Will the 2022 vintage offer good value for money in Bordeaux as En Primeur?

head of En Primeur week in Bordeaux, the quality of the 2022 vintage had already prompted interest among many visitors. “Wine enthusiasts and industry members across-the-board are more mindful of the quality of the vintage than the classification”, claims Gwendeline Lucas, managing director of Vignobles Clément Fayat. As she points out, the vintage came with many trials and tribulations, with “challenging weather conditions (frost, hail, high temperatures…) that produced quality wines. It was not simple, particularly knowing when to harvest. In the 2022 wines, there’s the warmth of the 2016s and 2018s with the freshness of the 2019s. But it is not like the 2003s”.

“On paper, the vintage was challenging, with extreme weather conditions. It’s a great surprise. We have it all – balance, freshness…” confirms Mathieu Cuvelier who helms Clos Fourtet, the Saint-Emilion Premier Grand Cru Classé B. 2022 ticks all the boxes, including a great image ahead of En Primeur week. “Customers and negociants made a purpose of coming to taste the wines. We will be seeing the return of some markets that had been absent since Covid”, predicts Cuvelier. Concurrently with this, traders on the Place de Bordeaux were calling for restraint in terms of pricing policies: “Every year at the same time, we have the same narrative from the negociants – times are hard, exchange rates are not in our favour etc. It is the negociants’ role to rein in the enthusiasm of the properties. You have to know how to listen and shoulder your responsibilities”.

For Wine Lister, “when setting the price for the 2022 vintage, which has already received praise, Bordeaux producers should take into consideration the fact that the price is still a decisive factor for customers buying En Primeur”.