How was 62 for DRC?

Took these pics when I stumbled on these at a local not so serious wine store a couple of years ago. Totally forgot until I started cleaning up some pics. Room temp, should I back up the truck? I’ll have to make a trip out to see What else lies in ruins.
[cry.gif]

As I remember it’s just all too expensive for a crap shoot.
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I would love to have those Martinis though 68/74.

Is anybody familiar with The Hammer Company import label on the RSV?

is that chuck’s fine wines? i’ve seen some old burgundy and bordeaux sitting there a long time ago. vintages and conditions did not look good.

No but your right, Chucks had some Old Old stuff upright on the top shelves, which must have been there for decades. I remember Chave bottles with ullage beyond belief. They used to have some stuff hidden Down in the basement too, but that was over a decade ago when I knew them well enough to let me snoop around a bit.

Rudy Specials?

Only folks willing to take 'em?

Part facetious, part “wow” no one tried to take those to auction.

DRC hit it out of the park in ‘62. However, unless storage is pristine, I wouldn’t chance it. Also, can’t see the ullage. LT is one of the greatest Burgundies I’ve drunk, but I had it over 35 years ago and it was out of a 3 liter bottle.

Weirdly, having just gone back to do a brief check of all the things Don found wrong with the fake 62 La Tâche sold by Rudy, that one looks legit.

Perhaps, I’m not an expert like the Don. That was the more my facetious reference. Overt fraud.

That said, my spidey-senses perk up on items in smaller or lesser know [players] shops that house something so unique as such a bottle. Holding out for a buyer to walk in when you could just auction and cash in immediately. Especially now when cash is king in this market and why wait for a sale. Could just be pedigree and storage questions at play.

All said, I don’t know the shop, so I could be wildly over-assuming. Yet, I could count on one hand places in NYC that would have such a bottle for retail that I’d trust. And then this is in Cleveland for a “local not so serious” establishment.

Let the buyer beware

I used to love this stuff. When I lived in SF I would scour the avenues for mom & pop shops and find great things like old Inglenook Cask bottles and stuff. I’d be on my knees and the woman behind the register would rush over and ask what I was looking for. Wine I said!

62 LT legendary. I’ll post my story about it tomorrow. A sad one.

LOL if those are indeed real DRCs then I bet buying them and flogging them off at auction (bought direct from retailer, one owner since) will yield a very handy arbitrage :slight_smile:!

Here’s an article from 1998 on Hammer wine distributors. In ‘98 they had been in business for 84 years.

Here is the current website for Hammer

http://www.ajhwines.com/home

Robert,

I was in that store last fall. I recall the temp to be less than ideal. I also think the fills on many of the wines (especially the DRC) to be of great question. It was an easy pass on everything, including the cali wines (which I would have taken a flier on had they been cheap enough).

Yeah, I think they have been there for eons Jeff. It’s in the other side of town so it’s not somewhere I go often. I just thought it would make for fun discussion. My guess is that they are real (although I know nothing), yet sadly we know they haven’t been treated well. No thoughts of buying here, but maybe I’ll stop in next time and see if I can get the story.

The price is crazy with what is known about the provenance, but what would be a price which one might gamble? $250? I’d take a flyer for sure on the 70’s cabs for maybe $40, but if I remember they wanted over a hundred.

In the early 2000s I went to Belair, home of overpriced wines, and traded Bobby 12 bottles of Maya for a beautiful magnum of 62 La Tâche. Wine was selling for about $6000 at that time, about the value of the 12 bottles of Maya. Invited several friends to a dinner built around the bottle. I had heard such great things about 62 LT and was ready for an epiphany. Needless to say, despite good ullage, capsule, label, etc, bottle was totally shot. No recourse and of course no backup. Never had it since.

Oy vey. That’s a bummer Alan!

I can’t imagine the heartbreak Alan. If
You want to take another go at it,
I have a source :slight_smile:. Burgundy and all this bottle is probably killer for some unknown mysterious reason.

I’d probably at least given you back a few of those Mayas. What was your back up bottle to the 62?

Really
Interesting that a few people can pin down these bottles
Just from the pictures. I bet that would
Be true even if it wasn’t known I live in Cleveland

It is the only wine still on my bucket list. I tasted one bottle at a Sotheby’s preauction, coming back a day early from a trip to Bordeaux to try this. Completely shot.

too pricy now. Don’t remember the backup but little league compared to 62 LT.

I bought two bottles of '62 Richebourg for something like $135 a bottle in the early 80’s. Fantastic wines, but I’ve never had the 62 LT.