How many of each wine do you buy?

[timnit]

So it finally happened!

After getting into wine a few years back and eagerly buying up everything I could - firstly just being a score whore, and now more aligned to what i like and cellar balance - I am at capacity! I have been buying a case of this and a case of that... I now have alot of wine. Well over 1000 bottles (cellartracker maintenance has been severely lacking)

So time to box up a fair bit and send it off to auction! But i do wonder , how much do you all keep of a single bottle? I have up to 4 cases of some wines!!

My annual consumption is about 50 bottles with the odd wine dinner where anything up to 10+ can go in a night !!! Although i have been solo drinking with a wife who hasnt had a sip in years due to 2 pregnancies and breast feeding..

Help me guys!!!

[rens]

I buy maximum four of any wine. I may go to Six if i think the wine is top notch and a good QPR. Minimum buy is generally two.
By my calculations, you have 20 years supply-just hope most aren't over the hill by the time you get to them.

[paulf]

That depends on a lot of factors.
I am certainly buying less 12 bottle lots these days. Where I do, I'm usually looking for something that has good QPR and I'm not afraid to open on a weeknight but still has the potential to age gracefully. These are usually my cellar defenders.
I buy 6 bottle cases a bit, but that is usually because I get them shipped straight to offsite storage, but I'd probably rather buy in 4 bottles or less. Where I am visiting a region, I am buying a few from a bunch of different places rather than a lot from one place.
I'll often split a 6 pack with a friend too when practical.

[tarija]

Limit is usually 3, or 4 if I want to try a bottle. Too many interests in my wine world to buy full cases of the same thing.

12 only if prices are fall off the back of the truck - I typically get "bored" after 6.

[shauno]

I get 6 if it's something I'd regularly drink (quaffers/etc), otherwise 4 or 3.

I'd bought too many full (12) cases early on & ended up with too many bottles I changed my mind on - ended up selling some excess to make space, as the OP is doing.

[Rossco]

3 to cellar/put down, then plus what i want to drink now.

I have 2 boxes (apart from the stuff in long term slumber). 1 is red drink now. The other is white drink now.
Anyone wishing to have wine, knows anything in those two boxes is 100% fine and go to for it.... no need to ask.

[felixp21]

I don't buy much these days, but when I do, it is six or twelve bottle lots. Only buy good stuff now, so I might spend the same per annum, but probably buy 1/5th the wine I used to.

[Ian S]

Hi Tim
Very rarely do I buy in case quantities of a single wine. The most ever was 23 bottles of a Barbaresco at auction (the price was stupidly cheap, only ~ half the lowball bid I put in). Happy to buy 6 packs of a wine I know and love, especially if not seen around that often

Mostly this is because I am a bit of a wine buying butterfly, a little or this, a little of that. I like variety. It's also down to (intentionally) limiting capacity quite a bit less than yourself. When buying and you only have space for a couple of dozen bottles, buying a whole dozen of a single wine never feels as exciting as a wider cross-section of wines.

For CT I find an annual / bi-annual 'audit' works on two levels:
1. Corrects the bottles missed when adding, or not taken out of CT when drunk. I figure it's up to 10% of each on every audit
2. It allows me to re-stack, burying the long term wines well out of reach, whilst bringing the older wines and early drinking wines up to the top

I tend to print out by location and then annotate the printout, but then I'm a luddite with a lot of technology if I don't think it works for me - they have a mobile version that many do use.

regards
Ian

[Mike Hawkins]

I generally by 6 or 12, but like Felix, buy less but better. That said, for certain Champagnes say 2008 Peters Chetillons, I bought 42 and would have bought more had they been available. I suspect this wine will be unaffordable in future.

I tend to avoid buying most wines in average vintages now. I look back at the 95 And 97s I bought from SA and kick myself for not doubling up on 96 and 98 instead.

[winetastic]

I generally cap out at 6 bottles, most commonly I buy in lots of 3 or 4.

Most importantly, if it is possible, buy a single bottle first to try for yourself.

[WAwineguy]

I used to buy 12 when building up my cellar - ignoring all the sage advice not to fill it up too quickly with wine you will eventually get tired of drinking. Then I realised they were all right, and I've had to resort to trying to drink all those 2010s and 2012s I bought that I shouldn't have. Tough job, but somebody's got to do it I suppose, and luckily they were both great vintages in SA and WA. I now only ever buy a maximum of 6 of a fairly standard annual release of wines, and lately have been buying only 3s. This allows you to build up a wide range of vintages of your favourite wines (I now have 10 vintages of some) without overstocking any one wine.

[JamieBahrain]

6 if special now leaning to 3 of everything else.

I also decided to dabble in wine investment, more out of interest in observed fallacies of wine investment strategies. Anyways, so in this case, I buy whatever amount suits only when an opportunity arises. For example, last year I bought a lot of Chave as an importer friend cleared his warehouse of Rhone.

[Ozzie W]

I think the answer to this question depends if you want a "deep" or a "wide" cellar. A deep cellar allows you to sample your wines periodically to see how they develop over time. A wide cellar allows you to have more variety. If your cellar is large enough, then you can do both, but since most of us have space limitations it's a decision one needs to make.

I went for the wide cellar option from the very beginning. I've got an average of 1.83 bottles of each individual wine and an average of 4.12 wines from each producer.

[WAwineguy]

I went for the wide cellar option from the very beginning. I've got an average of 1.83 bottles of each individual wine and an average of 4.12 wines from each producer.

Sounds like a good idea for a new thread!!

[mjs]

Still typically purchase in doz lots here

[mjs]

Still typically purchase new stuff in doz lots here. Of course, occasional auction purchases tend to be small numbers.

[Bobthebuilder]

2's and 3's mainly, quite few 1's however with stuff I haven't tried before and occasionally 6's whenever is atried and tested bottle that is good value
Only ever bought 12 once, when those Paolo Scavino Barolos flooded the market a year or two ago and you could get them under $30/bottle. Even the 6 off them were for someone else

[Polymer]

Too many things out there to try to really buy more than 2 or 3 of any given wine...

Even the stuff I really like, there is always another vintage..another vintage of the decade..another vintage of the century etc, etc.

That said...For certain regions that seem fairly underpriced, I could see going a bit longer on..mainly because I expect that prices will probably change significantly and I don't really see my palate changing too much from where it is at right now....but probably more likely than longer in a particular vintage is just longer in the region..getting back vintages, etc...

There is just too much fantastic stuff out there...so much more to try and some stuff I may never have the chance to try...

Outside of a few "BBQ" wines I'll bring for people that aren't into wine...I would like to get myself to a point where every single wine I have is one I'd be happy to share with fellow wine geeks....which is inline with what a few people have mentioned already - buy fewer but better..

[Matt@5453]

For wines that I intend to keep/cellar mostly 2 with the occasional 3.

[Brucer]

Min is 6, usual is a doz, then its 2 doz and if I really want a wine, its 3 doz.
I dont get bored, and dont understand that comment.
Beer drinkers drink the same stuff consistantly day in day out, or at least my beer drinking friends do.
3 doz wines, one drunk every 2 months, thats 6 a year, will last 6 years, and the wine changes as it ages.
If its a big keeper, its one every 4 months, and they last 12 years.
Wines that dont age well are sold at auction.

[Michael McNally]

3 to cellar/put down, then plus what i want to drink now.

I have 2 boxes (apart from the stuff in long term slumber). 1 is red drink now. The other is white drink now.
Anyone wishing to have wine, knows anything in those two boxes is 100% fine and go to for it.... no need to ask.

And how exactly do I access these two boxes Rossco?

Cheers

Michael

[Rossco]

3 to cellar/put down, then plus what i want to drink now.

I have 2 boxes (apart from the stuff in long term slumber). 1 is red drink now. The other is white drink now.
Anyone wishing to have wine, knows anything in those two boxes is 100% fine and go to for it.... no need to ask.

And how exactly do I access these two boxes Rossco?

Cheers

Michael

The question is how do you access the stuff NOT in those two boxes..... with the answer being to attend a Vic offline

[Ian S]

Min is 6, usual is a doz, then its 2 doz and if I really want a wine, its 3 doz.
I dont get bored, and dont understand that comment.
Beer drinkers drink the same stuff consistantly day in day out, or at least my beer drinking friends do.
3 doz wines, one drunk every 2 months, thats 6 a year, will last 6 years, and the wine changes as it ages.
If its a big keeper, its one every 4 months, and they last 12 years.
Wines that dont age well are sold at auction.

Sounds like you know what you like, and drink it relatively young. If you aren't bored, then all is good.

Looking at CT, of the 82 bottles we'd consumed this year (before the weekend), we'd drunk
1 wine 3 times
5 wines twice
69 wines we've drunk a single bottle of

Split across 11 countries and 29 grape varieties.

Different strokes for different folks

[Hacker]

I am guilty of over ordering. I am trying to moderate things now due to the realisation of my mistake, and dwindling storage options. Having said that I am still quite pleased with the majority of my over ordering 'mistakes'. Like I picked up 2 doz of the 2009 Pontet Canet and dozens+ of Woodlands Margaret of most years. Also am quite long Fourrier VV. All problems I am happy to have. Also I have 3 adult children and we share a fair bit of wine at family get togethers. Oh, and I am a newly minted grandfather, so the birth year of 2017 will stress my limited storage.

I am still guilty of overordering; reading the thread of the 2015 Wynns BL Cab is making me think I need another 6 pack. But I really don't need to do it. Good cop/bad cop.

[brodie]

Mostly buy in 3s and 4s. Too many wines from too many regions and too much I like to allow for much more than that. I used to buy 6s and 12s early on but have stopped buying cases of 12 a long time ago. 3s and 4s constitute 60% of my purchases.

[via collins]

Reckon I'll ditto Brodie at this point.

Guilty of 12s in the past - never again

Guilty of 6s in the past - would make a very rare exception

3s and 4s from trusted winemakers in good vintages - absolutely.

And singles and doubles as I push out into other regions, and other (ahem) price-points.

Cheers,

[Polymer]

Min is 6, usual is a doz, then its 2 doz and if I really want a wine, its 3 doz.
I dont get bored, and dont understand that comment.
Beer drinkers drink the same stuff consistantly day in day out, or at least my beer drinking friends do.
3 doz wines, one drunk every 2 months, thats 6 a year, will last 6 years, and the wine changes as it ages.
If its a big keeper, its one every 4 months, and they last 12 years.
Wines that dont age well are sold at auction.

You don't understand that comment because what you like fits into a more narrow scope..nothing wrong with that.

But to put what you said into a different perspective with multiple vintages..

4 vintages of the same wine means you're drinking the same wine (different vintage) once very 2 weeks..and that's from one producer...more vintages from the same producer means more often than that...

That's just ONE producer from a region you enjoy. You might like 10 different producers from a single region..4 vintages of that means you're drinking a wine from the same region almost everyday...from a set of 10 different producers...only...

And that's 10 producers ONE wine. If you like 2 wines from each producer (On average) you're looking at more than 1 bottle per day from the same region....only....If they're all keepers you're still nearly at 1 per day....So if you want more producers, more vintages (which you would if they were big keepers), more wines from a single producer, etc, etc....

If you like wines from a single region or general area...and that's what you like..go for it..nothing wrong with that.
If you like wines from different regions..different grapes, etc, etc...then it starts becoming really difficult to see how you're going to go through it..and the reality is, you don't. People all the time have more wine than they'll drink and buy more than they drink...they have a stash they'll never get through unless they stop right now for the next X number of years..

With your beer comment..If you think of it like a can of coke, people drink that everyday..they get exactly what they want..everyday...and some people are happy with that. I know plenty of beer drinkers that don't drink that way because they're trying different craft beers from all over the world and just trying a lot of different things..and while I don't think they drink as wide as many wine drinkers do, beer is also more like a can of coke than wine...

I will say, I personally don't quite know how people get into wine and drink the same type of wine all the time...it just gets incredibly boring after awhile...and that's not why I like wine...But I do accept that plenty of people DO drink wine like that..and they'd be perfectly happy drinking nearly the same type of wine every single day....I think those people are selling themselves short on what there is to know about wine, regions, the history, the people, the food, etc...but what you like is what you like....and it'd be boring if we were all the same..

[felixp21]

I am pretty much the same as Hacker. If I really like a wine, I usually can't get enough of it, and always wish I had more.
Been thru 2 dozen 2009 Branaire Ducru and 2 dozen 2012 Mortet Gevrey villages over the past two years, and am looking to source more of each!! Both fantastic everyday drinking, inexpensive, and never, ever boring!!
Of course., as I mentioned above, these days it is infrequent purchases of 6 and 12 bottle lots.

If I was just starting into wine, Polymer's strategy of smaller lots is an excellent idea.

[Redav]

Most of our purchases are singles with the occasional follow up a few weeks later. At this point we're primarily interested in three wineries where we get two or three of the wines we're interested in keeping plus a few to taste now but I want to move to six when it's affordable and proper storage isn't a problem. Our anniversary wines are half singles and half triples. The only other one is a cheap red quaffer that we buy a case of for the year. We'll drink two thirds of it over the warmer months and a few more over the year.

[paulf]

Beer drinkers drink the same stuff consistantly day in day out, or at least my beer drinking friends do.

There are a lot of people that just drink the same beer constantly, but there are a lot that don't too. I tend to chase different flavours in beer even more than I do in wine and would have had many many more beers than different wines, particularly over the past few years.