LVMH has a good day in New York

At the Sotheby’s auction held on the 28^th April in New York, buyers once again have demonstrated their fondness for older vintages and special formats, as long as they can boast the credentials of being Château released.

The sale was made up of wines supplied entirely from Château Cheval Blanc and Château d’Yquem, which are two of the estates in the LVMH portfolio that are managed by Pierre Lurton.

The 393 lots that were put up for sale realised a hammer price of $2.4m with a sell through rate of 99% by value and 98% by lot.

The percentage of lots that sold above estimate were in the region of 85%, but I think it is worth noting that the estimates often made little allowance for the wines being sold directly from the cellars of the two estates.

Traditionally ex-Château wines have sold for a premium at auction and this effect has probably been compounded by the publicity that followed the recent arrest of Rudy Kurniawan on charges of fraud relating to the forgery of wine. This has almost certainly focused the minds of collectors and raised question marks over wines offered from the older vintages. It is therefore not surprising that wines that can guarantee authenticity attract a great deal of interest.

Despite this I can only say that this sale has been a huge success for LVMH with individual wines smashing existing records. In high profile auctions such as these the winemakers are in a win, win situation. Not only do they realise top prices for their wines, but the ensuing publicity and enhancement to their brands, must amount to tens of thousands of dollars in terms of savings when compared to traditional marketing practices.

The top lot was a nine bottle vertical of Château d’Yquem based on a wines with a ten year gap starting with the 1899 vintage, going right through to 2009, missing only 1919, 1969 and 1979. The hammer price for this collection was $67,375.

To demonstrate just how successful this auction actually was, I have compiled a list of the top lots that have recently come under the hammer at other auctions in New York. Where there is more than one price within a close time frame I have used the highest.

*When dealing with wines from older vintages prices can vary due to a number factors, such as provenance, condition of the cork & fill level

Of course it was not possible match every one of the top lots, so the wines below complete the list of top performers and as can be seen by their high estimates, these wines also performed exceptionally well.

Published:29th April 2012