Over the past few weeks, the prices for Château Rayas wines from Châteauneuf du Pape in the southern Rhône Valley have stabilised and some vintages have even seen their prices decrease slightly. At the same time, the opposite seems to have happened in the northern Rhône Valley, especially in the Côte-Rôtie appellation, which places the enchanting Syrah centre stage.

Guigal, a Côte-Rôtie institution

Without the Guigal family, would Côte-Rôtie wines have seen the same trajectory of popularity with wine enthusiasts around the world? This emblem of the appellation has undoubtedly contributed to the rise of the whole region. The famous La-La-La trilogy from Guigal, an icon of the appellation, is a firm favourite in the iDealwine auctions with wine enthusiasts from several different countries (UK, USA, Denmark, Hong Kong, and Germany) buying bottles recently. Unsurprisingly, it is La Turque – the rarest wine with only about 4,000 bottles produced each year – which reached the top of the charts for our November auctions, with the 1985 vintage going under the hammer for €1,091 and the 1991 being sold for €856 (+28%). La Landonne, which is a powerful and well-structured wine, comes next with a German wine lover snapping up a bottle of the 1990 vintage for €732 (+8%) and an American purchasing a 1989 for €632. The 1999, awarded a 100/100 by Robert Parker, went for €558, being bought by an American bidder. Other vintages to note according to Wine Advocate are the 2015, which reached €422 and the 2010, which sold for €397. La Mouline, the most delicate of the three wines and from the Côte Blonde, stabilised at €384 for the 2009 vintage (another 100/100 Robert Parker score) and the 2015 selling for €360. None of these flagship wines were sold for less than €200 a bottle at auction. In more delicate vintages, such as 2013, La Turque and La Mouline both went for €236. As for the Château d’Ampuis cuvée, another Guigal treasure, a bottle from 2010 was sold to a wine enthusiast from Singapore for €136 while a 2005 bottle went to a Lithuanian wine enthusiast for €124. Also, to note is that the price for a 2014 Condrieu La Doriane settled at €87 (+30%), having been won by a bidder from Singapore.

Symbolic cuvées from Domaine Jean-Michel Gérin, Domaine Jamet and Domaine Gangloff

Domaine Jean-Michel Gerin, created in 1983, also owns a plot of vines at La Landonne and the grapes from this plot go on to produce one of two symbolic cuvées made by the winemaker whose family have lived in Ampuis, northern Rhône for six generations. The 1999 went for €186, the 2005 for €174 and the 2006 for €149. The domain’s other star cuvée is Les Grandes Places, which comes from a small parcel of only 1.4 hectares where the vines are planted on micro-schist soil which imparts exquisite minerality on to the wine. The 2009 vintage was bought at auction by a French wine lover for €149 (+42%) and a magnum from the 2005 vintage went for €276.

About thirty bottles of Côte-Rôtie wine from Domaine Jamet have made wine enthusiasts from France, Norway, Italy, UK and USA happy over the past month. The top wine at auction for the domain was unsurprisingly from its plot in Côte Brune, which is rich in iron oxides. The 2010 vintage sold for €570 (+4%), the 2015 went for €496, the 2016 for €434 and the 2018 for €422. The “classic” cuvée caused sparks to fly when the 1998 vintage went under the hammer at €416 (+22%) and other mature vintages were bought for high prices. For example, the 1996 sold for €322 (+34%) and the 2000 vintage went for €273. Both these bottles have since travelled on to Macao. The 2015 vintage also reached €174 (+4%) as did the 2012 vintage (+8%), while the price for the 2018, 2017, 2016 and 2013 vintages was set at €149.

The beautiful Sereine Noire from Domaine Gangloff is one of the wines from this appellation to follow. Its 2010 vintage reached €306 (+7%) at auction, the 2013 sold for €276 and the 2018 went for €269 (+21%). The Barbarine 2010 from the same winemaker was sold to an enthusiast from Singapore for €223 (+2%). This success confirms that the vine and the rock make a great pair, and above all else, that the domain will continue thanks to the work of Loup and Elsa, Yves and Mathilde Gangloff’s children.

Completely delicate wines from Domaine Benetière and Domaine Jasmin

Domaine Marie and Pierre Bénetière is one of the properties that are causing wine enthusiasts to lose their cool at the moment. Only about 500 bottles of the wine Le Dolium, from a small enclave in the heart of La Turque area, are produced. This truly rare piece, made with a Burgundian finesse, topped the auction tables for this domain. A magnum of the 2007 vintage was sold at auction for €781. The prices are also significantly higher for standard bottles as well. The 2007 went for €391 (+7%), the 2013 was auctioned off at € 372 (+15%) and the 2014, which was labelled as a Vin de France, sold for €409. The success of Cordeloux, deliciously spiced and ethereal, also needs to be highlighted because one magnum sold for €508 and another from 2009 went for €409.

Domaine Jasmin is known for its style of Côte-Rôtie, extremely delicate with plot-by-plot vinification. A mature vintage, 1989, was bought for €248 (+54%) while a 1990 was snapped up by a Japanese bidder for €161 (+8%).

Brilliant auction prices from other regions

November witnessed many bottles of Pomerol wines swapping hands, just like in previous months. Petrus saw its prices rise for mid-range vintages, a change which illustrates that the appellation’s flagship bottles are as popular as ever, no matter the production year. The popularity of wines from Château Lafite Rothschild in the Médoc have also remained unchanged.

In Burgundy, wines from Domaine Rousseau and Domaine Mugnier have plateaued (at high prices), in the same way that prices for Domaine Leroy wines have stabilized after reaching new record levels.
Mature vintages from Domaine de la Romanée Conti Grands Crus continue their upwards trajectory.

Wines from Domaine Truchot made auction headlines last month. While the domain is no longer operational, the vines that produced these rare wines are now managed by David Duband. Some collector bottles are now on their way to Asia, having been purchased at our November auctions. Wine enthusiasts from Hong Kong bought a magnum of Charmes-Chambertin Vieilles Vignes from the 2005 vintage for €6,944 and a 2001 for €6,820, while a 2005 Morey-Saint-Denis nearly doubled in price, having been bought for €1,426 (+49%).

In the Loire Valley, white wines are all the rage, particularly the Anjou wines produced by Domaine Richard Leroy, which were extremely popular with bidders in Asia.

See the entire auction report for November 2022 on the iDealwine site.

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