Keller Silliness

What “fool’s dynamic” has caused Keller GG Riesling prices to moonshot into the stratosphere, specifically in the US in the last 5 years? I used to buy these from Moore Brothers in NY at $70/apiece. They’re very solid/great wines, but not even close to $200 great. What hedge fund managers or speculator(s) have catalyzed this paradigm shift in pricing for these wines?

Well, I can’t really take full credit because I’ve been buying for a while and I certainly didn’t do it all myself, and also I’m not a hedge fund manager, but I did purchase another 27 bottles of back vintage GG’s this week for roughly the prices you mention so I think I should get some of the credit. I got 3 bottles of the 2016 Hipping auction kabi too but I think your post was only about the GGs.
Alex

Great, enjoy dude.

Thanks Bryan!
A

For me, wine is about capturing a moment in time and a way to mark the memory tying it to another place & time. For instance Keller GG’s will always be wines that reminds me of my friend Doug Schulman on this board. He introduced me to them a little over a decade ago. Gonon & Levet will always be about this forum, Muser will always remind me of my friend Hago, any birth-year wine reminds me of Scott a guy I worked for that gifted me a bunch of wines from my birth-year, and Vieux Telegraph Blanc will always remind me of my friend Shane.

A quick look and it seems that you’re only commenting on the “market” of wine in your first five posts. What is causing you to focus on the market aspect of wine? Are you ITB or are you just venting frustrations as you see the wines you have grown to love become less and less accessible? I hope this can be heard as someone asking with curiosity rather than the 'tsk tsk" tone. I look forward to reading more as you share, welcome to the forum!

Not ITB, genuinely curious what drives market $ up (please nobody here say, “supply/demand”, that’s simply not how this ‘market’ works)

Huh. This is pretty insightful. Really eye-opening. I’d never thought about it before, but now that I read this I think I’m starting to understand why I was forced to buy six bottles of Keller Morstein GG in order to get one bottle of the Keller Silvaner Feuervogel. Keep the wisdom coming. I would like to hear more please.

Go touch yourself Gillette.

I think silliness is a word, just sayin’.

That said, it’s not a fool’s dynamic, it’s importers and/or distributors/retailers that understand consumer behavior., i.e. supply/demand. Of course, points/press are always integral as well. Ahem, (sorry Ryan), I’ve only been doing this for 20+ years, so excuse the ‘ITB’ insight.

Bye, bye, Ryan! We don’t need you here

Super, super interesting question. I think it’s probably that his wines, while under-performing as you suggest, just got caught in the massive wave of German wine buying that has swept the world. I mean, what German dry wine can you buy at a reasonable price these days?

I pretty much stopped when they shot past Trimbach CFE, and a boatload of other demonstrably better wines coming out of Austria.

My bet would be that you just have bad taste. I mean, that would the simplest answer. Bad palate.
A

Interesting comment. I don’t really think of Austrian Riesling as being much like German GGs. Don’t really know anyone who does. They just strike me as totally different animals.
A

To a degree. The Austrians are still better wines. So is CFE.

That is definitely true for anyone that likes high octane wines. Not my thing, but have at it!
A

Plenty of GG is the mid 13s. I tend to stick to 14.0 or lower in my Austrian purchases, and drink very well for a lot less money.

I had to go back to this after someone suggested that you thought they were under-performing. I don’t read that here…what i do read is that you’re upset that you can no longer get these wines at the $70 price tag…which would seem to me, to indicate that they were greater than you thought.

I think they were massively under-valued at the $70 mark. I’m probably not a buyer at the $200-mark…but to me, your anger or frustration at the mark-up indicates that you valued them.

I don’t get close to 14 in my Riesling very often. It’s just not for me. Not sure about the money thing. I probably get better pricing on new releases than you. I’d expect top Austrians to be less expensive than top Germans. I thought we were talking about the better wine.
A

And I think the Austrian and CFE are better wines. Keller has never been something that rang my bells, not Schafer-Frohlich. Wittman has been up and down, etc.