For The Love Of Port

Sainsbury's have just started the annual crazy season and have reduced the 2001 Malvedos from £27 to £20 and then 25% discount if you buy 6. That's £15 per bottle.

UK readers - buy all you can!

USA & Others - apologies for the annual torture

Derek T. wrote:Sainsbury's have just started the annual crazy season and have reduced the 2001 Malvedos from £27 to £20 and then 25% discount if you buy 6. That's £15 per bottle.

UK readers - buy all you can!

USA & Others - apologies for the annual torture

I'm going on a rant here, so bear with me. I love a good deal, but I am sick of these type of deals. They make me not want to buy Port anymore here in the states, or at all for that matter. If you want to sell your product to a company that will blow it out for dirt cheap go ahead, but don't expect the rest of the world to buy that same product for 2 or 3 times as much. It does nothing but cheapen the image of Port and turn people off from buying at normal pricing.

I agree with you in principle, Andy, but there are commercial realities at work here that perhaps do not apply in the US due to the different dynamics of the supply chain.

The big supermarkets are by far that largest outlets for the principle shippers and they sell vast quantities of their standard and (non-VP/Colhieta) premium Ports through that route. The effect of that is that the supermarkets are able to wield enormous power when it comes to looking for a Christmas VP that lots of their customers will buy one bottle of. I would imaging that the conversation between the supermarket buyer and the shipper's marketing exec goes along the lines of "Give us a VP that we can punt out at £15-£20 per bottle at Christmas and your LBV, Ruby Reserve, aged tawnies can stay on the shelf for the next year and we will commission you to fill our BOBs." "Checkmate."

As for me, I and the few like me who swoop on these deals cannot influence the outcome whether we buy at this price or not and it would seem silly not to.

I'm quite versed in the behind the scenes dynamics of your big stores. That still doesn't mean something needs to change.
And trust me, I'd take full advantage of those deals too. I am a consumer after all. But that doesn't make them right in how they go about it.

The upshot is that you can perhaps get someone to try a bottle out (since so cheap) and be pleasantly surprised, turning that someone into a "regular".

I remember buying my 1st bottle of decent port v cheaply (Taylors LBV - remember it was discounted) at such a supermarket in the UK back in 2001/02 and finding myself v surprised by how good it was.

I understand Andy's anger, and at the same time recognize there are different price dynamics and ploys going on everywhere, with electronics pretty cheap in the U.S. compared to most of the western world. And the U.K. Port at this time is our turkey in a few weeks, when grocery stores will sell the 10+ lb birds for <$10, maybe even $5 just to get you in for the rest of your Thanksgiving shopping.

Eric Menchen wrote:And the U.K. Port at this time is our turkey in a few weeks, when grocery stores will sell the 10+ lb birds for <$10, maybe even $5 just to get you in for the rest of your Thanksgiving shopping.

I finally understand what it is I am to be thankful for!

Andy Velebil wrote:I'm going on a rant here, so bear with me. I love a good deal, but I am sick of these type of deals. They make me not want to buy Port anymore here in the states, or at all for that matter. If you want to sell your product to a company that will blow it out for dirt cheap go ahead, but don't expect the rest of the world to buy that same product for 2 or 3 times as much. It does nothing but cheapen the image of Port and turn people off from buying at normal pricing.

I think the damage is less than you might imagine. The shelf headline is £27 (normal price - more than I would be willing to pay for Malvedos 2001) down to £20 (what I would see as a fair price for a nice port). I don't see a £20 price tag falling into the "dirt cheap" category.

The rest of the discount comes from the fact that the supermarkets regular ambush each other with these "buy 6 get 25% off" deals and they see huge swings in alchol sales if they time their ambush right. It's only sad port lovers like us who interpret that to mean "buy all (the port) you can". Most people - my wife included - would buy a variety of wine along the lines of a couple of bottles of sparkling wine, a red and three whites. She might then think about me and add a bottle of Malvedos 2001 since this is part of the range included in the offer.

Understand Alex,
But now days with the internet and everyone who's into wine watching prices on a global scale. I see this and go, why would I buy something that is 50% or more cheaper elsewhere? My question is has the Port fallen off the wagon and the producer is trying to get rid of it? Or, great I've bought two cases of this last year at $60 bottle and now it's worth $20 bottle. My investment just tanked and why would I buy this product again? I don't see this being an issue with lower quality Ports, but with VP or SQVP I see it as a problem.

I know this is a big headache for the producers to deal with, as they are stuck between the proverbial "rock and a hard place." But something has to start being done to prevent the upper end stuff from being so drastically discounted like this at the retail level.

In the UK with only two tiers, it is very easy to achieve lower pricing and there is less restrictive regulations moving Port to the UK than the USA. Importers here also pay a significant uptick for the additional shipping fees which are small to the UK due to its proximity, but even more so, the quantity of bulk consolidation that takes place on ships heading that short distance vs. across the pond.

Roy Hersh wrote:Importers here also pay a significant uptick for the additional shipping fees which are small to the UK due to its proximity, but even more so, the quantity of bulk consolidation that takes place on ships heading that short distance vs. across the pond.

I would be very surprised if any Port still comes to the UK by ship.

Even trans-shipped through ports in Scandinavia?

Derek T. wrote:I would be very surprised if any Port still comes to the UK by ship.

Chunnel?