Extremely expensive wines

[MChang]

I recently discussed this matter with a friend who complained about wine prices.
For someone with an income of 100.000 a month … 1000 or 2000 for a prestige bottle is the money for 1-2 hours of work (and I know people like that), for others it´s a week´s or even a month´s salary.

I´m neither that wealthy - nor very poor. From time to time I pay up to 200, 300+ for a rare or prestiguous bottle, but not often.
On the other hand: when the bottle is meant for a group tasting, the price divides among 12+ tasters, and 100,- for a rare bottle to taste is worth the money for me - even if it´s eventually disapointing.

This is definitely something I think about sometimes… “I could work a couple more hours and get X”

[K_F_o_l_e_y]

Deleted.

[HenryB]

I’ve yet to meet a snake that couldnt be defeated with a bottle of Petrus lobbed at its head. You just need to urgently decant the contents before throwing it.

[Markus_S]

99.7% of the world thinks this thread is absurd.

Where is Godot and when is he coming?

[Taylor_Broussard]

I think we’ve pretty well exhausted the “it’s mostly relative to the buyer” perspective. We can all agree that what is extremely expensive to helicopter Screaming Eagle guy is different than Catholic School English teacher guy.

With that hopefully out of the way, what is your specific perspective? What is the most you personally are willing to spend on a single bottle, maybe say 1-3 times per year?

I think I top out around $350-400. Probably over 95% of wine I buy is below $80, but a few times a year, I’ll splurge on a First Growth, Cheval Blanc, Ornellaia or Cristal type wine, so I have a small stash of those in the cellar.

I don’t really open those bottles for myself or just for me and my wife. I mostly have them so I can (1) at least partly reciprocate in tastings with generous friends who share those kinds of wines with me or (2) share them with wine lover friends who don’t otherwise get a chance to try that kind of wine.

If I suddenly became very wealthy, would I spend more than that? I don’t really feel like I would, though I’d probably modestly increase the number of wines at that level that I buy. Maybe I’d do a once a year bottle at the next higher tier (Monfortino, pricier vintage of First Growth, that kind of thing)?

My 16 year old son asked me once, if I suddenly were very rich, would I buy super expensive cars? I thought about it some, and concluded I wouldn’t. I’m not judging anyone else for what they do with their money, but I don’t think I’m Bentley or Ferrari guy even if I were worth $20 million. I probably wouldn’t even be >$100K car guy. I just don’t think that’s who I am.

Like always, I think this is a very sensible take Chris. What I would add, as others have as well, is that there’s certainly a diminishing returns here. I think objectively, to the extent wine can be objective, one can reasonably buy better quality wine as they pay more up to a point. Depends on the variety, but I’d suggest that after $100-140+ you’re no longer seeking higher quality, but rather scarcity or some type of very specific preference (producer, vineyard, etc)… Then at that point, it’s completely relative. Someone seeking a trophy might be willing to spend several thousand on a bottle - I can think of better uses, but it has been and will continue to happen on a regular basis among the very wealthy.

But for those who think it’s always completely relative, and no price is too much… that gets into potentially silly territory where no one could claim that a $1M bottle of wine would be too much to drink.

[Chris_Seiber]

99.7% of the world thinks this thread is absurd.

I had no idea 7.6 billion people are reading this thread. I’d better think of something more clever to say.

[Chris_Seiber]

I think objectively, to the extent wine can be objective, one can reasonably buy better quality wine as they pay more up to a point. Depends on the variety, but I’d suggest that after $100-140+ you’re no longer seeking higher quality, but rather scarcity or some type of very specific preference (producer, vineyard, etc)… Then at that point, it’s completely relative. Someone seeking a trophy might be willing to spend several thousand on a bottle - I can think of better uses, but it has been and will continue to happen on a regular basis among the very wealthy.

I think you can get a better Burgundy or Bordeaux, for example, by paying $500 or $1000 than paying $100-140. Not in every case or almost every case, but the majority of the time for the knowledgeable buyer.

But as you note, the marginal cost for improvement goes up sharply as you get into higher price points. The quality difference between a good $20 Bordeaux and a good $50 Bordeaux is far greater than the difference between a $200 and a $500 Bordeaux, even though the price difference between those latter bottles is 10X as great.

[Taylor_Broussard]

I think objectively, to the extent wine can be objective, one can reasonably buy better quality wine as they pay more up to a point. Depends on the variety, but I’d suggest that after $100-140+ you’re no longer seeking higher quality, but rather scarcity or some type of very specific preference (producer, vineyard, etc)… Then at that point, it’s completely relative. Someone seeking a trophy might be willing to spend several thousand on a bottle - I can think of better uses, but it has been and will continue to happen on a regular basis among the very wealthy.

I think you can get a better Burgundy or Bordeaux, for example, by paying $500 or $1000 than paying $100-140. Not in every case or almost every case, but the majority of the time for the knowledgeable buyer.

But as you note, the marginal cost for improvement goes up sharply as you get into higher price points. The quality difference between a good $20 Bordeaux and a good $50 Bordeaux is far greater than the difference between a $200 and a $500 Bordeaux, even though the price difference between those latter bottles is 10X as great.

Certainly Burgundy gets into wonky territory just because the scarcity alone generates such high pricing. That’s less true for first and second growths because the actual volume of wine is reasonably high all things considered…but while I’d certainly concede that in the exceptional vintages the value proposition might move that dollar amount higher…I’d be curious if most here could distinguish real quality differences between a lineup of $150 and $500 wines in a blind tasting. (Even if they have a preference for the latter). Although I’m more than happy if someone wants to offer up their cellar so I could test that theory!

Edit: And please note, my figures are completely arbitrary! It’s possible that the upper limit is $200… I’m just not sure that things can be infinitely better quality. I do think there can be value to wines at $500 for all sorts of reasons, but I’m very tempted to doubt that they’re entirely due to “quality” differences.

[HenryB]

I know from empirical evidence my wife can, annoyingly. Was invited to a merchant doing a blind tasting of some nice burgundy many years ago (need to find out which region, I dont have it to hand). They didnt want to waste the bottles after the professional critics had been in earlier in the day - 36 burgundies from this micro site, (IIRC a slope near a church?). Wife managed to ‘I like that one’ all of the expensive ones, starting at about £300 a bottle. ‘I didnt like that one so much’ going up to about £150 a bottle. Shocking stuff. Properly blind too.

[Kelly_Flynn]

I suppose what most of us buy and drink is a product primarily of both our own financial situation and also our own “utility function”.

My general MO has been to buy what I like most at any given price point. But alas there are limits on the price point. As some of you know, I also have a bit of a contrarian streak. I love it when the wines I love are out of favor. So my cellar is disproportionately filled with Musar, Rioja, Loire, German/Alsatian,etc. In cab sauv I have more Sociando Mallet than anything else, and older Cali “classics”. And they are practically giving away most vintage port (<40 yo) and sauternes (ex Yquem). On the other hand, as we all are painfully aware, GC red burgs, First Growth bdx, etc., have become the Gamestops of the wine world.

I grapple with this a bit. As I am not getting any younger, and my wife is rarely still my drinking partner these days, I find myself trending toward less frequent but higher quality (and $) wines. More of the Pichons, Montrose, etc.

Don’t get me wrong – when I consider my all time great wine experiences, they have generally been extremely expensive wines. (Usually on someone else’s nickel.) But still I just can’t justify forking over the $ for them.

I do really get pleasure from pouring friends and loved ones a great wine they don’t know that makes them smile, knowing that pleasure was had at a great value.

[RTP_Latham_Richard_DBA]

I suppose I am a bit of a cheapskate, as though I could afford occasionally to buy a “trophy wine” for home consumption, I refuse to do so. We have plenty of what I consider high quality wines but none cost as much as $100 (before shipping and taxes). I have occasionally tried a slightly more expensive wine, but never more than one bottle as I did not like them enough to order more. If somebody else is paying for wine I will sometimes drink a so-so wine that I would not consider good enough to buy myself. The wines discussed here are also in the last category mentioned by the Italian professor of oenology who said something like: “There are three types of wine; good, bad, would drink it if someone else paid for it.” RTPL

[Terry_H_a_r_r_i_s]

Most of my wine purchases for the cellar and home consumption are in the $15 or so to $50 or so price range. For five or so years recently I pretty much quit buying any wine for home and otherwise drank down my modest cellar while also developing a love for all the local craft IPAs. Only the last year or so have I started buying wine again for populating my cellar. Again, almost all of it in that $15 to $50 range. On very rare occasions I’ve spent more than $100 or even $200 for a bottle of wine for the cellar.