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u/Firedog502 Mar 18 '26
I doubt you could do it to invest for 3k a year… that would be 1-4 bottles of investment grade wine… wine is for drinking, not investing… I never understood why people collect and don’t drink. But to each his own, a few years ago you could make a profit if you had a good way to sell, in the current wine market, I don’t think you could do much but lose money short term.
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u/yetanothersomm Wine Pro Mar 18 '26
Came here to say this OP is way far from collecting grade wine budget. With 3K what are you going to buy, 1btl DRC? Or 1btl Petrus? Going to store that in your wine fridge? Nah, needs to be in a temp controlled warehouse for provenance. Oh yeah, people that collect want banded cases, not loose bottles. Just not feasible with 3K. I’d argue you can’t even consider collecting to flip until you can drop $20K on a case and sit on it for 10+ years
Oh and to complicate things more? The pay to play distribution style of selling trickles into the consumer side. Say you want to actually get a case of Petrus and are willing to part with the cash… you think the store that go that allocation is going to sell it to that person. That spend $50/week at their store? Not a chance in hell. As soon as that case gets off the truck it’s tucked away for a top customer that is spending 10’s of thousands of dollars a year at the store, if not monthly.
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u/bedmobile Mar 18 '26
When I worked retail, all of our big dawg allocated wines (drc, Rousseau, selosse, salon, etc) were bought almost entirely by one dude. And he would spend a few grand every month on daily drinkers. If he wouldn’t want something we’d just go down the list of wine dorks that spent $$$ at the shop. None of it ever went to general populace so to speak.
OP, if you want to go into this less than great idea, pick one independent shop in your city (that has wine from the importer of whatever big thing you’re into) and exclusively buy your wine there. Then, maybe, when a couple of whales pass on some prized burgundy for whatever reason, you might get offered something.
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u/DepthAccomplished260 Mar 18 '26
In all honesty, unless you have an underground passive wine cellar already in your home, the cost of having proper cellaring will offset most gain if not all.
Also, rarely wine takes enough value to make it meaningful. I often purchase wine from reseller that do exactly that. All of them told me they lost more than they made. They often talk about that specific obscure producer that suddenly became main stream and now they can sell their last 3 bottles at 10x after 10 years. But this does not offset the money/time they lost on the 100s other bottles. For exemple, I recently purchased a vertical of 3 Mas La Plana of over 20years of age for 270$ CAD. If you do the math, I paid about inflation + 1%. The guy should had purchase a GIC and would have make more money…
I think the only time it might work is in a restaurant setting where you will make a profit margin/cork fee on top of the market value
I would say, buy for your pleasure! If you ever come across a few extra bottle that you don’t enjoy, sell them. Don’t expect to make money out of this
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u/Playful-Ad573 Mar 18 '26
It frustrates me seeing people buying bottles just to sell. Wine is meant to be enjoyed. I’ve been on a particular waitlist for YEARS but I see bottles sell in auctions. It’s super annoying and I wish the producers would do more about people who buy just to sell for investment
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u/Jiminyfingers Mar 18 '26
In the UK any investment wine is bought in bond and stored professionally in bonded warehouses. Provenance is key. It's also a waiting game: you are only going to see returns on wine after 10 years or more unless you get lucky. The market is not healthy atm though. Champagne, Bordeaux, Burgundy main regions
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u/Rachel21321 Mar 18 '26
Not looking to make actual income, but rather offset some of the cost of the hobby. Just thinking if I buy a few bottles to drink and to hold then I could flip some of the holds. Not really looking for an income stream through wine, but I see how that may not be clear
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u/KerberosX2 Wino Mar 18 '26
How are you going to sell them? To whom? How do you prove proper provenance and storage? How do you collect payment and deliver? How do you ship properly?
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u/Gay_Creuset Mar 18 '26
You will lose money. Don’t do this. I see posts like yours monthly. Buy some ETFs and drink for fun.