Is three the magic number?

So, I am beginning to look at my consumption history, and how often I go back to a bottle if I really enjoyed it at a certain drinking window. With the spring mailers in full force and my cellar space (and wallet) shrinking, I am trying to determine the correct number of individual bottles to buy for each wine. Of course, there are plenty of times when the amount of a certain bottle allocated is 1 or 2 and then it is easy to figure out. But, Three seems to be a good number as you can try one when you want and then hold the two for “perfect” drinking windows.

I have had NO interest in buying a case of any wine for a few years as I simply do not drink enough of the same wine at various times and our house would not have a large enoug party to need that many botles of one wine. butnow I am beginning to realize I do not need 6, 5 or even 4 of any bottle.

I guess I am asking do you buy only three or less of any wine, when Rhys, Rivers Marie, Carlisle, or whoever you like offers 4 or more of a certain wine does oneonly take three? The madness must stop somewhere, and while I trade a bit I am at the point where I think I would rather keep trying all the fun and delicious wines I am offered than loading down on a few…

Your thoughts appreciated

Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out.

I buy in 3’s as well.

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How much I take of any given allocated wine is usually tied more to my financial situation than my cellar situation; I usually take less than I’d like to.

For Rhys, I take what I am allocated of the SVDs. For pretty much everything else, 3 is the number. I’ll point out that I rarely get to try before I buy, which definitely plays a role in my purchasing habits. There are, of course, some exceptions for “daily drinkers” like appellation wines, lower level Burgs, and a couple others.

Three is a nice number. One for now, one for later, one for trying to nail the aging curve if #2 had upside.

And it’s not so many that if it is not up to your hopes that you are carrying tons of dead weight.

I think the magic number differs based heavily on the aging curve of the wine.

For white burgundy, three is probably about right. The non-premox drinking window is about 6-7 years, so 3 bottles means one every other year on average.
But Sauternes? Most sauternes have 30+ year drinking windows, sometimes longer. 3 bottles would mean that you get to try it once a decade. I would want to check in more often if possible.

This rule doesn’t always work, because wines with longer drinking windows are generally more expensive. For example, with something like Yquem the drinking window is maybe 40-50 years, so perhaps the right number there is 8-10 bottles. But unfortunately that can get prohibitively expensive…

I agree with this. For many years, the magic number for Burgs (red) has been 6, or maybe 4 if it is prohibitively expensive. With just 3, I have found it hard to pop one young, and yet I strongly believe popping one young is important… because it is fun and educational at the same time. However, as I get older, and with more wine than I can consume in my lifetime, I have come around to thinking 3 is now the best number for me. I’ve bought very lightly in recent vintages (2006-08-09-10), and almost all of it in 3-bottle multiples.

For me, six is the new three.

This is true on CA Syrah and Zinfandel, but especially on burgs (sometimes twelve, ack!). And I wish I had followed this rule with Barolo and Barbaresco.

If I followed more producers then maybe my magic number would be three. But, I’d rather follow fewer with greater depth, if you know what I mean.

I try to go with 3.

  1. right off the truck.
  2. after 5 years
  3. don’t know yet as I am a newbie. I would guess between 10 - 20.

Thanks for the thoughts so far.
Even though it seems “right” to try to have wines to cellar for the perfect window, and if you are going to keep trying new wines too ( as noted above in the logic of buying threes and my thought process as well) I think what I am questioning is how to balance trying something new and drinking something that I think is in a great window. According to CT I have 869 different wines, that is alot of different bottlings and I am not sure how I can get to all of them. At the same time, I am looking at wines that I have 6-12 of and thinking when will I drink all of them?

For me it’s 6 for something really special now and 3 or singles just to try across a vintage. This is my new theory especially with having a growing family, the last two years have been Faiveley ‘clos cortons’ so it hasn’t been so bad.
Continue trading, it’s amazing what you can get back on this board, everybody’s taste change over the years and everyone has stuff they don’t really want to drink so why not swap em’.

Three is much better than two or one (obviously). In setting allocation amounts, I have at times forgotten that 1 or 2 bottles really are terrible allocation set ups. That said, if you have such a tiny release or wish to spread things to have more people sample the wine, this is at times the more attractive offer. As a consumer, if I can only buy 1 bottle, I simply pass as I cannot place the pressure on one bottle, one moment to live up to such expectations. Two is more relaxed since you have another shot at it. Though, with three, you have a bit more strategy to play with. I have been alerted to this by a fellow Berserker just now, and I will certainly be more mindful of this in the future when setting allocations

I once sat next to Sylvain Pitiot at a winemaker’s dinner. During that time he told me to always buy 3 of anything I planned on cellaring. One for now, one for some arbitrary point to check on the progress and the third for an estimated maturity. He believed 15 years out to be near maturity for his wines.

I have since extended my minimum to 4 bottles given the sad reality that at least one of them could be flawed.