Monthly Report - September 2018

Chateau Cantenac-Brown sold in 2006 for €72 million

 

Now the guts of it – pretend you are an incredibly wealthy Billionaire with a spare few 100 million Euro, would you buy a fantastically expensive Bordeaux estate knowing the following:

 

• Global Climate Change wreaks havoc in every vintage throughout France now.  Be it through storms at the season’s start, heat during vintage, to unseasonal rains and humidity at varying times.  Can quality and yield be assured with any certainty for the coming decade?

• Many Bordeaux vineyards are located at very low topographic levels, and any rise in sea levels will risk rising salt levels in the groundwater tables, especially in the Medoc where some of the most expensive Chateaux are located.

• Is the period of excessive wealth and consumption seen in the past 20 years to continue indefinitely to sponsor the continuing profits of the chateaux?

• Has Bordeaux reached a “consumer” peak and if this is the case will we see within a few years a decline based on a changed perception of value and quality?  Will the historic precedence of the region continue to prop up what is becoming a vulgar display of consumerism at its most lavish?

 

And the answer would be most probably still an emphatic Yes!  And the reason why?  Because you may never get to own such an estate ever again – the sales of these estates are rare as hen’s teeth and if they were to be sold there would be a scramble to throw money at the sellers.  But the facts remain the same – there is a good chance you will lose your money and the wines that will be produced into the future may well be inferior and in lower volumes.  Some regions of the Medoc could become waste lands due to salt water encroaching up the Gironde River, and other areas throughout the world would start to gain traction with the same grape varieties as being “better” than Bordeaux.  It could become a lost cause.

 

This scenario is not limited to Bordeaux – this future modelling leads itself to a pretty difficult position for all wineries throughout the world – many are owned by families and there is no guarantee that the next generation will follow through and take up the reins.  Multiply this by the fact that many owners are approaching retirement, who will be running into a business that is so fickle and so difficult to understand?  Many young winemakers today avoid the traps of owning the vines, but their window of accessing these grapes may be closing as well as the owners start to move off the land and avocados or apples or peaches or macadamias become the preferred crop – vines and wineries will start to go missing and with it wine choice.

 

I do not really know how anything much will play out over the next decade – it may still be like today or it could have been totally disrupted and shattered into 1000 shiny pieces.  The price you set for your value is not the same as anyone else’s and this is the take away from this topic – a vineyard is as romantic a proposition as almost any for those who love wine, but its value is not fixed in stone, it is fixed in perception and mystery.  I look out on our vineyard and wonder what its real value is, and what’s my price, and I can honestly say, I don’t have a clue…

 

 

Slow spring start...

 

With winter put to bed, the first month of spring in the Margaret River region often brings up weather that is of winter interspersed with fine warming days as the sun starts to set later in the day.  Some very cold nights in the middle of the month matched in with predominantly clear skies and cold southerlies ensuring the heat never stayed in the system for long.

 

The numbers for the month and last year’s figures are provided below:

 

September 2018:      

Avg Maximum Temp          16.9°C

Daily Max recorded            21.9°C

 

Avg Minimum Temp             8.6°C               

Daily Min recorded               1.7°C

 

Rainfall:                               41.0mm

 

The maximum and minimum temperature averages for this month were a little lower than last year, and also noted many of the previous years.  The rainfall total for September 2018 is very low for this time of year as well, and many of the wetter parts of the estate have dried back quite quickly.

 

September 2017:      

Avg Maximum Temp         17.5°C

Daily Max recorded           23.8°C

​

Avg Minimum Temp           8.7°C

Daily Min recorded             2.9°C

 

Rainfall:                           116.7mm

 

Promotion…

 

With the release of the Reserves from 2016 I do have the opportunity to head out and about and run some promotions of our wines on the eastern seaboard as well as in Perth.  If you could make any of the tastings in the cities highlighted above please drop in and have a chat and try out these two excellent wines (there will be some older wines for reference of course).  Work on the vineyard and around the house at home will be flat out as it is not just vines that grow like crazy this time of year, so the lawn mower will be getting a fair old work out as well.  First wire-lift most probably on my return from East, and a couple of protective sprays will go out to keep the mildews at bay.

 

As always if you have any queries about what’s been written or about wine in general, do not hesitate to contact us either by email or www.twitter.com/bluepoles and we’ll do our very best to answer any question.

 

Cheers

 

 

Mark Gifford

Blue Poles Vineyard