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Posts Tagged ‘Wine Collecting’

Appreciating to drink a rare and fine wine can give you the desire to start creating your own wine-cellar. Collecting wine can be a very pleasant hobby. Especially when you seek the bottle of wine which is different from the others.

If you wish to start a wine collection, you will have to spend a little more money than you think. Indeed, collecting such product is expensive. The few councils exempted below will help you to start your own wine-cellar.

The space

First thing to do is to find a place where you will place your wine-cellar. You can store it in your house but you will have to find the good place: sufficient space and ideal temperature (50 up to 65°F).

You must also plan which type of wine you will include in your cellar. So many options are available that it is sometimes difficult to choose.

In order to better prepare your new bottle storage, you will test some various types of wine. You will learn much by yourself; for example: identify tastes. As you probably already know, there are many differences between wines coming from great vintages and those coming from new or immediately processed wine and that some can age, others cannot.

If you have just started a wine-collecting or built a cellar, you should avoid buying your product in great quantities as long as you are not sure about the type of wine that you plan to add to your cellar.

Culture

Participate in purses and tasting events. In these places, you can meet other persons who are passionate by wine collecting and who will give you the best addresses and suppliers. You will also learn more about the different brands and their prices.

You can also learn a lot by surfing on the Internet and searching for information about wine; by subscribing to some informative newsletters; by buying some books and read them in order to familiarize with your new hobby.

Supplier

You will also have to choose a good supplier.

While visiting your wine supplier, tell him that you are collecting bottles; this person will inform you if the wine that you want to buy can age in a cellar or not.

Also ask your supplier if the wines you are collecting are available in his inventory.

If you hope to collect products from other areas, he may be able to give you contact information for finding the wines you are interested in.

Suppliers information and addresses are available online.

Wine from other Countries

If you plan to collect wine coming from other countries, your supplier will be able to give you the right addresses. Also, you can make a search on Google in order to find the best foreign supplier or mail directly the vine-grower or even the castle where the product is bottled.

A French proverb said: “It is while forging that one becomes blacksmith”. Perhaps you will realize that collecting wine becomes a passion and that you want to start your own wine selling business. When you will have bought a sufficient quantity of rare wine bottles, you will be able to start your new business and sell your greatest bottles.

If you are a genuine wine lover or even if you are just slightly interested in the subject you can find everything that you need to know about wine online. Looking up wine online is simple and easy and it takes almost no time at all. No matter what you want to know about this fascinating subject you can find about wine online.

Looking up wine online has never been easier than it is today and as time passes it will only get even easier. This is because there are so many people just like you out there who love to learn as much as they can about wine. Since there is this need for information more and more people are putting the knowledge that they have about wine online. All of these wine online websites will give you all kinds of info.

Start your search of wine online by deciding what it is you are looking for exactly. The more you can narrow your search the better your search for wine online will be. So if for example you are doing a search in google about “wine cabinets” you will type this into the search box. You should then get a list of all the wine online sites that have this kind of info. Then all you have to do is click on the links and go to town. You can read about your subject matter as much or as little as you need to when you are doing a wine online search.

You can also purchase wine online. This is a great way to buy your wine whether you are a collector or even if you are just looking for that special wine to celebrate a special occasion. When you search for wine online you can compare the prices and the years and any other characteristic of your wine that you want.

Buying wine online is just as easy as looking for information about wine online is. There are thousands of wine merchants who will be willing to ship you as much wine as you want. You can find wine online from another country even. It is nice to be able to get Italian wine online without ever having to go there!

So the next time you need some info about wine or you are looking to purchase some wine online just check the internet.

For those of you who have had the good fortune to get on the mailing lists of the “cult” wineries from California years ago you may be shaking your head in agreement as you read this note about wine prices. Those readers who have just started collecting top California wines may not have the same perspective due to current market prices in recent years.

This time of year some of the best boutique wineries are sending out to their mailing list customers wine allocations notices and pricing for the upcoming vintage. The list of top California wineries has been growing due to improved financial backing, better winemaking technology and sustainable agriculture practices; all of this is fueled by a very hot wine market. From my personal tastings, California’s top “red” winemakers and ones you should get on their waiting list include: Harlan, Abreu, Colgin Cellars, Bryant Family, Dalla Valle, Shafer Hillside, Screaming Eagle, Sine Qua Non, Hundred Acre and Pride Mountain.

Consumers who have been on these winery mailing lists from the beginning have seen a steady rise in wine prices. For some wineries the price increases are staggering. The 2004 Screaming Eagle came out at $500 per bottle. Their first release in 1992 was selling for $50 per bottle. The 2004 Harlan came out at $350 per bottle. Their first release in 1990 came out at $75 per bottle.

The free market system tells us that “goods” sell at prices that the current market will bear. Today many cult wineries are having no problem selling their wines because of the small quantities they produce. But at what point do long time patrons of these wineries have to stop buying because they are either priced out of the market or find more compelling wines at lower prices?

Top California wines are approaching the bottle prices of the First Growth Bordeaux wines. I think this will be a critical intersection to watch since the French have established 100+ years of bottle aging data whereas the California newcomers have at best at 10-15 year track record.

I wonder if we are approaching some critical mass where the wine buying public starts to seriously look and purchase wines from other upcoming areas that reflect pricing of California wines from 10-15 years ago.

It is clear to me that one of the reasons Americans have fell in love with Australian wines in the past 5 years is that the quality to price ratio is often 1/3 that of similar California wines. Will the same hold true for wine from Chile, Argentina and Spain? Only time will tell.

One of the wine world’s best stories in 2006 is the 95 points Robert Parker awarded to a $19.95 wine from Australia. The Mollydooker “Boxer” Shiraz has one of the highest price to points ratio in the history of Mr. Parker’s notes. The wine made by veteran winemakers Sarah and Sparky Marquis defies gravity with a screw cap enclosure and a rip-off wine label “tab” that allows wine lovers to keep the name of the wine close to their hearts. So much for the snooty tissue paper wrapped bottles from the Napa Valley!

I would say that since this wine sold out in a matter of days post his review, American’s appetites for $150+ California Cabernet’s may be waning. In closing, one of the best wines produced in California is the Phelps Insignia which sells for around $130 per bottle. This is widely available at wine retailers and every vintage is a great value. Some of the best vintages can compare to the top cult wines at 1/3 the price. I’m still amazed why this wine does not sell off the retail shelves in the first few weeks of sale! I commend the Joseph Phelps winery for keeping this great wine priced for all to enjoy. I wish more wines of this caliber and aging potential were priced this reasonably! I just recently tasted the 1994 Insignia and it was superb!!!! This wine has a well establish aging profile so give it a try.

When it comes to wine collections, most people start small and then work their way up. So when you’re thinking of storage for your wine bottles, you’ll want to do the same, and start looking at some of the small wine refrigerators on the market. You really want to avoid a situation where you invest in a large cabinet or cellar, only to find that wine collecting isn’t really for you after all.

There is a wide range of space conscious wine coolers that are ideal for getting started. Before you go shopping, though, you need to decide where you will place your new appliance and just how big it should be.

You can fit a wine cooler into all sorts of little spaces. Just like there are microwave ovens that can be installed under your cupboards, you can install one of the small wine refrigerators in a similar fashion. Somewhat larger models will fit under the counter if you have some room there, but they will have to be a front venting style for this to work.

There are some really compact wine fridges on the market, which means that even if you don’t have a lot of room to spare you should still be able to find something to suit your needs. For example, there are miniature wine coolers that sit on the countertop that can accommodate as few as eight bottles.

It’s good to know that you don’t have to make a big commitment of space or money to get started with wine collecting. There are enough small wine refrigerators on the market that can give you a start, and you can grow from there. As you gain knowledge and your collection expands, you’ll know exactly what your requirements are for wine storage. At that point, you’ll be able to select the perfect wine refrigerator like a pro.

Wine investment is kind of a funny thing, actually, because most people who are involved in wine collecting seem to become investors simply by accident. What usually ends up happening is that people have a decent sized collection of wine built up and later on when they run out of room, they sell off some of their collection. This is when they realize that their collection is gaining value just by sitting there. Usually they will go on to purchase wine with the intention of selling it later on down the road for a decent profit. But when you spend so much time, and especially money, on making the investment, then you need to make sure that you store it properly so that you can ensure you will be able to reap the benefits.

Once you purchased some investment wines, you will want to be sure to store them properly so that your investment time and money are not wasted. The storage of wine investments is absolutely a critical part of the wine collecting process because if you don’t store them properly, you will never see your wine collection reach its full potential value.

Proper wine storage simply comes down to whether you are just going to be a casual wine collector or if you want to be a serious, professional collector. For the casual collector, a wine cellar is usually recommended, as it is the most ideal place to store your wine investments. It meets all the requirements that experts will tell you are the best possible conditions in which to store your wine. You do not want some place that allows any light to show through, nor do you want an area that will feel any vibration. Your wine cellar should be kept at somewhere around 55 degrees Fahrenheit for your wine collection to reach is full profit potential.

For a more serious wine collector, most do not have their own wine cellar, but instead look towards professionals to store their wine investments. It is usually best to keep the wine in its home country where it is made simply for the fact that its value goes down the second it goes outside the country. This of course can be quite expensive, as can building a wine cellar to protect your investment. Another solution would be to use some kind of wine rack or some type of wine chiller. As long as the environment you store your wine in is not too damp or too dry, you should be fine.