. Anything I open that I find I don’t like or if my tastes change I will open any remaining bottles for a group of non-wine drinkers at a get together so at least it gets drunk. Buying and holding wine as an investment does not appeal to me in any way.

+1 on many of the responses above. I’ve never sold a bottle. I like the idea of knowing that if I had to liquidate, I could probably get 50-75% of what I paid, but if I ever get to that point, I have a lot bigger things to worry about. This is a hobby and a passion, not an investment vehicle.

He’s not writing for me; he’s talking in generalities about the cellars people are asking him to buy. I am sure the advice is generally sound for that purpose. Although his brush is awfully broad and could induce some pretty big mistakes.

And some of the advice seems just plain weird. Always buy from the same guy at the same shop and don’t shop around for the best price? Does not sound like good advice, especially for someone buying as an investment. Perhaps he’s talking to the person who does not know, and doesn’t want to know, about wine, and in that case it might be a good idea to attach oneself to a single person who can scout for you. Otherwise, it is stupid advice.

This!

So, I’m not going to get rich off of the case of Willamette Pinot under my bed?