For The Love Of Port

At the risk of asking a question which no one is willing share their secrets, what are some of the retailers (local or online) that people find have the best selection or pricing?

Many thanks!
David

You will have to do the research as to website, phone number and location etc. but I am willing to share and am a satisried customer of all of these retailers:

Indywineman

Winexchange

The Rare Wine Company

Hart Davis Hart

Premier Cru

The Wine Club (SF)

The Chicago Wine Company

Tinamou Wine Company

K & L Wine Merchants


If I think up some more that I deal with, I will let you know. These are the ones off the top of my head.

I do not live in the US but once I made a transaction with sherry lemann in NY and had tremendous service. Price are a bit higher than some other places but it worth paying an extra to get better service and be certain that the bottles where stored in pristine conditions.

I have a feeling that in time, we'll have a lot of folks for the UK posting on this site. I say that because it seems that so many Port lovers live there and the retail scene is so much more developed for older bottles of Port. I was like a kid in a candy store when I was in London a few years ago (for the very first time!).

So, although I do buy from a couple of retailers there, I'd like to hear from some forumites who live in the UK about their favorite retailers for Port.

For the UK, those that I have both used and can recommend are:

1. Berry Bros. Roy is right that the shop is as much a living museum as St James's Palace next door and well worth a visit. This combined with a web / mail-order service as modern and efficient as any new business. A perfect combination. Also, like the Wine Soc. (below) you can be sure of the povenance.

2. Farr Vintners. If you have GBP500 min. to spend in one go there is nowhere (retail) cheaper* that I have used. Shame they can't cut that min spend a bit for regular retail customers .

3. The Wine Society. More expensive for bulk/cases than Farr, but provided you spend only GBP75 you can buy odd bottles cheaper than anywhere. However, the range of vintage port available is very poor. Usually only one or two (plus one or two singe quintas) at any one time.

In summary, in terms of value I'd recommend the following depending on your likely spend:

GBP75 - GBP180 - Wine Society
GBP180 - GBP 499 - BBR or Wine Soc.
GBP 500+ Farrs


*I'd add the caveat that Fine and Rare Wines (that seems a whisker cheaper than Farrs) seems to have a mind-boggling array of older ports but I have not tried it yet so can't recommend it. I think their min. spend is only GBP200. Would welcome comments if anyone has tried them or I'll report back if I do.

Finally, though, in the UK mature port is cheapest of all at auction as there is no VAT/duty to pay (except on the premium) if it has already passed bond. However, auctions, of course, have risks attached re: provenance etc. Personally, for port, I think the risks are worth it as the discount at auction outweighs the portion of dud bottles.

Stuart,

I have used Fine and Rare Wine a number of times and can recommend them.

The only negative I have with them is that it very often takes 2 to 3 months for the wine to arrive as they appear to sell it on behalf of retailers all over the globe. However, when it does arrive, it is invariably as described and in very good condition. I have also found their prices to be consistently good.

Another merchant I have used recently is Ancient & Modern Wines. Extremely helpful, excellent service and the bottles I purchased were in excellent condition.

I have recently started using Uvine.com and have found it an interesting experience. It's more of an online auction than a retailer and some of the prices are very good. I have yet to take delivery of the bottles I have bought so cannot comment on quality/condition.

Derek

This maybe a dumb question , but what does "bond" mean?
When I buy a bottle of wine in the Netherlands, I just pay 19% taxes.
Could somebody please explain this to me? Thank you.

Monique.

SweetDA1 wrote:At the risk of asking a question which no one is willing share their secrets, what are some of the retailers (local or online) that people find have the best selection or pricing?

Many thanks!
David

In the San Francisco Bay Area:

K&L Wine Merchants (online at http://www.klwines.com) - Good selection of VP's, fair selection of Colheita's, poor selection of other non-VP ports (esp. LBV's)

Beltramo's - Great selection of Tawnies and LBV's, fair-poor selection of VP's.

Both of the above places have some very friendly, knowledgeable port-lovers who are passionate about ports. Though at Beltramo's I've also had not-so-knowledgeable staff read the back label of bottles to help me choose between bottles. It would have been nice if they just got their "port guy" instead.

Premier Cru (online at http://www.PremierCru.net) for some superb pricing on some VP's -- few tawnies, colheita's, or otherwise. Professional in-store service, if not a bit on the cold side of the personality spectrum. (nice selection of BA, TBA, & SGN's as well...)


An interesting aside... I was at Mollie Stone's (moderately upscale supermarket in San Mateo, CA) and was told by their "Zin Man" (the guy's actual name tag) that there is no difference between vintages among ports and they all taste the same. I told him I thought otherwise, then continued to humour him as I browsed since I didn't see anything to be gained from a debate, but my cue to run was when he said ports from Portugal aren't any good.

It was all I could do to restrain myself from bursting in laughter.

http://www.welovefinewines.com
I have bought from Alistair before and find his prices reasonable, pretty good service small selection though

You can also try finewineseller.co.uk

Monique Heinemans wrote:This maybe a dumb question , but what does "bond" mean?
When I buy a bottle of wine in the Netherlands, I just pay 19% taxes.
Could somebody please explain this to me? Thank you.

Monique.

By "in bond" we tend to mean that, although it has arrived in the UK and been paid for, the tax has not been paid. I'm not sure how it works in practice, but certain warehouses that are licenced and monitored can store wine indefinitely without the tax being paid. Indeed, provided it remains in a bonded warehouse it can stay there indefinitely for decades, and even be bought and sold between parties tax free. However, when it gets to the point that one of the owners wants to drink it (or even have it in their own cellar to look at) it has to "pass bond", come out of the warehouse and the tax must then be paid.

The point I was making is that if you buy port (privately or auction) from someone now (say a '77, for GBP500) that has always been in bond you also have to pay the duty (about GBP20) plus VAT at 17.5% on what you pay now - in total about GBP620. However, if it passed bond in '79 when it arrived, the owner would have paid the tax then (probably only about ten shillings!) and there is no tax to pay now. A much better deal

Thank you, Stuart,

Monique

Stuart,

If I were looking for a '77 I'd much rather bid on a lot that was IB at Octavian - or a similar temperature-controlled facility - than one that was DP and had possibly spent ten years in someone's loft.

DavidL wrote:Stuart,

If I were looking for a '77 I'd much rather bid on a lot that was IB at Octavian - or a similar temperature-controlled facility - than one that was DP and had possibly spent ten years in someone's loft.

A good point, and I'd agree, which is why I take care to choose carefully and read the povenance. For example, if it is duty paid and "lying in Hertfordshire" you can be pretty sure of where its been for 26 years (from where you could buy the same thing for much more if you were daft!!!!). Also, where there are large parcel lots, even when duty paid, what's the chance that it has not been kept carefully or professionally? Further, when there are large batches that have come from a private cellar there is usually a description of the condition of the batch as a whole and what the storage was like. Some of my best buys have come from private cellars.

I don't doubt you take a small risk, but I re-iterate that the portion of bad bottles is less than the difference in price.

i would agree with you stuart in my experiances

I had someone asking me today about recommending Port buying sources. I decided to move this back to the first page so people can add any new sources which deserve mentioning.

I'll also echo some of my favorites in the UK: (ok, ok, guys -- favourites)

Farr Vintners - Just as mentioned above. Wholesale pricing, but you have to spend a minimum of 500GBP
Seckford Wines - They hold their own stock and they can get pictures etc very quickly.
Richard Kihl - They don't always hold their own stock, but have great communication and are super easy to deal with.

In the US -
I'm sticking to the following:
K&L Wines
Wine Exchange

I'm not allowed to say :joker:

In the US, I use a number of them and it would be to great to list all. But some of the main ones are Wine Exchange, Premier Cru, Hart Davis Hart.

Not allowed to say .
The SAQ man might be watching

I bought from http://www.winechateau.com and http://www.planetofwine.com and had perfectly good experiences. But I don't think either has a large selection of VPs. For those I've used:
http://www.bpwine.com/ - Multiple purchases, good prices, great service
http://europeanwineresource.com/ - Good selection, overpaid for one bottle, decent service but not so responsive
http://www.specsonline.com/ - Surprising selection, good service, but not the greatest web interface to find stuff
-Eric