I have never regretted getting off an expensive mailing list, with the possible exception of Scarecrow.
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Personally …
Promontory - Stay
Colgin - Cut
Lokoya - Cut
Myriad - Cut
Rivers-Marie - Cut
Carte Blanche - Cut
Kinsman Eades - Stay
Macdonald - Stay
Roy Piper - Stay
Impensata - Cut
scarecrow - Stay
Maybach - Cut
Memento Mori - Stay
Vida Valiente - Cut
Realm - Stay
Bevan - Cut
William-Mary - Stay
There ya go!
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What is your annual spend for these wineries, out of curiousity?
Seems to be a very expensive group of wines.
And like @joejolesch said, when you buy a ton of Napa you end up with CASES of wine that need a decade plus to age and that is where my collection is.
I’ve gone back to buying more zinfandel so I can drink that in the interim while I age my Napa cab, syrahs and other wines I like with more age.
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Completely disagree. He should keep the ones he likes the best. Assuming that he is buying for drinking, why does it matter what happens to the price AFTER he buys the wine
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That’s a lot of Napa Cab! A conservative estimate, of you average 6 bottles per year from each of those producers, is over 500 bottles.
If you’re like many/most participants here, you’ll eventually find yourself being interested in a wider range of wines, both domestic and international. Of so, you’ll have a fantastic cellar of Napa Cab, even if you stopped buying all of those today. So trimming back to the producers you love most makes sense. Otherwise you’re going to find yourself overwhelmed with just one style of wine in your cellar.
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I’m convinced that MacDonald allocations are being addressed in Estate planning by those lucky people who have made it to the promised land.
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It is kind of crazy to think that the difference between a couple/few years signing up for that list (based on when the OP says he signed up and when I signed up) is having an allocation and thinking you’re unlikely to ever get an allocation.
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My recommendation is to spend some money buying older wines from these producers so you have a better idea of how they age and whether they match your palate once mature. Not all of these are easily available on the secondary market but for those that are, it’ll give you more data on which to make a decision.
The funny part is that given the price increases on Napa Cab in the last few years, buying something ready to drink may cost the same or less than buying the latest release… though provenance is obviously more of a risk.
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I don’t buy trophy Napa wines, so I could be off base here, but I would guess that of the wines on his list which don’t have long waiting lists and high flipping prices, he could ask to skip a vintage and stay on the list.
Most wineries would rather keep a good direct customer even if he or she skipped an offer or a year.
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It used to be that this was unheard of - that the customer felt that they could not skip a release for fear of either being kicked off the list OR being downgraded.
My guess is that there are still a small number of wineries who may work this way, but as you noted, smart wineries are realizing that ‘life happens’ and folks need to pass on releases every now and then.
Cheers
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because if you like them, and they are less in the secondary market, you can buy them there.
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These producers are laughing all the way to the bank.
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How so?
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There are two reasons to drop a mailing list - 1) Because you can buy the wines without being on the list in a way that’s cheaper or more convenient, etc. or 2) Because you don’t want to buy the wines any more.
Ian has already posted the perfect answer for the 1st question.
For the 2nd question, why don’t you want to buy the wines any more? If a particular producer has gotten too expensive or you don’t like the wines as much as you thought you would or as much as you used to, then obviously you should drop them.
I took your question, though, as indicating that you still like all of these producers but you just want to buy fewer bottles of Napa cab every year due to overall spend or overall storage capacity (including the desire to perhaps dedicate some of the spend/capacity to other categories). Assuming this is the issue, then IMO you need to start by looking at how many bottles you already have vs how many you want to have. Given your budget and storage capacity and current drinking preferences, how many of these Napa cabs (as a whole) do you want to be able to drink every year going forward? On average, how old do you prefer to drink them (in terms of years after release not years after vintage)?
This tells you how many you want in your inventory (12 per year x 10 years of age = 120, 50 per year x 20 years of age = 1000, etc.). If you are still below your target inventory, and still like all of these producers, stay on lists such that you are still buying more than you consume, until you hit it. If you are at your target inventory now, cut the lists down so that you are buying the same number of bottles per year you are drinking. If you are over the target inventory now, cut the lists down even further so that you are buying fewer than you are drinking. And if your age and inventory are such that you already have enough to last the rest of your life, drop off all of them unless you want to leave an inventory behind for future generations.
But IMO you can’t decide which lists to keep and which to drop (unless you’re dropping for other reasons like price or not liking the wines anymore) until you answer the above questions, assuming that like most of us both your budget and storage are finite.
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keep RM, macdonald, RP, scarecrow, maybach, bevan, WM.
dump the rest.
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Exactly what I came to say. I started with the 18 vintage and am active on like 5 lists, but I am already forecasting the plethora of wine I will accumulate before any of those top bottles are ready for drinking. 15 bottles a year over 10 years and suddenly I have 150 bottles of wine, the majority of which isn’t anywhere near ready for primetime.
I just don’t open $150+ bottles that often.
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You have 17 on the list. 1/3 keep (6) 1/3 cut (5), 1/3 (6) on the bubble.
Cut all from your cut list and half your bubble list. That gets you down to 9 keepers this year.
Do the same next year but cut only your bottom 3. This gets you to 6 keepers
Criteria has been discussed. You can go with an answer the panel gave you or chose one of your own.
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Lots of great advice here.
Only other tidbit I can add is that Maybach Materium is a bottle that will often cost you more on the secondary market than the club/list, so if that is a criterion you care about, keep Maybach.
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Just looked at my California Cabernet, it’s a lot more than 150. Some of those are getting into a 10 year drinking window but they can also age longer. These bottles add up quickly!
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If it were me, this is what I’d keep from your list.
Kinsman Eades
Macdonald
Roy Piper
Maybach
Realm
William-Mary
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