Bottling Time: Does Wine Get Better With Age — Or Just More Expensive?

For most of human history, wine had but a brief moment of drinkability and then turned to vinegar. That all changed in the late 17th century when Bordeaux winemakers learned how to make wines that could last. But once wine could age, somebody had to pay to store it, someone had to know when it was ready to drink, and somebody else had to know how to sell it.

In this second episode of Areni Global’s three-part series on wine ageing, Pauline Vicard and Felicity Carter trace how a simple drink became something that could be cellared for a long time, and then turned into an asset class.

The story includes:

●     The wine ageing experiments of chemist Robert Boyle;

●     The tannic Bordeaux wines developed for the English market;

●     The smugglers of Scotland who built warehouses and segmented the claret trade;

●     Port’s reinvention as a patriotic drink; and

●     The emergence of ‘vintage’ to differentiate one year from another.

Along the way it takes in butlers, brokers and early wine geeks, who wrote long and lavish books about wine. It ends in the auction room, from James Christie’s first sale in 1766 to Michael Broadbent’s wine department, and then Wine-Searcher and Liv-ex.

And it asks the economists: does wine become more valuable because it improves, or because it becomes scarce?

Featured in this episode:

Charles Leary, wine historian, journalist and author of Leary’s Global Wineology

David Hancock, historian and author of Oceans of Wine

Christine Pascal, oenological research manager, Vinventions

Amayès Aouli, global head of wine and spirits, Bonhams

Joe Breeden, physicist and researcher on wine auction prices

Philippe Masset, EHL Hospitality Business School, on market segmentation and the age-price relationship

About Areni Global

Areni Global is an independent think tank dedicated to the future of fine wine. Headquartered in London, its mission is to help the fine wine sector understand and respond to the economic, cultural and societal changes reshaping the world around it.

Through independent research, strategic reports, podcasts and industry events, Areni brings together producers, merchants, distributors, collectors and experts from across disciplines to explore the questions that will define the next generation of fine wine.

To learn more about Areni's work, subscribe to the newsletter or become a member, visit www.areni.global.