2021 wine buying abstinence thread

DavidG · Post by **DavidG** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 6:54 pm

I have purchased 0 bottles in 2021.
It has been 74 days since I last purchased wine.

OrlandoRobert · Post by **OrlandoRobert** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 7:42 pm

I could use some abstinence but I doubt I am capable of that. I bought like a junkie last year. Was already looking at 2017 Jamet and Allemand today.

Blanquito · Post by **Blanquito** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 7:52 pm

I bought no wine yesterday. Today, I just won a 3-bottle lot of the 1987 Riojanas Monte Real Gran Reserva for $67.55 a bottle all-in.

DavidG · Post by **DavidG** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 8:07 pm

Orlando Bobby, look at Blanquito's post. He gets it. One day at a time. And start over if/when we fall off the wagon. No judgment!

stefan · Post by **stefan** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 8:24 pm

In December, not counting gifts for others, I purchased only 4 bottles of Champagne and 5 magnums of La Lagune. I received shipments of ten other cases, which fulfilled my need. So far this year I have not even thought about buying something. I actually did look up 1996 La Mission Haut Brion on WineSearcher, but I did not think about buying it after seeing the current price.

Comte Flaneur · Post by **Comte Flaneur** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 8:30 pm

Blanquito:

“I bought no wine yesterday”

Congratulations Patrick! Cold Turkey, one day at a time as David suggests. I haven’t bought anything for a few days now and my fast starts tomorrow.

stefan:

In my opinion 1996 LMHB is a surprising underachiever in the vintage but it is also very backward so may come good.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 11:05 pm

I have purchased no wine in 2021.

It has been 42.5 hours since I last purchased wine at 11:35 PM on December 31, 2020

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 11:07 pm

See my latest post on the New Year's resolution thread for inspirational material on not buying wine.

Dandersson · Post by **Dandersson** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 11:11 pm

Bought 5 bottles of cheap chianti today.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Sat Jan 02, 2021 11:42 pm

Let's not let this become the "what have you bought lately" thread. There's already a perfectly good thread for that. It's the wine buying ABSTINENCE thread. Descriptions of purchases are appropriate when relevant to having "fallen off the wagon" and needing to renew a vow of abstinence

JoelD · Post by **JoelD** » Sun Jan 03, 2021 8:12 pm

Currently summoning up the courage to join this movement, along with a dry January. Will re-access after my last wine night on Monday with a friend.

Claret · Post by **Claret** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 2:08 am

Bought nothing in December and holding.

Nicklasss · Post by **Nicklasss** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 6:21 pm

Zero being 0, please keep track of what you're buying this year, and let's make control point at each 3 months?

There is no reasons (good or bad) to buy wine in 2021 : no Champagne for new birth in your family/friends, no buying of a 1945 because your family member born in 1945 is dead in 2021 and you want to remember that person, no buying of those 3 bottles of 2008 Chateau l'Église-Clinet at 25 $ each on "super final sale", no buying of wine because it is your birthday, no buying of Rudy Kurnawian bottle just to see if it is a real fake, etc... All gift will be considered "suspicious", as it is easy to say to everyone you don't want wine for gift in 2021.

If someone is able to do it, i will generously gave to that person at the end of 2021, a red Bordeaux made under the influence of Rolland or de Bouard, to encourage that person to continue to still refute what makes her/him happy in life.

So 0 purchased bottles for me in the 4 first days of 2021.

Nic

DavidG · Post by **DavidG** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 6:31 pm

Nic, that's a bold claim for this early in the afternoon! Are you confident that you can last another 9 or 10 hours?

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 8:33 pm

I have found a very unique and 21st century loophole in my abstinence vow. BEFORE January 1st, when it was still 2020, I placed a bid in a Zachys auction. That auction was then cancelled due to a ransomware attack. The auction has now been restarted, with all previous bids still in place. It is my contention that, should I win wine with the bid I placed in 2020, that this would not constitute purchasing wine in 2021, even though technically the purchase is happening in 2021. What say you?

JCNorthway · Post by **JCNorthway** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 8:39 pm

I believe that wine buying abstinence rules are created in order to be broken with the astute use of exceptions.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 8:41 pm

I think if it takes no proactive action whatsoever during 2021 to get the wine, then that counts as a valid exception.

I would actually have to beg Zachys to cancel my bid -- "but you don't understand! My new year's resolution!"

Nicklasss · Post by **Nicklasss** » Mon Jan 04, 2021 8:56 pm

DavidG wrote:Nic, that's a bold claim for this early in the afternoon! Are you confident that you can last another 9 or 10 hours?

Normally, i will not be able to maintain my target at zero, within the next 14 days... i'm already fighting hard enough at the moment to avoid reading marcs or blanquito posts, as they're buying wines all the time in their abstinence wine buying time!

Nic

JimHow · Post by **JimHow** » Tue Jan 05, 2021 2:46 am

Gerry... I'm sure you've seen that NH has 15% on mixed case for ALL wines in January.

DavidG · Post by **DavidG** » Wed Jan 06, 2021 1:59 pm

marcs wrote:I think if it takes no proactive action whatsoever during 2021 to get the wine, then that counts as a valid exception.

I would actually have to beg Zachys to cancel my bid -- "but you don't understand! My new year's resolution!"

Sounds perfectly logical to me. Though the power to grant exceptions rests solely with the BD. Judging by his enabling post above, I think your odds are very good!

JimHow · Post by **JimHow** » Wed Jan 06, 2021 2:50 pm

Exception granted.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Wed Jan 06, 2021 4:38 pm

Sadly, I was outbid, and I think it's clear that actually increasing my bid would count as a purchase.

auctions are my weakness and the source of most of issues during 2020.

Nicklasss · Post by **Nicklasss** » Wed Jan 06, 2021 6:20 pm

I'm already out. I bought a bottle of the 2019 Joseph Drouhin Mâcon-Lugny yesterday. Now can i keep my total at 1 bottle for 2021?

Nic

Winona Chief · Post by **Winona Chief** » Wed Jan 06, 2021 7:53 pm

I have no intention of participating in any kind of wine buying abstinence during 2021. Other than Champagne, I didn’t make many high end wine purchases in 2020 and expect that to continue this year. I do expect to buy more nice Champagne and usual assortment of sub-$50 Roses from Provence and the Rhône, nice German Rieslings, red Cote de Rhônes and various whites (mostly Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay). If I happen upon an interesting serious red wine, I’ll buy it if the price seems okay. I don’t see a need for an artificial moratorium.

Chris Bublitz

Frederico · Post by **Frederico** » Thu Jan 07, 2021 5:08 pm

Yesterday I fulfilled my 2021 wine buying promise to my wife: a bottle of Sergio Zenato Amarone Riserva '13. In case you ask, my 2021 plan is only one bottle per month. It seems like an over-promise though

JimHow · Post by **JimHow** » Thu Jan 07, 2021 5:14 pm

It seems like an over-promise though

LOL.

Yes, my friend. It certainly does.

Frederico · Post by **Frederico** » Thu Jan 07, 2021 5:34 pm

JimHow wrote:
It seems like an over-promise though
LOL.

Yes, my friend. It certainly does.

My wife disagreed unfortunately

Blanquito · Post by **Blanquito** » Thu Jan 07, 2021 8:44 pm

I am having one of my periodic bouts of shock at what we are all willing to pay for wine. It feels like waking up from a dream or coming out of a daze. In this current state, things that normally seem like a deal seem outrageously expensive and I am finding it so hard to believe that I have been ready and willing for years to buy bottles that cost $50 or (much) more! WTF? This is nuts. (That’s how it feels).

Obviously, this (likely fleeting) state of mind makes wine buying abstinence quite easy, so I’m posting in this thread. Yet, despite feeling this way, I some how have already bought 6 bottles of wine in 2021. That’s the real problem — lasting resistance takes an unwavering commitment, because even 5 minutes of weakness can result in cases and cases of wine purchases with just the click of a mouse.

Gerry M. · Post by **Gerry M.** » Thu Jan 07, 2021 10:21 pm

JimHow wrote:Gerry... I'm sure you've seen that NH has 15% on mixed case for ALL wines in January.

I know about it now, lol. After my last auction wins I was intending on shutting it down for a few months but a 15% off everything sale will make it tough. I mentioned on your other thread that ill look at Champagne in particular. I may also pick up some La Dame de Montrose and a few other 16's. I also may look at some whites' which I'm low on.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Sun Jan 10, 2021 11:38 pm

Blanquito wrote:I am having one of my periodic bouts of shock at what we are all willing to pay for wine. It feels like waking up from a dream or coming out of a daze. In this current state, things that normally seem like a deal seem outrageously expensive and I am finding it so hard to believe that I have been ready and willing for years to buy bottles that cost $50 or (much) more! WTF? This is nuts. (That’s how it feels).

Obviously, this (likely fleeting) state of mind makes wine buying abstinence quite easy, so I’m posting in this thread. Yet, despite feeling this way, I some how have already bought 6 bottles of wine in 2021. That’s the real problem — lasting resistance takes an unwavering commitment, because even 5 minutes of weakness can result in cases and cases of wine purchases with just the click of a mouse.

Well put. I was in a similar mood when I made my New Years Eve post (viewtopic.php?f=4&t=9415). Except for me it wasn't so much the cost of an individual bottle as the sheer size of the collection I had accumulated. How could I possibly think there was any practical use to adding to a hoard of wine that already contained over a thousand bottles of, in most cases, extraordinary quality wines? At this point the only purpose was chasing some collector's fix, not practical planning to drink the stuff. Of course the problem with the collector drive is that the more you indulge it, the stronger it gets, so you end up in a situation where the less you really need something, the more you want to buy it. I have plenty of other financial demands I need to pay attention to, including savings. I'm lucky in some ways but it's not like I'm actually so rich I don't need to worry about retirement, etc.

JoelD · Post by **JoelD** » Wed Jan 13, 2021 12:51 am

So I am 8 days strong of wine abstinence drinking wise. However I have kept buying wine. Keep needing to get a few last orders in, then an auction win. Vicious cycle. I really want to try though. This is seriously making me question my self control, which I thought was quite good.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:19 pm

I dodged a bullet yesterday. Got a mailer offering the best Pierre Yves Colin Morey "satellite" wines for 2018 -- St Aubin and Pernand Vergelesses premier crus -- for $50-60 a bottle. I still feel somewhat short on white Burgundy, like the PYCM style, know that these wines can be very good, and have been brainwashed by the last year into seeing $50 as "cheap". Fortunately, when I clicked through to "just see how many they had", all but one bottle had been sold out. Since one bottle is not a very exciting prospect I was able to reimpose self control. Saved by my fellow wine fanatics, thank you anonymous PYCM freaks!

I hope this thread can be a refuge for all struggling with wine purchasing abstinence, even those who may have temporarily "fallen off the wagon" or are are combatting temptation. This is a safe place for you to confess whatever issues you may have. Even if you may have temporarily lost control, we will support you in becoming abstinent again.

Comte Flaneur · Post by **Comte Flaneur** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:47 pm

I am getting severely tempted to pile in buy some 2019 red burgundies - for no logical reason what so ever - but the urge is very strong. The EP season is in full flow and people are scrambling and begging for allocations. And prices are generally higher than in recent vintages.

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 5:29 pm

What I consistently find useful is to benchmark against my existing store of already owned wine and asking what my plans for actual drinking are. When I do that it brings me down to earth in terms of the large backlog I have to work through before I would be drinking any additional wines I purchased. Ownership is potentially infinite, drinking is finite and limited by the human body. How much pre-2019 Burgundy do you own that you really do want to drink?

Investment motivations are a way of smuggling the desire for infinite ownership through the back door, since returns in wine are not high compared to other, more liquid and scalable kinds of investment such as securities. (People in equity markets talk about 10x investments, which granted are very rare but they do exist. For high end wine at current prices, a 2x investment would be a big deal).

stefan · Post by **stefan** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 7:59 pm

>>
How much pre-2019 Burgundy do you own that you really do want to drink?
>>

Not nearly enough. Ditto if you change "Burgundy" to "Bordeaux". When I go to select a dinner wine and look at a possibility, I think "not quite ready and I do not have enough bottles to waste one," or "this one is too expensive/too difficult to replace", or "I don't feel like cracking open this case today", or ...

marcs · Post by **marcs** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 9:06 pm

so, no wines you want to drink. May I ask how many wines you own

?

seriously, though, conceptualizing your wine collection as "I want to own the perfect bottle for any possible situation or passing mood, and preferably multiple of them in case the situation repeats itself" is a good way to motivate yourself to amass an infinite wine collection if you are interested in doing that! After all, the moments of life are finite, but the possible forms they could take, and wines they could call for, are much greater. One could probably model it mathematically.

Claret · Post by **Claret** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 9:39 pm

Browsed my local wine store yesterday and left empty handed.

stefan · Post by **stefan** » Thu Jan 14, 2021 10:16 pm

Marcus, I pass from the finite to the infinite to the uncountable and back again all the time in my work.

DavidG · Post by **DavidG** » Fri Jan 15, 2021 12:40 am

marcs wrote:What I consistently find useful is to benchmark against my existing store of already owned wine and asking what my plans for actual drinking are.

A very effective tool, and why I always have CellarTracker open.

I really want some 2008 Taittinger Comtes. The $190 price tag is helping me resist.

s*d*r · Post by **s*d*r** » Fri Jan 15, 2021 10:55 pm

marcs wrote:Of course the problem with the collector drive is that the more you indulge it, the stronger it gets, so you end up in a situation where the less you really need something, the more you want to buy it.

Somehow Marcus has found the heart of my oenophiliac soul

.