Should I buy wine in Bordeaux?

[SethG]

I will be in the Dordogne region for a week in May with my wife and baby girl (world events notwithstanding), and we plan to spend one night in St. Emilion. Although we plan to drink plenty of wine while we're there, our trip is really designed more for relaxation in the countryside than for touring wine estates. I don't want to pass through Bordeaux and miss the wine buying opportunity of a lifetime, however, if such an opportunity is there.

A few years ago we went to Tuscany and found that with a few wine touring guidebooks we could buy excellent wine-- from cheap table wines to relatively expensive Brunellos-- for less than half of what we would pay for such wines in the U.S. And we had a great time tasting the wines in local wine shops; all of the local sellers seemed eager to invite outsiders in to sample what they had and explore the wine in depth before it was bought.

I get the impression that the Bordeaux region is not like this. And so I ask you experts (since we are very far from experts)-- is it worth buying wine in Bordeaux? Will we see lower prices there than we would see in the U.S.? If so, are the bargains big enough that it's worth buying a bunch and shipping it home? Are there welcoming places to sample and purchase wines outside of the individual producers themselves? (And please name some of these places.) Or now that I've been doing some reading on the various wines of the region, should I just look for the best bargains on the web here at home?

[marcus]

The distribution system in France is such that you will likely spend more for Bordeaux in Bordeaux at retail than you will in the US. There is a very famous shop in Bordeaux that has everything, unfortunately I forget the name. I would suggest that you go on the web and make a list of the US prices for 10-20 top growth wines from great years and then do a comparison, in order to calibrate.

[Beachfan]

Bring a newsletter from the Wine Club, Wine Exchange, K&L or some other discount supplier. Then you'll be able to check while you are there.

[ctgm]

Generally speaking - no

I think that the shop that was mentioned was L'Intendant. It has a nice circular staircase with bins of wine all the way up the stairs. When I lived in Bordeaux it was my favourite shop as I loved the design.

It is possible to buy some cheap champagne there at the other end of the Cours de L'Intendant from the wine shop (name escapes me at the moment).

You can sometimes find some real bargains. You want to heck out Leclerc supermarkets and in particular the one in Leognan (which when I lived there 10 years ago was selling 1899 Lafite and 1906 Latour). They occasionaly have Foires aux Vins and some of the prices are good.

I also remember going to a warehouse in the middle of the Medoc were there was a big wine sale with some great prices. I remember picking up a case of Phelan Segur 1990 for about $5 a bottle. However I think that the days of the very good prices may be long gone, but keeop an eye out for these sales.