For The Love Of Port

Whether it was the last bottle in a bin end, a magnum marked down, a bottle hiding on a shelf forever, a lowball bid that won at auction ... we all have at least one great Port story which will make for great reading.

So what discovery, uprooting or unearthing of Port treasure did you actually purchase that you'd like to recount?

To make a long story short. I was browsing the auction market and ran across a "1950 Niepoort Vintage Port." Now, my mind was like, "Niepoort didn't make a VP in '50 that I know of, only a Garrafeira" So I check out the picture and to my amazement I recognize the bottle as being a Garrafeira. It was obvious the auction house had no idea what the bottle really was, and I was not about to tell them. So I place a low bid of $116....and won. I get the bottle and it is still wrapped in the original plastic wrap from Niepoort with an old original price tag of $234 on it. SCORE!!! My best "deal" to date on an old bottle. Its still in the cellar waiting for the right moment......

Best deal: A case and a half (all I could afford at the time) of 2003 Offley Boa Vista Vintage Port. Not a great port, but a decently solid one; one that I hope will be better in 15-20-30 years time.

The deal? Well, originally this VP was on the shelf for $79 Cdn. I'm not buying it at that price. After a half year of glancing at it as I occasionally walk past the shelf, I notice it has dropped to around $65. Still a bit pricey, but I'm encouraged enough to check it out weekly after that point. Finally, on one fateful day, I mosey on in and see it marked down to $18 Cdn (including tax). A big oops by the liquor store... a couple of days later, armed with more cash in hand, I return to the store intent on emptying their storage room and seeing if any of their sister stores in town have any, and lo and behold... back up to $68 it is. Drat!

But still, a great deal!

Todd

I picked up a commemorative bottle of Fonseca port from the Wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana. It’s in a 700 ml bottle and a fancy description on it. Never seen the bottle offered since. I bought it off of a Diana collector for a hell lot less than a Fonseca from the late 70’s or early 80’s would cost.

So what happened to the other 50 mls?

Roy Hersh wrote:So what happened to the other 50 mls?

His royal highness must've have drank it? We have all seen who he dumped Diana for... Never seen a 700 ml bottle before...

I've had two good auction scores this year. The first was three bottles of 1966 Dow for approx. $80 each (I can never remember exactly what I paid for these). For some reason, no one else bid. The first one opened was very good, and I've already posted notes.

The second one was a magnum of 1977 Gould Campbell. I put in a low-ball bid of $120, thinking I would never get it. When I got my invoice for the auction, this bottle wasn't on it, which wasn't surprising. When I checked the auction results, they listed the selling price as $100! I called the auction house to find out why my bid hadn't been executed. Turns out that they pulled the lot because they thought that it showed some seepage that they hadn't described in the catalog. They offered it to me for $100. Since they're local, I went to look at it and it was clear that there had been NO seepage but that the staining was from a different bottle that must have been next to it. I paid and left PDQ! I opened it last weekend at an offline and it was perfect. I'll post tasting notes this weekend.

John

That's a GREAT story John. Congrats on quite the score!!!

Todd

Brother John, you da man!

If only the local stores around here would allow me to go check out their "in-case" stocks and discount them appropriately if they showed signs of seepage.

I could smuggle in a small container of Cruz Ruby and put it to good use!!!

Todd

Hummm....one of the better finds was Churchills VP 1994 for $24.75 or it could be a Graham's Malvedos 1962 that I just purchased last week for $50.00.

One story comes to mind for me.

First one was when I was walking past a local wine store in London and this was 2 weeks before Christmas. The store had brought in cases of 1985 and 1977 Warre's VP, and were selling it by the bottle. The prices were very cheap, and I bought as much as I could afford. Still drinking them...

Nicos,

You can't leave us hanging like that. How cheap is "very cheap" for those two Warre selections?

My best bargain was a 12er case of Fonseca 94. Somebody in my neighbourhood put it on ebay and totally misspelled it. Neither the word vintage nor port was in the description, so I finally got the whole case which I picked up from a total ignorant for 320 EUR (250 USD).

Sometimes late at night I sneek into my port-cellar and start smiling for about half an hour thinking about this deal...

leaving a great pub in nyc one night about 2 years ago, i decided to check the local wine shop to see what they had. on the shelf were 6 bottles of 1994 fonseca, each priced for $70.00. i bought all 6, and came back 2 days later to see if they had any more. to my chagrin, they were now priced at $170.00.

i always check little wine shops to see if there may be any oversights or other hard to find gems.

dave

If someone is still looking for great deals, Binny's website shows magnums of 1997 Fonseca for $99.99. I bought some of these about a year ago and expected the price to go up, but it hasn't. Here's the link:

http://www.binnys.com/search/winesearch ... 1997&aspr=

Ok, I'm feeling good about myself today. I just won a number of ports at auction, some better than others. Here's what I'm feeling good about:

2 bottles of 1978 Krohn Colheita - $10 each
3 bottles of 1985 Warre VP - $37 each
3 bottles of 1995 Warre VP Q. da Cavadinha - $27 each

It almost makes you glad winter will be coming up for port drinking. Almost!

All the best,
John

I got a good deal yesterday considering the prices we have here in Quebec. A friend of mine received an email from one of his friend selling some port. Mainly 85 and 94, many of the ports where not listed at SAQ so the guy was selling them quite cheap.

80$ for Noval 94 and
90$ for Graham's 85. All in Canadian currency.

This is under the current release price for these house here in Quebec so I'm satisfied

Well, this is not about a "good deal" in money-speaking, but about my finest recallection: about Niepoort. Few years ago I asked mr. Niepoort a question about the vintage 1997 and he kindly sent me two half bottles of the new vintage 2000 (Niepoort and Secundum) even before they were bottled! It was a great experience for me to taste these two samples aside for three days, (didn't spit anything...).
Ofcourse I bought a dozen of them

And Roy, to be very hounest.....these re the ONLY two empty bottles I've kept.....