First thread here! I did some recon to see if anyone else has asked a similar question but I have not found my answer.
I am a huge fan of the Whites from Lopez de Heredia. (Tondonia Blanco and Gravonia)
I usually buy a few any time I can see them. Lucky for me I have a grocery store in the Northern California area that has them from time to time.
As my appreciation for these wines has grown, I have been increasingly interested in hunting down a Gran Reserva Blanco (probably just one considering the steep cost), problem is, I cannot for the life of me find one of these bottles at “retail” price. After many weeks of scouring the web the lowest price I can find is $350, but most places are selling for $500/bottle. I believe the retail price is in the $150-$170 range according to some price data from K&L wines.
Am I crazy to expect to find a 2001 Blanco Gran Reserva at retail price? Could anyone point me to a location on where to find one? Obviously these are extremely sought after and rare wines and I know I may never find one at retail but I need to make sure I open every door before I give up on my search!
My local shop has the 2001 Red Tondonia GR in stock at $160/bottle. I bought one out of FOMO, but the whites of LdH are what truly intrigue me! They have my phone number written down if they get any in stock but I am not sure if I will ever get that call, or what the price would be per bottle. Thanks for your help!
It’s a little late, but Astor just had some for $165 last Thursday. I thought it was already done, so who knows. It may very well resurface again. Have your WS alerts set and wake up early.
Supply seems to be trickling in slowly, so I’ll second the suggestion of setting up W-S alerts and being diligent about responding to them quickly.
I managed to scrape together 8 bottles of the 2001 GR at an average price of $170 (incl shipping) by just monitoring W-S alerts. 7/8 of the bottles were from retailers in FL, which all seemed to get some stock at around the same time last November.
Just keep in mind that only 5000 bottles were produced and it’s in pretty high demand, that’s why you are seeing the price gouging.
Andrew you rock! I sent Astor an email explaining my situation and it just so happened that they had one bottle left! And to add to the fun they shipped it for free due to me being a new customer. Thanks very much for the help!
Does anyone know why the price of the white GR exploded so suddenly? In the old days you’d just assume Parker slapped a 100 on it, but clearly something else is going on here?
I also wish I knew the answer. Although LdH gets a lot of love from WB and other Wine communities, I would bet that it is almost unknown to a lot of people who are into wine but don’t venture off the more traditional consumer path of Napa, Bordeaux etc. So I am unsure why the old school Spanish LdH would suddenly become so inaccessible? Well the GR’s anyway, the Reservas seem to be easier to find at more reasonable prices.
Sure, but a lot has changed since the last GR release, which was 5 years ago? Demand for blue chip wines have increased and even the GR reds jumped in price from <100 to pushing 200 at nearly an order of magnitude difference in production volume. In other words, I don’t think there’s some singularly event unique to LdH that’s caused the price jump.
Demand seems to have gone off the rails. I noticed this first with the rosado where that was a fairly cheap wine sitting on the floor of WineX a decade ago. Now I’m regularly seeing last years release of the regular LdH Reserva reds starting at $60 on WineBid and selling. In most cases you can still find those wines on WS under $45 from multiple locations. Somehow the reputation has got well in front of the supply for LdH.
Yeah but $500 isn’t just a whole 'nother level, it’s a whole 'nother sport. The rose also snapped its price point but even the “bad” pricing is like in the $100 range. I have no idea what the deal with the white is.
I’m posting this for no other reason than to say that I share your frustration in tracking down Heredia Gran Reserva Blanco at anything resembling a reasonable price. That, and to express my jealousy at your ability to land a bottle for $165!!!
I don’t know what I’m doing wrong, but lots of people on this board seem to be able to buy their wines for way less than the prices I see. I think I shop both retail and secondary market like everyone else, but the prices I see quoted on this board frequently are well below anything I ever come across.
Hey Noah, feeling the need to increase your frustration a bit more.
I paid under US$120 for the 2001 GR Blanco…BUT my allocation is a single bottle. Ditto for the 2001 GR Tintos as well.
When you have been buying the same wines from the same retailers for over 20 years; you may be able to get access to small quantities of sought after wines at “1st tranche” pricing. For some folks here, the amazing prices they describe may well be due to something like what I describe. Also the 3 tier system in the USA is not your friend for wine pricing in general.
I feel you there. I’ve literally been searching for one for about 6 weeks now and if I didn’t make this posting I doubt I would have ever tracked one down
