2009-10 Bordeaux price disparities

Despite the acclaim both vintages have received, the 2009s and 2010s from certain estate can vary widely in price.

The 2009 and 2010 vintages in Bordeaux are often touted as two of the best the region has produced in recent years.

Many châteaux received exactly the same (high) scores for the wines they produced in both years from critics such as Robert Parker.

When one examines the prices therefore, it can be surprising to see how wide the disparity between prices can be – with either the 2009 or 2010 wine from an estate apparently being the more favoured.

Liv-ex has compiled a list of those wines in the two vintages that currently have exactly the same Parker points (not always as received at the time, Montrose 2010 was ‘promoted’ to 100-points after a re-tasting in 2014).

There are wines where the price gap is either negligible or outright non-existent. Pontet-Canet is the absolute dead centre, its 2009 and 2010 wines currently commanding exactly the same price (£1,680 per dozen). Either side of it, the 2010 vintages of Margaux and Haut Brion are very slightly more expensive than the 2009s, whereas it is the opposite for Vieux Château Certan and Pavie.

From there the differences can mount sharply. The most extreme at either end are for Conseillante and La Fleur Pétrus.

The former, scored 96 in ’09 and ’10, has a 2010 vintage 11.1% more expensive than its 2009. The latter, rated 97, has a 2009 vintage 14.3% more expensive than its 2010.

Other notable gaps in favour of the 2010 vintage include: Ausone (a 9.1% gap), Latour (6.8%) and Grand-Puy-Lacoste (6.6%), while for the 2009 vintage there are the wines of Gazin (12.5%) and Montrose (8.9%).

The case of Montrose was examined back in 2015, soon after the elevation of the 2010 to a full 100-points by Parker.

Although the gap between the two wines (a few hundred pounds per case) is quite large, it is substantially smaller than the 38% price gap that used to exist previously when the 2010 was a lowly 99-point wine.