Cheval Blanc 2021 was released en primeur this morning (19 May) at €390 per bottle ex-Bordeaux, up by around 3% on the 202o-vintage opening price last year.
Liv-ex said the new release was still cheaper on the market than the well-regarded vintage trio of 2018, 2019 and 2020. UK merchants offered the 2021 wine at £4,740 (12x75cl in bond), it said.
It marks another relatively early release for Cheval Blanc, with this year’s Bordeaux en primeur campaign just getting started.
Cheval Blanc 2021 was rated 96 points by Decanter’s Georgina Hindle, positioning it as one of the success stories from a challenging and heterogeneous Bordeaux 2021 vintage.
‘A fantastic effort from the team and winemaker Pierre-Olivier Clouet,’ Hindle wrote in her in-depth tasting note on Cheval Blanc 2021.
‘An obvious buy’
Analyst group Wine Lister said, ‘Although prices need to be down on 2020 [en primeur releases] as a general rule, Cheval Blanc is one of the few wines that can get away with a small rise thanks to market performance.’
With a recommended onward selling price of £395 per bottle (in bond), ‘the 2021 is an obvious buy’, Wine Lister said.
It said the release price was around 28% lower than current prices for the top vintages of 2019, 2018, 2016 and 2015.
David Roberts MW, buying director at Goedhuis & Co, told Decanter, ‘In terms of quality and style Cheval Blanc is one of the great Right Bank successes of the vintage and the property is a Goedhuis favourite.’
In the context of back-vintage prices – and with 2020 more expensive than on release – he said 2021 represented ‘an extremely attractive offer’.
Cheval Blanc’s second wine, Petit Cheval, was released at €132 per bottle ex-Bordeaux.
Pavie 2021 released
Yesterday also saw the launch of Château Pavie 2021, meaning two of the Premier Grand Cru Classé A estates from St-Emilion’s 2012 Classification have now released their wines.
Château Pavie was released by UK merchants at £2,784 (12x75cl in bond), Liv-ex said. Pavie’s ex-Bordeaux release price was €234 per bottle, down 2.5% on the 2020-vintage release.
Roberts at Goedhuis said, ‘We were hugely impressed by the quality of the 2021 Pavie, arguably our favourite from the Château for a number of years. We have a select but loyal following for Pavie, and this year’s price reduction has been positively received.’
This price dip is in-line with general projections for the Bordeaux 2021 en primeur campaign in a Liv-ex survey published this month.
