Disposing of my wine collection. 1931 Quinta do noval

[triumphstuff]

I am wanting to dispose of the remenants of my once plentiful wine collection... there are mainly single bottles.. there is one bottle that i think may be off interest to you. i have 1 bottle of 1931 quinta do noval port... i want to sell this bottle and others to finance a special car purchase.. if you would like to know more about the wines i have to offer call me on 07866 426825 (after 5pm please & before 11.30pm) if you cant get thru, send me a text and i will call you back. (weak phone signal where i live) i am based in Nottingham between the A1 and M1... there is a strict time limit on this offer because i need the money asap.. if you email me send a phone number because i dont sit on a computer all day.. i will only be able to pick up my emails when i get home. James

[Conky]

James,

A fascinating first Post. Welcome to the Forum. I personally would never get involved in a rushed, auction. It may not suit you, but if you are unsuccessful in your wish for a 'quick' sale, a secondary option would be to engage in discourse with the members of this Forum. They may require much more evidence regarding the condition and provenance of any items for sale.

I'm sure your not one of them, but the world is full of folk who are bizarrely dense enough to think they can scam people, such as our members, with tales of great ports that need 'money up front'. It never works, but never seems to deter the 'triers'.

Of course I'm sure you will prove to be a genuine source. maybe you could start your provenance of your collection with a photograph or two.

Alan.

[triumphstuff]

i understand in this world of blaggers and thiefs that people should be wary of an offer like this.. computers are not my strong point so im not quite sure how i would go about putting a picture on here.. this is not an offer for cash upfront etc.. its not an auction.. i just want somebody to buy my wine at a sensible price.. ie im prepared to let it go for a price that you would benefit from and i can make a quick sale... i have given my location in the uk and my phone number.. i am prepard to drive a realistic distance to meet with the buyer or they can come to my house.. the quinta do noval 1931 was purchased from T & W wines in thetford about 19 years ago and was part of a collection of 400 bottles of fine vintage wines that i collected at that time (when i had money) since then i have slowly worked my way thru most of the bottles leaving me with 37 bottles left. i have 6x 1991 quinta do vesuvio in a oak box, 1x taylors 66 2x grahams 77 1x grahams 70 1x dows 75 1x dows 77 1x warres 77 1x 83 warres 1x taylors 80 1x ch gilette 1956 sauternes 1x 1956 4 putt tokaji 1x 1956 5 putt tokaji theres also ch lafite,mouton,latour .. 1989 hermitage 1989 chateuneuf-du-pape... i think you get the idea.. J[/img]

[triumphstuff]

i had a go at the picture thing.. not happening... i will take a picture on my mobile phone and i could send it to your phone.. i will take a picture of the collection and one of the 1931 quinta do noval... i would like to reiterate that this is not dodgy... and that i expect no money to change hands untill the buyer is happy that they have got what they were expecting... i am offering this to the port forum first because the bulk of the wine is port... on monday morning i will start offering it to anyone who is interested ... vintners etc J

[DRT]

James,

If posting images isn't your thing then perhaps you could begin by telling us how the bottles have been stored and what condition they are in - e.g. fill level, leaking? labelled? etc.

Derek

[triumphstuff]

The bottles have been stored in a vaulted cellar for all the time i have owned them. the bottles have not been moved unless i was picking it out to drink. there is no leaking, fill levels are all good (all above the main body of the bottle in the neck) apart from the 31 noval which is just touching the bottom of the neck.. most of the labels are fully intact, the odd one has a scrap or two on the paper and the taylors 1980 label is missing completely (it fell off about a week after i bought it).... and of course they are covered in dust... The capsule is missing on the 31 noval. it was missing when i bought the bottle... non of the bottles have protruding corks.. the bottles were moved on sunday 3rd feb 2008 from the cellars where they have been stored since about 1989 to my house so i can dispose of them... the bottles of wine were never bought for speculative profit.. they were bought to drink... so i really am open to offers... what i dont want is people buying 1 bottle J

[Alex Bridgeman]

James

If I understand correctly that you are looking to sell your entire cellar in a single transaction then I suspect that although there are a handful of people on this board who have the financial means to buy the remains of your cellar from you, your best bet for a rapid sale would be through a wine merchant.

For example, you have quite a lot of wine that I would be interested in (eg. Quinta do Vesuvio 1991), but about half of the bottles you have listed would not be ones I would want to hold on to and would therefore be looking to sell on to others. It would take me time to get this organised, time to get myself organised to travel to meet you and look at the cellar and then time to organise the transport for the remains of 400+ bottles. All of this while being out of the UK for the first two weeks of February.

A wine merchant who is interested in the wines you have left would be able to drive to meet you in their van with their cash in their pocket. You'd probably get significantly more from a private sale but will get a much faster sale by disposing of the bottles through the trade.

I wish you luck in your negotiations and hope to see some of the bottles that I'm interested in being offered for sale. Or if you decide to auction the remains of your cellar, please let us know where so that we can bid for the things that we would like.

Alex

[triumphstuff]

Thanks for the reply.. just a few points.. there is not 400+ bottles there are only 37.. i dont mind selling groups of bottles, what i dont want is 37 people buying 1 each.. i will make this really simple.. the time and effort involved in disposing of the wine needs to be the bare minimum.. if i were to sell the quinta do vesuvio x6 for £100 and had to drive for 90 minutes each way with a £30 fuel bill.. that would not be worth the time and effort.. if you were to buy all the port for £400 minus the Q D Noval.. that would be worth the effort.. on the subject of the Quinta do noval 1931, all somebody has to do is make me an offer... i'm not greedy.. an auction ie christys etc is neither quick or convenient.. i really did not imagine that it would be this hard to dispose of this wine.. i put it on this forum because i thought that you guys would jump at the chance to pick up some cellar fillers for the right money... so far nobody has actually asked how much or made an offer.. tick tock goes the clock... PS. IT IS NOT AN AUCTION i'm not taking bids to find the highest price.. i am open to offers. J

[g-man]

FYI http://www.frw.co.uk/ has the 1931 Quinta do noval for roughly 1800 british pounds retail.

Last auction at Christies sold this for 2200$ USD inclusive of buyer's premium
High end for acker's had it for 3k$ USD inclusive of buyer's premium.

[Andy Velebil]

Triumphstuff,

allow me to explain simply. yes there are very good people here, some that I've met in person several times now even though I live 1/2 a world away. However, what your trying to sell doesn't happen overnight and there WILL BE a LOT of questions asked. especially since you are new to this wine forum and the type of wine you are trying to sell. On almost all wine forums it is unwritten, but considered bad form to show up and try and sell something as your only posts. This is nothing against you personally, but you have to understand people being a bit leary and asking LOTS of questions. As they dont know who you are yet.

However, you do need to tone down the sarcastic reply (your last one)

an auction ie christys etc is neither quick or convenient.. i really did not imagine that it would be this hard to dispose of this wine.. i put it on this forum because i thought that you guys would jump at the chance to pick up some cellar fillers for the right money... so far nobody has actually asked how much or made an offer.. tick tock goes the clock...

as that is not how to go about selling things. Just offering a bit of advice based on experience.

[DRT]

James,

The apparent urgency with which you seem to want to sell your ports coupled with your less than friendly approach mean that you are highly unlikely to sell your unwanted bottles to anyone here.

Best of luck in trying to sell them somewhere else.

Derek

[g-man]

Curious as to what car this might be put towards.

out of 37 bottles, I know 6 of them are the 91 vesuvio, looking through the other samples, they're all roughly 100-200$ USD.. Most of the older bordeauxs top out around 300-400$ barring the great years.

so high end estimate of say 30k$ usd ... be enough to buy a new mitsuibishi lancer evo

[Alex Bridgeman]

I wonder if James ever managed to sell his collection and buy the car he was after? I guess we'll never know.

However, if anyone sees what appears to be his collection come up for auction, please post here as - purely out of curiosity - I would be interested to know.

[Conky]

Alex,

I've seen James viewing on the site a few times since, and suspect he may have had too harsh a response. I know it's a pet hate of mine, as well as others, when folk start off their life on the Forum by trying to offload Port, but as well as the opportunists, there will be genuine cases. As a consistent approach, I think the regulars on here, should always decline such offers, but suggest we may be very interested after a Newbie posts on other matters for a few months.

So in the hope James may read this, how about chipping in on your Port thoughts, or on any other subject you have an opinion on.

Alan

[Alex Bridgeman]

Alan,

I hope I wasn't being too harsh on James when I was replying to him. I was genuinely not intending to be and tried to be very fair in my replies. Under normal circumstances I would have been very interested in what he had to offer and would have been prepared to have travelled north of the Thames to meet him, see his cellar and make an offer on the ports he had in his collection.

However, James had a much more urgent timescale in mind than I was able to cope with given my 2 week trip to the US. Since I wasn't able to meet his requirements and since noone else on the Forum appeared to be keen to buy what he had to offer as a single lump sum transaction, I made a genuine suggestion that he should look to sell to one of his local and trusted merchants. That way he would have received cash up front for the entire collection but would also have given up the chance to maximise his sales price.

The one thing that I regret was that he came across in a way that I found to be quite aggressive and did not necessarily encourage me to go out of my way to make an offer.

My guess is that James is not in marketing! However, he would not be the first person on this forum to have posted in a way that makes me feel uncomfortable only for me to develop a friendship over time based on a love of vintage port. Like you, I hope that James does read this post and - if he is still drinking port of any kind - feels that he can post and contribute to our knowledge on the subject.

James - if you do read this post please consider this a direct invitation to post your thoughts, comments or opnions on vintage port. Everyone on the forum would welcome your participation so please feel free to tell us what you thought about your most recent glass of port.

Alex

[10Anos]

While reading this thread I was thinking of two possibilities.
- the seller went bankrupt and tried to sell the Ports quickly to get some money, or
- was someone more sinistre, maybe someone trying to sell stolen goods, esp. someone who knows the value of certain Ports and wines.

I don't think we'll ever hear from him again, so I guess we'll never know for sure...

[Alex Bridgeman]

I don't think that there was a sinister motive behind James' initial post, I think that there was a genuine kindness there to offer us an opportunity to perhaps have an advantage in buying some of the wines that he had accumulated over a number of years.

I just think that James had anticipated that events would flow a particular way that we were not able to match. It happens. I bear James nothing but goodwill and hope that he was able to sell his wine and buy the car that he was looking to get - or even better would be that he won the lottery, bought his car and kept his wine collection!

One day I hope that James will post here again and will join in some of the discussions on the port topics.

Alex

[jdaw1]

the seller went bankrupt and tried to sell the Ports quickly to get some money

Hmm, I hadn’t thought of that. But would he risk doing so publically hiding assets is an imprisonable offence.

I still think fraud.

[10Anos]

the seller went bankrupt and tried to sell the Ports quickly to get some money

Hmm, I hadn’t thought of that. But would he risk doing so publically — hiding assets is an imprisonable offence.

I still think fraud.

And I hadn't thought of that!

I don't know about fraud. He was honest enough to mention some bottles had flaws. And he didn't forget to mention that the one bottle (31 Quinta do Noval) has two flaws (low fill level and missing capsule)... Wouldn't that seriously devalue his bottle?

I'm new to port, but after a quick search on the internet I too know the value of the 31 QdN.

[DRT]

I think TriumphStuff should be given the benefit of the doubt on this one before being hung drawn and quartered without a defence, which he probably doesn't need.

TriumphStuff, if you are reading this then please be assured that you are welcome to participate on this Forum and have no need to answer any of the rather pointless and uninformed speculation above. You got off to a bad start but you're not the first and won't be the last to do that. The important thing is what happens from here, not what has gone before.

If you wish to put this to bed I would suggest you simply post on another thread and we leave this one alone from here on in

Derek

PS: Come on guys, remember why we are here

[triumphstuff]

hello everybody.. i'm not dead honest.
Have had a very busy year so far. i do race support, ie i build a racing car and ship it to the circuit each time it is required.. whereupon i glue it back together if it gets smacked or broken. 9 weekends already consumed
a few more to go..
A few questions answered... i have not gone bankrupt.. i did sell all the non port wine to a collector in southwell (just up the road) I think he used to own viyella and a major chain of car dealerships..
I got my new car.. possibly not to all your tastes ... A white Renaultsport Clio 197 Cup, its fab and its also my first modern car.. all my cars have been 60s and 70s triumphs...
My reasons for selling my collection of wine off.. i just dont drink anymore (not an alcoholic). i never really got into drinking. when i used to open a fine bottle i would have a small glass and my guests would drink the rest.. you could say i'm the perfect host.
The celler where it has always been stored belonged to some family friends, they were selling there house..
so it needed to be moved.
I needed a cash injection to buy my new car, so as not to leave me short for insurance, petrol etc..

I know i waded in straight off without any introductions and touted my wares.. I did not think you would be bothered when there was a chance of some good ports at realistic prices..

Now we all know each other i have for sale a fine Quinta do noval 1931.. It really needs to be in the hands of somebody who will either drink it with a bunch of friends or place it next to some younger relatives
where it can grow old gracefully.. I am not selling it on here so i can con anyone.. i guess the chances of us mere mortals having such a bottle are slim.. i bought it when i was young and had disposable income.. somebody make me an offer..

Just to give you an idea of the type of person i am.. I am the owner of 12 michael rothenstein prints from
1973 Valued at £500 - £1200 each.. I have sold one way under its value to a friend because they liked the picture.. The money i gave to charity... Another i gave to some friends who got married..
If i sell the noval, the feeling it will give me knowing that somebody out there has derived joy from it will
ofset any perceived monetary loss..

James based in nottingham Call me on 07866 426825 thanks.. J

ps I'm trying to clear my life of belongs that have no real meaning to me.. and replace them with things that do

[triumphstuff]

Have gone back and read the old posts.. made me chuckle.. i deal with a few car related forums, most of the people who read my posts have met me and know me. and would not take anything i put up badly.

Its always difficult in text form to get across the mood at the time.. i have always posted on the port forum
with a smile on my face because thats the type of guy i am.

suppose thats why i'm typing now because i have not taken your comments badly.

In my life i have always gone out of my way to help people and i trust people from the off until such time as they let me down.. to this day my kindness has never backfired on me.

A little story for you..
Once upon a time; i was taking my girlfriend to a hen party at a hotel, on the road to the hotel i passed a triumph spitfire at the side of the road with its bonnet up.. so i dropped off my girlfriend and drove back to the triumph.. The front vertical link had snapped and the young couple were very distressed..
They lived in devon (broke down in nottingham) and they had no recovery and very little money.
They were attending a funeral so had pretty much spent up just to do the journey.
I remembered a friends brother worked for a recovery company, half an hour later he arrived and disscusions
ensued as to the best course of action... I had all the parts at home 8 miles away..
we got the car moved to my house (recovery man would not accept any money for the haul) and i made them tea and cooked them a quick pasta dish.. made them a bed up...
Next morning i awoke early stripped and rebuilt the suspension even fitting new brake pads.. the job was all finished before they woke up.. i told them that it was pointless even talking about money, because they had non. so i sent them on there way...
That was 18 years ago.. We see each other at a couple of shows a year (they still have the spitfire)..
i last saw them in early feb and was telling them all about the new car i was thinking of buying...
They came up to me towards the end of show and asked me for my address so they could send me an xmas card
2 days later an envelope arrived... inside was a long letter and a cheque for £500 ..
In the letter it told of how that time when they broke down was the pinnicle of a catalogue of bad luck they had been having. since those days they have had kids etc and are now in a position to pay back the dept.
They warned me that if the cheque arrives back at there house they wont be too happy.. J

[Alex Bridgeman]

James,

It's lovely that you have been able to post back here, and such an open and friendly post after something of a roasting that you received at our hands. Thank you for doing so.

Alex

[triumphstuff]

Thanks all for looking.. I have now sold the Quinta do noval for a price that suited both partys..
I will pop in from time to time to have a good read.. Thanks again. James

[triumphstuff]

Hi all.... remember me...

How my life moves.. It only seems a few weeks ago that i was selling my collection of port to buy a car...

I'm now selling the car to buy a derelict barn.. 08 plate,1 owner from new 19000 miles... Only kidding...

I would love to give you some tasting notes on port, but i have not drank any port for ages..

i was a big fan of taylors. There was also something about grahams that always left a warm feeling inside...

As a homage to you all, i will be opening a Taylors 66 up with friends at christmas.. that will leave me with about 9 mixed bottles..
They should last me another 20 years..

If the purchaser of my QDN 31 is reading... send me a PM, on how you got on...

Cheers and a fun christmas to you all... James