There’s no experience quite similar to opening a fine old cellared wine for the first time. If you’ve caught the wine collecting bug, you might not know where to start. Buying and collecting wines are two completely separate things, and even if you have a basic understanding of wines, you’ll have to know which wines can be valuable and which ones are even worth aging. In this article, we’re going to give you a few tips on how to build your wine collection on the right foot.
How To Pick Wines For Your Collection?
While you may be tempted to go for wines with the greatest resale potential, it is always better to go with wines that you actually like first. Your wine collection should reflect you, and anything that actually reflects your tastes should have priority over anything that happens to be in vogue at the moment.
Research will be your best friend when picking wines for your collection. On the first level, you should start checking for their critic ratings, vintage reports, point scores, vineyard location, retail price and tasting notes. Then you should start looking at things like the history of the region where the wine was made and the wine-making history of the winemaker as well.
You should also ask how long it would take for the wines to peak and look at some other wines the winemaker produces. But you can’t just stop there. You also have to check things like how many bottles were produced, what was the winery’s initial claim to fame and what their plans for the future are among other things.
Dealing with the Paperwork
Wine is one of the easiest valuables to replicate, so you have to make sure that you are sure of the provenance of the wine and the reputation of the seller. You also have to be able to authenticate your wines when the time comes to resell them. Make sure that you keep all the documentation related to the purchase of the wine. You should document everything from how the wine in question was purchased, the shipping conditions and how the wine was stored as well.
Cellaring your Wine
When it comes to wine storage, you can either choose to store your wine on your own or deal with a third party. It would probably be a wise idea to go with a wine storage company if it’s for fine wine storage. Vintage wine storage cannot be taken lightly and even the slightest of mistakes could totally ruin a wine with great potential.
A much better idea would be to store your wine with someone like Octavian. Not only will they be able to age your wines properly, they will also make the appraisal process much easier. Even a small fluctuation in temperature or atmospheric conditions could ruin your wine, so if you’re unsure and you want your wines to mature to their full potential, then you’d be better off leaving it to professionals.
Tasting or selling your very own bottle of Merlot or Cabernet Sauvignon can be one of the best moments in a wine lover’s life. Follow the few tips in this article, and you should be able to amass a respectable, and potentially lucrative, collection for yourself in no time.
Have you any Wine Collecting Tips?
Do you collect wines to resell? What are your tips for getting the maximum value for them? Or do you simply enjoy collecting wines to enjoy with family and friends? Share your wine collecting tips with us by commenting below or by connecting with Pikalily on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.
Welcome to Pikalily, an award-winning food, travel and lifestyle blog. We are Nial and Helen, a happily married couple from Northern Ireland, who share a passion for food and travel among many things. We became parents to our beautiful boy Lewis in 2017. Follow our adventures through the blog.
