Bordeaux 2016: best ever Armailhac out

Fifth growth Château d’Armailhac has released but does the claim it’s possibly the estate’s ‘best ever’ offering justify its slight price increase?

From the stable of Mouton Rothschild, Armailhac released this morning at €32.40 a bottle ex-négociant, a slight increase of 12.5% on the 2015 price of €28.80.

With the exchange rate the price a case is being offered at in London – £390 – is 17.7% above the 2015 price.

On the other hand, the 2016 has a better score than the 2015 and in fact the only vintage dating back to 2005 with a similar score is the 2010, which is available for just over £400 a case – 11.4% more expensive than the new 2016 wine.

Neal Martin, whose scores for the vintage were released last week, rated Armailhac 2016 92-94 and said it was “one of the best” wines from the estate he’d ever tasted and “not a million miles away” in style from Grand-Puy-Lacoste.

It’s one of the first ‘big’ name châteaux to release so far this campaign with an increase on the price of its 2015s ex-château and négoce.

For an estate that has clearly excelled in this vintage relative to its track record however and given the wine costs around £30 a bottle and generally follows a ‘traditional’ pricing pattern of older stock appreciating as stock becomes scarcer, it is unlikely there will be too many quibbles from either merchants or collectors with regards the small increase.

Liv-ex’s analysis of the release suggests that, possibly, the 2008 which is the same price and has more time in bottle – but has an inferior score of 89 from The Wine Advocate might offer a tempting buy for some.

Also out today are two labels much-beloved of ‘drinking claret’, Labégorce from Margaux and Capbern from Saint-Estèphe. The former is being offer for around £20 a bottle in-bond, £240 for a dozen and it has a 94-96 point spread from Martin while the latter garnered 90-92 points.