ThePortForum.com

Good afternoon. We have an unopened boxed case of Dows 1977 port, which we’d like to sell. Is it better to sell through an auction house, or a vintner? We’re outskirts of London, but up in Herefordshire frequently too. Thanks for your advice!

The choice between AH or vintner has a number of factors: at AH, the buyer collects or arranges delivery, so that may be simpler for selling to a non-local vintner, depending whether a local vintner will offer you a decent price; however if a local vintner will offer a good price that will almost always be better since they do not have the additional auction house margins to pay as buyer, and neither do you as seller. Since you're London based, and there are a number of good vintners around the area, I would enquire from a few; I expect that will likely be your best route, unless you get any good direct offers from here.

How long you have had the port, and how it has been kept will also be very important in what you might expect to achieve. Also, just in case you're not aware, Dow '77 is an odd case, because it has a high incidence of TCA (actual occurrence % not known, but perhaps 30% and affected bottles are very poor) which will depress the price somewhat, but when not affected it a glorious port which helps keep the price up.

My husband bought 2 cases from his livery company when they were selling off stock about 15 years ago. One case we are enjoying each Christmas- which is just fabulous- and this one we’d like to sell. Since he bought it, it has been in his parents’ cellar. Prior to that, I suppose it was in bond with the rest of the company’s stock.
I shall make some phone calls tomorrow to a number of vintners to enquire. Thank you for you advice and time!

Any news on this, I'm interested.