Another Napa Cab joins the $300 per bottle club. I was offered two 3-packs at $900 each along with some large formats but will sadly be leaving them on the table after several years of buying. $300 is my cut off point. The 2020 vintage which I bought was $225 per bottle. $300 seems to be the new $195-225 from just a few years ago for many Napa Cabs.
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I’m surprised, but not surprised. $75/bottle jump in one year is a hard pill to swallow. A 3 pack all in is $1015 now. 
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I’m hesitant to purchase. I’ve always loved the wine but at what point do I say. “That’s too much….”
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Never had one of their wines, so I am in no position to comment about the value proposition, but a 6-pack of Roy Piper’s 2021 - which was released today - cost just about the same amount as a 3-pack of the MM.
Coming out of the other side of my mouth…I had a Dalla Valle Maya the other day that was sublime. And that costs even more.
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[quote=“Eric_Werner, post:3, topic:304139”]
Coming out of the other side of my mouth…I had a Dalla Valle Maya the other day that was sublime. And that costs even more.
[/quote]This was my first year on the Maya offering and the price of entry is quite steep… I took a run at it in hopes that my experience is good later down the road
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Agreed I was actually looking forward to this release until I scrolled to the price. I absolutely love the wines and the people. They were great hosts when we visited Napa. However as you mentioned at what point do you say the price is too much because as we know it’ll never come down from where it’s at
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Great wines and great people behind it.
The price increase of $75/per hurts a bit for sure, but I have been buying heavily since the 2014 vintage and they had kept the pricing the same for all those years. So I would rather have this one increase, 9 years down the road, then the annual “death by a thousand cut” increases that most wineries are implementing over the last several years.
To be candid, I have been surprised over the past 3-4 years that MM hadn’t bumped up their pricing.
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Thanks for the post on our wines. We have tried not to raise prices for as long as we could. Post Covid we have seen costs go up across the board on most everything (fruit, farming, packaging, shipping, etc) and the recent inflation is not helping.
Our hope it to maintain the highest quality and move forward from the ‘21 vintage and hold prices here as best we can for the long term. We are also working to make sure the wines are a good investment over the long term. All this said, I totally understand the price point being tough. Really hope we don’t lose you over it, the ‘21s are a special vintage.
RTL - Hayes
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Thanks for chiming in Hayes. We have an expensive hobby. 
By the way, how’s the new MM home coming along?
In the words of my child hood favorite superstar:
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The new estate is pretty incredible. I am super excited about the vineyard and we just worked with Jim Barbour to add an acre of new vines. We’re all really excited to harvest the existing vines and see what Sam does with the fruit this year. Btw, one of my best friends from college who became my CFO at the tech company I had for a long time hit me with Macho Man quotes daily. I’m having flashbacks. 
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Jeff - Sorry we disappointed you on price. I understand. We haven’t raised sine 2014 and will do our best not to raise after this vintage for the next 7-8 years. There are a lot of factors for the raise I mentioned in another reply and just this morning I saw an article in the SF Chronicle on Napa prices being up across the board by over 30% so I think macro events are effecting most everyone. I promise we are doing our best both on release and in the secondary market to make your investment in Memento Mori is worth it. I hope we have a chance to earn you back. The '21s are pretty spectacular and with the new property we acquired we are trying to create something special for all our clients to share with friends in the valley. Thank you for all the support and RTL.
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Agree. Decided to pass this year. At some point it just becomes too much.
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Go for their Cabernet, I actually prefer it to the Maya.
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We just visited the estate less than two weeks ago. Awesome experience with great wines. Ordered a 3-pack of the '21s then, trying to decide if I need another now!
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Hayes, thanks for chiming in here. I have not totally given up on MM and am wrestling with pulling the trigger on a 3 pack. Next to Realm, MM is probably the only other that would be a buy for me at the $300 price point even if I don’t like the price starting with a 3. Most of the others on my higher end Napa Cab buy list that went to the $300 per bottle this year were easy to trim out but I am finding difficult to trim MM out.
Can you comment if the price structure will be the same with the SVDs? Will they also be $300 or something higher?
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Mike - Thanks for not giving up on us. I appreciate it. We love Realm too. They are doing incredible things in the valley. There are some factors with the SVDs that are forcing our hand a bit (re all the things I stated above) and the SVD pricing will be over $300; but after this increase we will be holding the price for the foreseeable future. We are meeting as a team to finalize SVD pricing in the next couple weeks after the dust settles on the flagship release. This may be a bit of an overshare but we were lucky enough to get into some of the old Schrader blocks and in doing so it changed some of our cost structures. That said, I would do it all over again without question because the quality of the fruit is just incredible. We are lucky that as Sam keeps creating incredible wines we get additional access to some of the best vineyard blocks in all of Napa. Quality is what we are striving for and we hope to try and keep the price as competitive as possible. I don’t know how big of a fan of Las Piedras you are, but the '21 may be my favorite we have ever made from that site. I would put it up against just about anything out there. I hope you get a chance to try it and all the others.
Apologies for the long response. I get kind of excited about where MM is now. I started as a Napa wine consumer back in 2004 before co-founding Memento Mori and Vida Valiente Wineries and have a strong love for the valley. I still buy quite a bit and taste at 5-6 different estates every quarter to try and keep a fresh perspective on what everyone is doing. The fun of collecting and sharing new finds is still something I love and look forward to. The fact that MM is gaining access to some of these blocks is a dream. We are excited to share the bottles with you. I hope you’ll try them out.
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Price bump hurt, and >$300 bottles definitely is an outliner for us. However, we’ve loved not only juice, but getting to know @Hayes_Drumwright and his team. LPV is my wife’s fave and we enjoy the visits so much I’m getting a pass to stick with MM.
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Oof. “Over”!?
The Schrader LPV block sounds intriguing. But even Schraders LPV for 2021 was $305
Will it still be a 3 bottle commitment for each release?
Despite the price increase I still enjoy the flexibility that Vice Versa and Realm give me. 3 here, 1, here, 2 here, etc…… (VV gives shipping refund for consolidated orders). At the $300+ price point, I can’t have them all anymore. 
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I couldn’t agree with this more. When Vice Versa released this year I knew it would sting a bit but I was prepared. The best part is not being stuck to 3 pack of all the same wine just to meet the minimum. I wish more producers understood at the $300 price point flexibility is paramount even if there is a order minimum… As you mentioned when the threshold is crossed cutting some of the fat gets easier. Was tempted a few times to go back and load my MM order into the cart but each time the urge went away
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Pretty cool that you are coming here willing to answer questions and share information. I was going to pass but you’ve changed my mind. Thank you.
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I’m sure Hayes will give a more definitive answer but my experience with the MM SVDs is that you may not get an allocation if you are newer to the flagship list. I think it took me a year or two to be offered SVDs. For 2018 vintage I was only offered one Dr Crane and one LPV and was able to wish list one additional of each which was granted. For 2019 vintage I was offered one LPV and the ability to wishlist one DrC which was granted. So if only buying one 3 pack of flagship don’t expect to be offered more than one each of the SVDs. Which works out for the wallet anyway not having to buy a 3 pack.
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