jaimetown
DC area
Wine Bottler
Posts:3488
 | | 12/30/2007 2:55 PM |
| Interesting article on the rising prices of wines - including quotes from a familiar face from this board:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/28/AR2007122803256.html
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Bob Bressler
Napa Valley
Wine Lover
Posts:4858
| | 12/30/2007 3:55 PM |
| | I'm still undecided if CellarTracker's cellar valuation tool is a good or bad thing. Looking at that number every day is somewhat daunting. | | | |
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Vine
Milwaukee, WI
Grape Fermenter
Posts:676
| | 12/31/2007 10:45 AM |
| Thanks for posting this article, very interesting. One has to wonder if the wine market will eventually level off or if this tremendous growth that we've seen over the past few years will continue at the same pace.
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Dave
Wine Thief
Posts:2890
| | 12/31/2007 11:09 AM |
| This is reminiscent of my record buying days in LA. There were two used record stores on the same block. One guy (the "pirate") sold the records for market (perhaps above-market) prices - $80 to $1000. The other store marked all the records at between $.99 and $5.99. I bought records to listen to and not to sell. If I found one of the rare records that could command pirate prices, I would snap it up if I didn't own it already. If I owned it, I would leave it for the next collector. Almost all of the other record collectors did the same. Unfortunately, the store was ruined by one fellow (the "minion") that spent enormous amounts of time at the low priced store. He had a wonderful knowledge of records and their prices. If he found a valuable record, he would buy it and immediately sell it to the pirate. It sort of ruined things for the rest of us since his appetite was limitless. Fortunately for the rest of us the store finally banned him.
Wine is a commodity. Your odds of finding a wine like the '05 Dujac on the shelves at reasonable prices are almost nil. Any store that employs a reasonable pricing strategy will have their valuable bottles snapped up by hordes of minions that will immediately flip them. Thus, I don't blame stores for gouging. Still, I miss the more genteel times. | | | |
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jason
Napa Valley
Wine Addict
Posts:6876
| | 12/31/2007 12:27 PM |
| | All I can say is nice profit on the Vogue (I assume) Dan!!! | | | |
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love_cab_chard
Master of Wine
Posts:12485
| | 12/31/2007 2:47 PM |
| "One has to wonder if the wine market will eventually level off"
- in my opinion, NO. Not as long as people are out there willing to pay market price for a (any) "collector" item. Be it wine, stamps, coins, cars, dolls, etc... In this case, it just happens to be, wine. Some one just paid $2Mil for a stamp. | | | |
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Vine
Milwaukee, WI
Grape Fermenter
Posts:676
| | 12/31/2007 3:37 PM |
| Posted By love_cab_chard on 12/31/2007 2:47 PM
"One has to wonder if the wine market will eventually level off"
- in my opinion, NO. Not as long as people are out there willing to pay market price for a (any) "collector" item. Be it wine, stamps, coins, cars, dolls, etc... In this case, it just happens to be, wine. Some one just paid $2Mil for a stamp.
I agree with you and to me this is just one more reason to buy wine direct via mailing lists and not complain about the prices. The secondary market more than makes up for any yearly price hikes a winery may impose upon it's mailing list customers.
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love_cab_chard
Master of Wine
Posts:12485
| | 12/31/2007 5:17 PM |
| | I learned, took advice from ojeffso & Jones long ago. Like any other investment, if that is the way you are heading, is to be ahead of the crowd. | | | |
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Randy Wigginton
Wine Connoisseur
Posts:5494
| | 01/01/2008 10:49 AM |
| | It will be curious to see the effects of the subprime meltdown as it spreads across real estate and then into the rest of our economy. I'm curious if the majority of the new money flowing into wine is from nouveau riche in this country or from offshore. With the dollar falling the way it has over the last couple years, many wines have become affordable for relatively affluent foreigners that do not have the dollar as their primary vehicle. | | | |
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love_cab_chard
Master of Wine
Posts:12485
| | 01/01/2008 11:52 AM |
| | Randy, the last recession/bad times 00-03 did not slow the wine market down all that much. May be a little but not much. | | | |
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Al_ksyrah
Barrel Filler
Posts:1044
| | 01/01/2008 1:43 PM |
| Over the past week, a couple of the local retailers told me that business in December was great, even crazy. Of course, December may had be the indicator for the long term trend.
-Al | | | |
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dinwiddie
Barrel Sampler
Posts:2176
| | 01/01/2008 2:07 PM |
| In the early 80's there were a couple of guys who thought they'd make a major investment in wine as an investment, not to drink. About 8 years later they had to sell out at a loss. Wine is a risky investment. Sure if you can get Petrus or Screagle, etc. you can make a killing, but for the most part, the stockmarket is better in the long run.
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Randy Wigginton
Wine Connoisseur
Posts:5494
| | 01/01/2008 4:41 PM |
| | dinwiddie - I can't imagine losing money on wine in the early 80s; if they just put all their money into 82 bordeaux, at any price, they would have made a killing. | | | |
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Dave
Wine Thief
Posts:2890
| | 01/01/2008 6:52 PM |
| | Exactly. It was impossible to lose money in the stock market in the '80s too. All you had to do was buy Amgen and Microsoft stock and you would have made a killing. | | | |
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dinwiddie
Barrel Sampler
Posts:2176
| | 01/02/2008 9:42 AM |
| In the early 90s, the Montgomery County ABC stores bought the collection of the guys who tried to do this. Of course these guys did not have the good sense to buy 1st growths, (or thy may not have been able to get a hold of them) but as it turned out, there were exceptional buys for a couple of months while the County sold off what they bought. The original investors did not lose money, but they did not make as nearly as much as if they had just put it in a mutual fund that tracked the S&P 500.
Wine is a tricky investment. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. We all could have made money if we had bought the '89 Petrus at $16 a bottle, but we didn't.Â | | | |
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Vine
Milwaukee, WI
Grape Fermenter
Posts:676
| | 01/02/2008 9:52 AM |
| Posted By dinwiddie on 01/02/2008 9:42 AM Wine is a tricky investment. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. We all could have made money if we had bought the '89 Petrus at $16 a bottle, but we didn't.Â
1989 Petrus for $16.00 per bottle? You're joking, right?
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Daniel Bailey
Grape Puncher
Posts:724
| | 01/02/2008 11:41 PM |
| | If anyone has a hard copy of the actual article from the Post, I'd appreciate being able to buy it from you so that I can add it to my files. Always interesting to see what makes it into an article after the talks with the reporter. | | | |
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Pool Boy
Laurl, MD (DC suburb)
Master of Wine
Posts:13707
| | 01/03/2008 9:17 AM |
| Posted By Daniel Bailey on 01/02/2008 11:41 PM
If anyone has a hard copy of the actual article from the Post, I'd appreciate being able to buy it from you so that I can add it to my files. Always interesting to see what makes it into an article after the talks with the reporter.
If I still have my copy, Dan, you can have it. I'll check tonight. I just about fell off the sofa when I happened to notice your name in the article.
But the article definitely reminds me of frenzies in other colletibles. My old boss bought every flipping Beany-Baby for his daughter. All of the rare and super-rare stuff. He was nuts.
And I remember being a comic book dealer. One of my partners told me he'd be right back -- we were setting up our booth at a convention to sell our stuff -- and I asked him where he was heading. He wanted to scan all of the other dealers to see what quality level they had of this particular issue -- Amnazing Spiderman #129. We had a copy but I gave up trying to tell him he was wasting his time. He comes back and tells me to give him $40 as he was going to buy another copy. After a brief discussion, I caved and gave him the $40. We immediately marked it up to $125. It was a stunningly perfect copy. Our other copy was pretty good, but not as good as this one he just bought. We ended up selling the perfect one for $130 and our other one for $50. I think all 6 copies available at the convention that day sold. Unreal.
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www.roguefood.com -- www.cellartracker.com | |
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Daniel Bailey
Grape Puncher
Posts:724
| | 01/03/2008 11:12 AM |
| | I'd really appreciate it TJ. Thanks. | | | |
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R8der
Livermore, CA
Barrel Filler
Posts:1083
| | 01/06/2008 2:07 PM |
| The same story was printed today in the Tri-Valley Hearald, which is part of the Alameda Newspaper Group (Oakland Tribune). Dan, if you want this hard copy as well let me know.
Chris
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