ThePortForum.com

Hi All,

I am planning to buy some 2007 VP's and am currently looking at the pricing in Holland which appears to be very expensive.
The Fonseca for example costs 472,50EUR for 6 bottles which to be fairly honest is too high for me.

Yet I do want them

So, therefore I am wondering what the price of a case of Fonseca would be locally in Portugal or if anyone on has some reasonably priced alternatives.

rgrds,
Dries

btw. If I would go to Portugal to buy the 2007 VP , I obviously would take the opportunity to visit some quinta's and get some more port.
So I'm really interested to know if there is a general price difference and if it would be worth to buy locally.

Hello,

I cannot answer your question directly but I can say that port in Portugal is more expensive than it is here in the United States. Why that is I do not know.

But to the premise of your question, I would say that you may not want to buy 2007 Vintage Ports, which you will have to stare at longingly for 20 or 30 years, when you can buy 1997s, 1994s, 1985s, or 1977s for roughly the same price, some of which are drinking beautifully right now. In my humble opinion, aged port is a bargain relative to other aged wines and even to young port.

Dries,

In my experience Portugal is one of the most expensive places you can find in the world to buy Port. Despite the strong Euro I think UK prices probably still represent the best value. As a direct comparison, a 6 pack of Fonseca 2007 can be purchased in the UK for £190 plus duty and tax, taking the full retail price to just under £230.

Derek

smisse wrote:Hi All,

I am planning to buy some 2007 VP's and am currently looking at the pricing in Holland which appears to be very expensive.
The Fonseca for example costs 472,50EUR for 6 bottles which to be fairly honest is too high for me.

Yet I do want them

So, therefore I am wondering what the price of a case of Fonseca would be locally in Portugal or if anyone on has some reasonably priced alternatives.

rgrds,
Dries

Hi Dries,

At Gommers Wijnimport, the Fonseca is € 390 a case (this is the best price I found in the Netherlands so far, even better than Ton Overmars where it's € 441).

I don't know the difference in price between Holland and Portugal myself, but I am ordering my 2007 VP in the UK, where prices are better than over here in the Netherlands. I am going to pick them up myself, because the shipping costs for my order are about thesame as the cost of a weekend to the UK (by car and ferry or tunnel), so I am combining one with the other.

It seems to be the case that wherever you go in the world, the most expensive place to buy a wine is the shop across the road from the vineyard..

The top ports are absurdly expensive in Portugal, but good standard tawnies, the everyday quaff of the Portuguese; seem quite reasonably priced.

I believe the cheapest place to buy Standard and Reserve ports is France, and for LBV, Crusted and Vintage, the UK.

The IVDP data suggests that France also gets cheap vintage, but I think that is due to a focus on lower quality VP's. It also suggests that White and Ruby ports may be inexpensive in the Netherlands, that France may be a good place to get aged Tawnies, and that Denmark may be the place to go shopping for Colheitas.

However, one should remember that the IVDP data does not take account of shipping or sales taxes, and it does seem to be the case that distributors and retailers in countries that have a low per capita consumption of port, expect higher margins.

Tom

Hi..... my experience is that the price is the same in Portugal compare with Denmark. Sometimes is cheaper to buy in Denmark

Hi all,

Thanks for the good advice. I have a work visit planned in the UK next month and will see if I can find some good deals there.
I do find it strange and unfortunate that the Portuguese prices are not lower. It would've been another good reason to visit Portugal.

rgrds,
Dries

Well, let me expand this topic a little as a thought came to me on the way home from a BBQ today.

Are there ports that are ONLY available in Portugal?

SushiNorth wrote:Are there ports that are ONLY available in Portugal?

I would think that is undoubtedly the case. There are a very large number of producers who simply do not have the scale, infrastructure or money to export their products. However, this may start to change because the big boys no longer buy wine from the little guys, they only want to buy the grapes. This means less of the little guys will be producing wine and therefore will be less likely to keep some back to sell as there own finished product.

It is absolutely correct that there are wines which are only available in Portugal and not elsewhere - but exactly which these are is difficult to know because different producers have different relationships with importers in different countries.

But I would also offer a counter-argument to the earlier ones on whether port is cheaper in Portugal than elsewhere. In my experience, it depends greatly.

If you visit some of the shops in Oporto you have seen mentioned here from time to time (such as, but not only, Vinologia) you will have a great opportunity to taste and buy ports from small or independant producers that you will not see very often outside Portugal. The prices are cheap / fair and the product you are getting is made only in very small volumes. On the other hand, if you go to the lodges with the big names, you will see prices which are designed to maintain stock levels and remunerate the shippers properly for any sales which they make from their ex-cellars stock - most of the big shippers do not want to sell out large volumes of the small numbers of bottles that they have left in the cellars in Vila Nova de Gaia and price their wines on offer accordingly.

Another opportunity is if you visit the vineyards. Again, the independant producers are often very happy to sell their wines to you at the cellar door for the same or a similar price to their trade price. I won't name any because I would not want to risk damaging any producer / buyer relationships, but you can always call ahead and enquire whether a producer will sell direct and what their ex-cellar price would be.

Let us know if you want some help in finding port shops in the UK when you visit. More importantly, tell us when you plan to visit and we will organise an off-line to honour your trip to the UK

I am travelling to Birmingham coming Wednesday evening and returning Thursday late afternoon.
Too short for an offline, but if you know a good shop not too far from Birmingham I might take the opportunity to buy some.

I've never bought from them, so can't make a recommendation, but Connolly's Wine Merchants is one of those shops I keep promising myself to visit. They are at Arch 13, 220 Livery Street, Birmingham B3 1EU.

AHB wrote:I've never bought from them, so can't make a recommendation, but Connolly's Wine Merchants is one of those shops I keep promising myself to visit. They are at Arch 13, 220 Livery Street, Birmingham B3 1EU.

Correct URL: Connolly's (Wine Merchants) Ltd.