The Great 2022 Wine Buying Freeze has begun!

[Nicklasss]

I went in with Joel on some 2014 Conseillante. I'm out!
Not that there's anything wrong with that.

...

...

And now I'm in again! A new freeze has begun!

Buying wine for us is like covid : we would like to get rid of it, but it always come back.

I was myself completely convinced of respecting a new wine buying freeze after my last purchase and.... musigny151 talked about Bandol in the last poll thread... and not that I'm gonna fail... i like mourvèdre and Bandol too... when I'm not in a wine buying freeze, i like to buy Beaucastel because of that nice Mourvèdre... but I'm on a wine buying freeze and i don't need more wines.... but do you need something to buy it... i "buy" income taxes and i don't need it... there are so many computer hacking, maybe my money would be safer in wine than at the bank... but no wine Nic, you're on a wine buying freeze... and some say it is not wine, it is grape juice.... i'm not in a grape juice buying freeze... so taking money out of the bank to change it in grape juiçe is fully respecting my wine buying freeze...

Like covid resisting to all counter-measures.
Like Dracula resisting drinking blood.
Like the Montreal Canadiens resisting to win games since the beginning of hockey season.
Like Jim resisting all influencers here that are trying to convince him Lynch Bages a 2nd Growth or have a merlot as WOTY
Like HM$ resisting easily to Pinot Noir.

I will resist to buy wine, and buy grape juice instead.

[Blanquito]

Joel asked that we restart this freeze in 2022, and clearly that is our only hope.

Upon consideration (of our pathetic start), the freeze is officially OFF until January 1st, 2020.

Like all New Year's resolutions past, we shall embrace the new day -- putting aside our credit cards, check books, PayPal accounts, cryptocurrencies, and little baggies of gold dust -- and embrace our new-found abstinence with the righteousness of the freshly baptized, reborn in the knowledge that (say it once, say it twice, say it each time you go online)... WE... ALL... HAVE... WAY... TOO... MUCH... WINE!

[JoelD]

Like covid resisting to all counter-measures.
Like Dracula resisting drinking blood.
Like the Montreal Canadiens resisting to win games since the beginning of hockey season.
Like Jim resisting all influencers here that are trying to convince him Lynch Bages a 2nd Growth or have a merlot as WOTY
Like HM$ resisting easily to Pinot Noir.

I will resist to buy wine, and buy grape juice instead.

Well said Nicola, I like these examples.

2022 it is. I still say we need a monetary "Contest" like in Seinfeld...

[JimHow]

Lol... You guys are wonderfully pathetic.
Well done, gents! Well done indeed.
Viva BWE!

[Claret]

I am in a freeze, a very deep freeze. Consumption must be reduced, so more buying is out of the question.

It will need to last years to whittle down my cellar.

[Tom In DC]

Joel asked that we restart this freeze in 2022, and clearly that is our only hope.

Upon consideration (of our pathetic start), the freeze is officially OFF until January 1st, 2020.

Like all New Year's resolutions past, we shall embrace the new day -- putting aside our credit cards, check books, PayPal accounts, cryptocurrencies, and little baggies of gold dust -- and embrace our new-found abstinence with the righteousness of the freshly baptized, reborn in the knowledge that (say it once, say it twice, say it each time you go online)... WE... ALL... HAVE... WAY... TOO... MUCH... WINE!

Amen, Pastor Pat! Keeping up the BWE tradition of kicking the can down the road. No wonder we gather in DC so often!

[DavidG]

Well then, 12 days left to binge!

On the 12th day before freeze my Visa bought for me…

[Blanquito]

Well then, 12 days left to binge!

On the 12th day before freeze my Visa bought for me…

… a full case of twenty fourteens!

[DavidG]

Well done, Patrick, well done indeed!

[Blanquito]

Only 2 days until The Great 2022 Wine Buying Freeze Begins! Last chance to buy 2014 La Conseillante BWE 2021 Wine of the Year.

[Racer Chris]

I plan on buying more 2014 La Conseillante on Jan 3rd when my fresh budget kicks in.

[JCNorthway]

It may all be gone by Jan. 3!

[stefan]

RC, it is admirable to stick to a budget IMO. I am proud of the fact that I have never exceeded mine. Today I spent my planned amount for March 2046.

[DavidG]

I’m certain that BWE WOTYs get an automatic exemption.

All other purchases require special dispensation from the BD. Though I don’t recall that he’s ever refused to grant one.

[JimHow]

Lol… I pass on full exemption authority to the VBD while I’m gone, David.

[Blanquito]

Standing BD Buying Freeze Exemptions:
-1989 Lynch Bages
-any BWE WOTY awardee
-La Lagune (for Stefan ONLY, to prevent innocent BWEers from inadvertently buying this cooked plonk)
-Magdelaine (for me at least, to help me wallow in my the-wine-world-has-all-become-modernist-glob misery)

Anything else?

[JoelD]

Standing BD Buying Freeze Exemptions:
-1989 Lynch Bages
-any BWE WOTY awardee
-La Lagune (for Stefan ONLY, to prevent innocent BWEers from inadvertently buying this cooked plonk)
-Magdelaine (for me at least, to help me wallow in my the-wine-world-has-all-become-modernist-glob misery)

Anything else?

Some of my own personal exemptions, which are loose and I may need to tighten:

-Up to 30% of the $ value of wines that I sell from my collection(but also can't go crazy with volume).

-A wine that I actually legitimately want, that is at least 25% lower than the lowest WS price and/or 15% below auction hammer avg. (all in, after tax, excluding reasonable shipping)

[Nicklasss]

Clearly the biggest joke ever the BWE wine buying freeze.

I have never seen more arguing for nothing...

[DavidG]

Standing BD Buying Freeze Exemptions:
-1989 Lynch Bages
-any BWE WOTY awardee
-La Lagune (for Stefan ONLY, to prevent innocent BWEers from inadvertently buying this cooked plonk)
-Magdelaine (for me at least, to help me wallow in my the-wine-world-has-all-become-modernist-glob misery)

Anything else?

Some of my own personal exemptions, which are loose and I may need to tighten:

-Up to 30% of the $ value of wines that I sell from my collection(but also can't go crazy with volume).

-A wine that I actually legitimately want, that is at least 25% lower than the lowest WS price and/or 15% below auction hammer avg. (all in, after tax, excluding reasonable shipping)

Is there any wine at least 25% below WS low or 15% below auction average that you don’t want?

[JoelD]

Standing BD Buying Freeze Exemptions:
-1989 Lynch Bages
-any BWE WOTY awardee
-La Lagune (for Stefan ONLY, to prevent innocent BWEers from inadvertently buying this cooked plonk)
-Magdelaine (for me at least, to help me wallow in my the-wine-world-has-all-become-modernist-glob misery)

Anything else?

Some of my own personal exemptions, which are loose and I may need to tighten:

-Up to 30% of the $ value of wines that I sell from my collection(but also can't go crazy with volume).

-A wine that I actually legitimately want, that is at least 25% lower than the lowest WS price and/or 15% below auction hammer avg. (all in, after tax, excluding reasonable shipping)

Is there any wine at least 25% below WS low or 15% below auction average that you don’t want?

Anything Leve rated over 98 points!!

But in all seriousness, theres plenty. To clarify, I meant anything I would seriously consider buying normally at low retail prices, or hammer auction prices. Some of these items may never come around at that price again so I don't want to be kicking myself down the road like I have on other things. Just need more discretion obviously.

This isn't a lifelong buying freeze by any means for me. Maybe I'm not the perfect candidate for this. So maybe I should combine the two clauses. Only 30% of the $ of my wine sold can be reinvested, with the second clause taking effect.

[barsacpinci]

You guys talked me into it, I picked up two bottles of the 2014 La Conseillante, as well as a 2016 Saint Pierre, various Walter Scott Chardonnays, a 2008 Paul Bara Comtesse Marie de France, a 2017 Domaine du Closel Le Gel, and a 2016 Elio Grasso Gavarini Chiniera. And I’m definitely on a wine buying freeze come Jan 1.

[Nicklasss]

Jim will be the only one freezing on January 1st, in Fairbanks, Alaska.

And good catch barsacpinci. 2016 Saint Pierre rocks!

[Claret]

A 6 week head start for me and still frozen.

[William P]

You guys talked me into it, I picked up two bottles of the 2014 La Conseillante, as well as a 2016 Saint Pierre, various Walter Scott Chardonnays, a 2008 Paul Bara Comtesse Marie de France, a 2017 Domaine du Closel Le Gel, and a 2016 Elio Grasso Gavarini Chiniera. And I’m definitely on a wine buying freeze come Jan 1.

Good call on the Walter Scott Chardonnays. There was no wine made for the 2020 vintage. I would imagine their stock (library) is getting rather thin for everything else. For club member there is a two bottle shipment in March of 2022 and then nothing until March of 2023. This is true for many of the smaller wineries.

Bill

[Blanquito]

Happy 2022! This thread is to support a wine buying freeze.

Those of you who don’t have a buying problem or have reasonably sized cellars (say, 1500 bottles or less), please don’t mock us in our efforts to scale back. We know this will be hard. We will not pretend we will never buy wine again or that we will never fall off the wagon in a big way at some future date (tomorrow?), but every positive step helps as we try to reach a normal equilibrium.

To help us in need of help, let’s start with a reasonable goal — buy no wine in January (at least), which should be easier as some of us (myself included) will be on an total alcohol fast for the month as well (Dryuary). Ignore deals and sales, wines on the BD lifetime exemption list, anything that will test your resolve over the next 31 days. Just do it.

We will report back in a month on our progress. Let the sanity begin!

[DavidG]

Thirteen hours, sixteen minutes in and I feel fine.

[JoelD]

Best of luck, gents. I will give a real try to no buying January. In the past I used to supplement my dry times by buying a lot extra. Here's to hoping I can funnel that into something more productive this year.

[Claret]

Tasted at Mt. Vernon winery in Auburn, CA today. Tasted and spit, but no purchase, although the Zin was pretty good.

[barsacpinci]

I'm in for no buying this month. I went overboard in 2021 and have no room left in the cellar.

[Musigny 151]

I am good. Did not buy anything today. One day at a time.

[Blanquito]

Well done, gentlemen, very well done indeed. Day One (nearly) down.

As mentioned, the DC Convention, my trip to France (especially Burgundy) with many a wine dinner organized by Ian (15 or so of his top 100 wines in 2021 were opened in that 10 day stretch), and some compelling notes on this forum (most prominently, on 95 BAMA, cru bojo, Levet and Figeac) all triangulated to make a perfect storm of wine buying. From October 1st through December 31st, I bought 168 bottles of wine. Wow!

I’m tempted to post them all here together, to get both the satisfaction of sharing them all in one post and to see the awful truth writ large to help motivate the freeze.

[Nicklasss]

Even me i'll try the wine buying freeze. But it will be tough, after the nice Chambolle from last night, or the Muscadet today...

But like you're all saying, one day at a time.

[marcs]

Well done, gentlemen, very well done indeed. Day One (nearly) down.

As mentioned, the DC Convention, my trip to France (especially Burgundy) with many a wine dinner organized by Ian (15 or so of his top 100 wines in 2021 were opened in that 10 day stretch), and some compelling notes on this forum (most prominently, on 95 BAMA, cru bojo, Levet and Figeac) all triangulated to make a perfect storm of wine buying. From October 1st through December 31st, I bought 168 bottles of wine. Wow!

I’m tempted to post them all here together, to get both the satisfaction of sharing them all in one post and to see the awful truth writ large to help motivate the freeze.

It shows how distorted our perspectives are that I’m reading this and thinking…huh, 168 bottles in three months, that’s only about a case a week, right?

[Racer Chris]

My highest ever quarterly purchase was 161 in the first quarter of 2021, but I don't have a cellar already full of wine.

[Blanquito]

My highest ever quarterly purchase was 161 in the first quarter of 2021, but I don't have a cellar already full of wine.

Precisely!

[marcs]

It’s the dollar spend as much as the number of bottles. Chris buys a lot of those solid midrange $30-50 Bordeaux that age. 160 bottles like that are maybe a case of first growths dollar wise. Or a case of red Burgundy

[Blanquito]

Well done, gentlemen, very well done indeed. Day One (nearly) down.

As mentioned, the DC Convention, my trip to France (especially Burgundy) with many a wine dinner organized by Ian (15 or so of his top 100 wines in 2021 were opened in that 10 day stretch), and some compelling notes on this forum (most prominently, on 95 BAMA, cru bojo, Levet and Figeac) all triangulated to make a perfect storm of wine buying. From October 1st through December 31st, I bought 168 bottles of wine. Wow!

I’m tempted to post them all here together, to get both the satisfaction of sharing them all in one post and to see the awful truth writ large to help motivate the freeze.

It shows how distorted our perspectives are that I’m reading this and thinking…huh, 168 bottles in three months, that’s only about a case a week, right?

Lol, I know! But in theory, I’m in the cellar reducing stage of my life, so fail. And the mindset that a case a week isn’t bad (I open 2-3 wines a week usually, so way too much).

Mostly through offloading wines at auction I don’t really like anymore, I managed — for the first time to ever — to slightly reduce my cellar size in 2019 and again in 2020. But not 2021. Even though I sold 166 bottles at auction that year, I was still up a net of 54 bottles in 2021!

[Musigny 151]

I keep reading about “old” collectors selling their collections. But given the current marketplace, and wine prices on the rise, where are you planning to put all that money? The stock market is jittery, and bonds are paying less than 1%. Wine seems to be as good a place as any if you are diversifying risk. So I am buying.

But very, very carefully.

[marcs]

The transaction costs in selling your wine are very significant compared to stocks or bonds though. It seems perfectly possible for stocks to go down 5% and wine to go up 10% in the short run but the net loss from selling your wine would be greater than the loss from selling stocks (for example if the transaction cost of selling the wine was 20% vs basically zero for stocks).

Then in the long run only a small subset of wines have ever beaten stocks in terms of appreciation.

I also believe that wine prices are correlated with the stock market to some degree, even though people tend to claim strong diversification

[Blanquito]

Buying in bond definitely seems to be the way to go for using wine as an investment vehicle.

I’ve made money overall in my wine selling, but much less than the stock market’s average return. But then I wasn’t buying or selling wine to make money, so it was hardly optimized.

Honestly, the biggest reason (for my mileage) to not use wine as an investment vehicle is hassle. Finding, shipping, organizing, and properly storing wine when buying (to a degree, these things are part of the fun when buying wine as a collector or connoisseur), and then gathering, boxing, shipping back to the auction house, organizing auction lots and collecting payment when selling, are collectively an enormous PITA. (Buying in bond probably eliminates most of these hassles).