The hidden cost of buying wine en primeur, and why it now makes little sense
Buying wine en primeur has two potential benefits. First, if the wine is sought after, you secure your allocation. If that’s the case in your situation, then you can ignore the rest of this post. But for most Bordeaux, the wine most widely sold this way, this is rarely the case.
Second, if the release price is attractive, then it can be the cheapest way of buying the wine. The problem here is that in recent years the châteaux have been keen not to let the customers and secondary market take too much of their margin, and have adjusted their prices upwards. Back in the day, canny drinkers would buy two cases, and pay for the consumption of one case by flipping the other at a later date (although, as we’ll see, their economics might not have been all that solid).
But there are some hidden costs that collectors sometimes forget, when they sell wines many years after buying them and are basking in the profits they think they have made.
As an example, let’s say that 15 years ago you bought a case that ended up all-in (duty plus VAT included) at £1200. The current market price, all taxes paid, is now £2400. It looks like you have made quite a profit.
But let’s adjust for inflation.
That £1200 from 2011 is now £1897 in 2026, according to the Bank of England inflation calculator.
And let’s not forget about the storage costs, before the wine is delivered, which work out quite expensive. I looked at some of the prices in the UK.
- Corney & Barrow £18.60 per 12 bottle case (stored per unit = 6 bottles, insurance included)
- Berry Bros & Rudd £17.28 per 12 bottle case
- The Wine Society £10.28 per 12 bottle case (includes insurance)
- Seckford Wines £13.20 per 12 bottles
- Big Yellow also offer wine storage in London, but this is based on a certain size of storage unit. You have full access to your wine during opening hours. This is not in bond storage.
Let’s add the charges over 15 years at an average of £14. A conservative figure.
This is £210 (and I should have done some interest calculations on each of the payments, but I didn’t, so this is a low figure), bringing your £1200 up to £2107. Suddenly the profit doesn’t look so much!
But it gets worse if you look at lost opportunity cost.
Imagine you had invested the £1200 in a low-cost global ETF yielding (conservatively) 7% per annum, and then you compound the gains.
The £1200 is now £3310
This means you have made a loss!
Let’s make this practical. What were the actual prices in 2010, which was regarded as a very good vintage at the time, and would have been sold in 2011 en primeur?
As an example, here’s a list of projected prices at the time, in bond per case of 12.
The likes of Montrose and Haut-Bailly were £900
Montrose got some 100 point scores and is now selling for £1650 in bond
Haut-Bailly is selling for £1200 in bond
Using lost opportunity cost without storage costs these wines will have made losses of
£833 and £1283 respectively. And this is for high-performing investment-grade wines from a good vintage.
In general, you are much better going into the secondary market.
