How does everyone feel about provenance considering these two avenues ? Also do you prefer to buy wine in the UK or Europe as opposed to USA ?
These days, and for quite a few years now, in the United States the major auction houses are in direct competition with major brokers for the same population of wines. Additionally, many smaller or direct import merchants are now equipped to legally purchase and resell private collections, so just about all of it is coming from the same pond. Provenance of course varies by collection, but given the safeguards in place I do not think either side has a general specific advantage in terms of finding and presenting good stock.
A lot of the badly heat damaged wines that were circulating in the US secondary market in the late 90s and early 00s are largely gone, or now blocked from the market. I am speaking here to the oceans of 80s and 90s Bordeaux that languished on retailer shelves until general interest and market pricing began to accelerate in the mid 1990s. As an appraiser, it has been quite a while since I saw 80s Mouton with capsules turned orange or 82 Bordeaux with multiple red flags.
But there still does remain the risk of 80s and 90s wines which were not imported with the greatest care or which sat on retail shelves (or in cases) at 70+ temps for 2-3 years that have no outward signs of damage, but are now at an age where that minor heat exposure is going to become most evident. And for that reason I still tend to go to the UK for 80s Bordeaux unless I am VERY comfortable not only with the provenance of a US collection but also the known/likely point of entry at importation.
And for even very young wines, the higher up the prestige chain you go- the greater the risk of getting bottles that are 90-95% there, but slightly impaired from exposure to heat or other factors by virtue of a dayās bad luck here or there as the wine is sold and resold multiple times- sometimes traveling around the world. When you look at the rarity factor, it is clear that many of the rarest burgundies in the world are clocking far more miles than is ideal and being resold multiple times. And buying in the UK is no longer insulation from that risk unless you can established that you are buying bottles stored since release.
Long story short- these days I stick to the UK for 80s and 90s Bordeaux restocks except in rare cases where I really know what I am getting is pristine, and if I am after a really high end burgundy that is more than a few years old, I will be fanatical about ensuring I am only the 2nd or 3rd owner- no matter where buying.
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I like Tomās approach but am utterly lacking in confidence that I can KNOW that Iām just the 2nd or 3rd owner of premium bottles. Regardless, I regularly buy wines of the last 25 years at auction as long as there are no obvious faults (I.e. leakage, corks pushed or depressed, or low fills). Havenāt had too many problems.
I often see both auction and retail sellers touting provenance, but I donāt assign much if any value to it given my lack of confidence in sources. Unless the wine is actually coming directly from the winery proof is just about impossible to come by. Heck, sometimes I canāt even get good quality pictures.
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My hit rate at auction is as good at retail, so ai like to buy bottles at a significant discount ar auction. I buy mostly under $100 bottles (auction price, some at retail can be 5x).
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I bought a lot of winebid in the 2000ās. Tons of failures. My retail has been pristine.
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I live in Germany. I only buy in Europe - from producers directly or at auction.
UK is gone since they left the EC.
At auction I ignore bottles with US slip labels.
Otherwise most has been ok to fine.
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I appreciate the feedback and encourage more discussion. As Iām back in the Bordeaux game Iāve also decided that at 61 Iām not buying any new vintages. I am looking for older examples though. I recently hit a lot of 2000 Latour at HDH that released by the chateau in 2016. I did pay a significant premium over another lot of 2000 Latour. Itās still a few years old as far as release date but figure it has a better shot at being well stored.
Iāll also admit to having an Anglo bias on this issue. In my mind the larger retailers over there are taking care of storage or obtaining well stored lots. I have no evidence for this whatsoever.
Iāve also been buying a bit from Flickinger and Cellartrading. flick because they do a decent amount of offers that are either chateau or negociant releases. In the interest of honesty I also sell through both. I have more confidence in Cellartrading because they are a storage facility and while there is no guarantee that these bottles have sat there since release at least I know where their last resting spot was.
I buy regularly on Winebid. I donāt think I have ever had a bad bottle. On the retail side I know I have gotten bad bottles, but likely only 2-3 a year. I also buy direct with about the same hit rate as retail, but the maker has always made the situation right.
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I have mentioned it before on the board. I stopped buying years ago from Winebid after I sent in a consignment that I stated most if not all of the wines I was consigning were bought at auction (wines as old as 15 years or so). All the wines were listed as ābought on releaseā. Are they better about it now? No way to know
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I can judge only from my experience which has been perfect. Iāve bought RhĆ“nes as old as 20+ years.
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Also Europe here. Basically, all retail bottles have been great. For the auction bottles I try to stick with inspected and validated cellar auctions. Iām always suspicious when I see auctions of 5 bottles which could indicate one has been consumed and either they didnāt like it or it was volatile. At least the French auctions are very strict about not shipping from June to September.
There are many regions Iām wary of, but in my experience, red Loire has always been great, most Rhones can be safe too, oxidative Jura is great too, and otherwise sturdy āfarmerā wine like Trevallon.
used to think about that with 11 of course. whoās to say a 10 bottle lot didnāt have 2 attempts?
Yes youāre absolutely right and that just adds to the insecurity IMO.
I frequently buy at auction and have purchased a number of bad bottles. I buy mostly Barolo/Barbaresco, and have had a number of bad bottles 2013 and older.
Your experience is an outlier. Iāve had a lot of success and plenty of failures at Winebid. They are the last choice of consignors for some that consign a lot, and not because of sellers premium.
I just factor it into my bids. I donāt hear nearly the level of failures from , say, K&L.
All qualified by the fact that I havenāt bought in 10 years.
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I think it depends on what youāre buying or maybe I am just lucky.
I bought 55 bottles in 2024. Everyone I have opened has been great. The oldest was a 1999 magnum of CdP. The newest were some 2021 California Grenaches.
I suspect, too, that a bunch of wine ends up at auction because the owner opens a bottle or two or three and figures out they are no longer any good. Or they have not been stored properly. Maybe somebody dies with a large collection having been sitting in their 70 degree basement for the past 20 years.
Of course, there are a number of reasons why a bottle will end up in an auction, but there are negatives that are possible that you will not find present or as present in a retail purchase - i.e. that an aged bottle at auction may have been improperly stored for years or that a bottle at auction may be part of a bad case.
I bought many cases from them over several years. This was all 10+ years ago, so take it for what itās worth, but my failure rate was so high that I stopped buying from them completely. I have never gotten so many bottles from any other source, or even from all other sources combined. I would never lump them in with other auction houses.
It didnāt help that the few times I contacted them to point out that something was really obviously heat damaged, just trying to help and explicitly saying I was not asking for anything, they were bizarrely confrontational about it.
For winebid at least they want larger collections so you canāt just sell a bad case or two. They want larger consignments. So do collectors turn over lots of bad stuff at once?
As an aside I just bought some library releases direct from a prominent winery talked about here often. I got corked bottles. So it happens from multiple sources.
Maybe they have changed, maybe they havenāt. My Winebid experiences have been more in the last 5 years or so.