For The Love Of Port

Last week I brokered a deal between buyer and seller, for the first known sale of a 1931 Quinta do Noval Nacional since the sale at Christie's Auction house back in 2006.

The buyer paid a net price of $10,000 USD and the bottle had been purchased on release and held in his cellar until December 1984. I knew the 2nd buyer who had 10 bottles of this back in the day. This was his very last bottle and he was the only other person to cellar this one until it was consumed on Monday night.

The last time a Nacional was sold, it was broadcast widely in all wine media circles on both sides of the pond. I considered using a PR friend of mine to promote this big time, but finally decided that deserved to be the place where this was first announced.

Wow! That's quite a port and quite a price. So rare... I hope it showed well!

Previous bottle was not far off that price, back in 2006. Both of our 1931 Nacional bottlings (different sources) were in the same neighborhood. One of them was stunning. The other ... not so much.

Roy Hersh wrote:The last time a 2006 Nacional sold

Derek T. wrote:

Roy Hersh wrote:The last time a 2006 Nacional sold

I think Roy was too excited to type coherently. Or maybe it wasn't the excitement, but the Port itself

Eric Menchen wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

Roy Hersh wrote:The last time a 2006 Nacional sold

I think Roy was too excited to type coherently. Or maybe it wasn't the excitement, but the Port itself

Or perhaps caused by the reason that the bottle is now empty.

Yeah the corked one.

Roy Hersh wrote:Yeah the corked one.

Hey, do you try the plastic wrap trick on that one?

Believe it or not ... yes, and it failed miserably.

A double Nebuchadnezzar (30L) of Taylor '63 was offered by Christies in London on Dec 13th last year (lot 190)

I thought it had sold, as I recall the bidding going above it's low estimate of £6,000; but it is missing from Christies sales results listings, so maybe it didn't - although it hasn't been re-offered since.

Had it sold for £6,000, the buyers premium would have brought the total to £7080. Multiplied by the exchange rate at the time, this computes to $11,400.

Question is - was it sold, and if so, to who??

Tom Archer wrote:A double Nebuchadnezzar (30L) of Taylor '63 was offered by Christies in London on Dec 13th last year (lot 190)

I thought it had sold, as I recall the bidding going above it's low estimate of £6,000; but it is missing from Christies sales results listings, so maybe it didn't - although it hasn't been re-offered since.

Had it sold for £6,000, the buyers premium would have brought the total to £7080. Multiplied by the exchange rate at the time, this computes to $11,400.

Question is - was it sold, and if so, to who??

And of course the follow up questions as well of, can we come when it gets opened? I mean there's more than 3 cases of wine in that one bottle, plenty to go around. And of course, who should bring the forklift to move/pour the thing!

It would be fun to watch someone try to remove that cork!


I can find no information about that bottle being sold, but hope that someone can.

Anyway, the 1931 Quinta do Noval Nacional will remain at least for now, the most expensive 750 ml bottle of Port ever sold.

Have emailed Christies..

Christies tell me that the bottle sold for £8,625 including buyers premium, which equates to $13,900 at the time of the sale.

The bottle was bought by a South American wine merchant.

- Sorry Roy!

Tom Archer wrote:Christies tell me that the bottle sold for £8,625 including buyers premium, which equates to $13,900 at the time of the sale.

Eh, that's hardly an apples to apples comparison.

1 actual bottle vs a "bottle" that's really 3+ cases of wine in a hand-crafted container that just happens to be made of glass and shaped sort of like a giant version of a bottle.

It may be a blo*dy big bottle, but it's still a bottle..

Glenn E. wrote:

Tom Archer wrote:Christies tell me that the bottle sold for £8,625 including buyers premium, which equates to $13,900 at the time of the sale.

Eh, that's hardly an apples to apples comparison.

1 actual bottle vs a "bottle" that's really 3+ cases of wine in a hand-crafted container that just happens to be made of glass and shaped sort of like a giant version of a bottle.

More like an apple to apple tree comparison!

Tom Archer wrote:It may be a blo*dy big bottle, but it's still a bottle..

That's like saying that Le Lignon in Vernier, Switzerland, is a home. While technically correct, it's beside the point.

How cool would that be to open. Talk about a lot of friends to help drink over a couple days

Roy Hersh wrote:Anyway, the 1931 Quinta do Noval Nacional will remain at least for now, the most expensive 750 ml bottle of Port ever sold.

It does irritate me that I still read new material - Mayson's latest book is an example - where lazy writers don't undertake diligent research and simply requote the mantra that "...the most expensive bottle of port ever sold was a Quinta do Noval Nacional 1931 sold by a restaurant in the Carribean for $5,900..." in the late '80s.

The Christies sale in 2006 superceded that with a bottle of NN31 selling for just over $7,700 at today's exchange rates.

And now in 2013 we have seen a bottle of NN31 sell for $10,000.

Incidentally, the most expensive case of port that I have ever seen reported was $38,400 (including buyer's premium) for Nacional 1963 at Christies in Hong Kong in November 2012. If anyone has seen a case of port sell for more, please tell me.