Wine Investment... what is better?

I am new to collecting wine.

Using Screaming Eagle for example…

Is a full vertical better to own or just the rare key bottles from the best years for investment purposes… like the magnums etc?

Thanks in advance!

And off we go!

Call me a coward, but I’m not brave enough to invest in anything which has already increased by the multiple wines like SE have.

Drinking it is better.

I am not sure why you would want to come onto board like this and ask about wine as an investment. The last thing we want to do is encourage it. It takes wine out of the marketplace, it raises prices and makes it more difficult for people to be able to drink the wines they want.

Let me add this is not for amateurs. You have to deal with storage and insurance, transport, different state laws, and be able to identify arbitrages in the marketplace. This used to be a little easier; not now with the Internet, where everything is known, and there are very few bargains around. Friends who used to augment their living with sniping at auction have now given up; too much work, too risky and no real rewards.

So in short, if you do decide to do this, it’s against the interests of anybody here to help you, and with all due respect, I hope you fail.

I concur with what other people have said.

Before you spend a lot of money, look at the price of old Screaming Eagles and run some calculations. The relevant data on Wine Searcher is at this link. Ignore the auction prices listed there, which are probably just minimums. Also, be aware that at $2,000 and $3,000, these wines do not move quickly, so don’t expect to be able to cash out quickly and easily at the highest price you see there.

I think that you’ll find that the compounded rate of return on most vintages over time isn’t that great, particularly considering that, if you sell, you’ll take a big haircut from a retailer or auction house. If you are paying for commercial storage, you have to factor that cost in, too. A lot of Screagles from the 1990s are available for only about 50% more than the current release.

Plus, it’s a horrible investment. Transaction and storage costs are high. The marketplace is vague. It’s not investment, it’s pure speculation.

Seriously, with so many fakes of high end wines around, times have changed RE: investing. If you want to turn a quick profit get someone’s place on a high in demand mailing list (Like your example), flip the good years for double and break even on the average years. You might even want to try one for dinner for fun. But investing in DRC, Latour, Petrus etc,. that have been through many, many hands is risky at BEST.

Disagree with this. One can flip SE easily from the mailing list and make an instant profit via auction/wine store. But I agree with not holding on to it a long time. Too costly and risky.

Wine is a beverage.

To answer the original question, whether you are selling for profit or any other reason, I have not seen people pay a premium for verticals as a general rule.

A fair point. But the original post asks about “investing” in verticals, so I’m assuming he’s NOT buying off lists.

yes I was just wondering which was better?

some friends of mine told me that people pay premiums for entire verticals?

pardon my ignorance. I just was curious honestly. Ty to those that actually answered my question.

I personally would never spend that much on a bottle of wine to drink. I just used screaming eagle as an example only.

To make a million bucks in wine investing, start with 2 billion dollars and a staff of shoppers and authenticators…

But, then, why would anybody want to ‘invest’ in wine at that point?

If you can’t afford to, don’t.

If you can afford to, don’t.

Dunno, but if you find “The Golden Secret”, please tell me!!!

The only people who have argued for wine as an investment are people selling wine.

Why invest in something you know nothing about?

With all due respect, each of our cellars has a similar effect, whether intended or not.
By the way, wine investors tend to get hosed. Arrangers of wine investments get paid to do the hosing.

Why invest in something you know nothing about?

How else can I afford to retire early?

… wine investing, …

If you can’t afford to, don’t.
If you can afford to, don’t.

Agreed.

Invest in gold. You can’t eat it nor drink it, but you can always sell it and it stores easily. Just paint it brick red and use as a door stop.