Bryant Family + Cult Wine and the Cost of Shipping

[andrawes76]

A family member of mine just bought an allocation of Bryant Family with three other friends, simply to be able to enjoy DB4, Bryant Family and Bettina Red. I recently came across the receipt and found something that bothered me AND more importantly bothered him more. To start off, he's a successful surgeon and he can afford to buy wines in the $100+ category.

Here is what was all bought and had shipped:

9 each of the Bettina Proprietary Red 2009 (released originally at $250/bottle, but increased to $299 when Parker gave it big scores).

6 bottles of the DB 4 2009 released at $95/bottle

9 bottles of the 2009 Bryant Family Cabernet Sauvignon @ $335/bottle

Freight (Shipped 2-Day!!!) was $398.00 for 24 bottles, or $16.58/bottle. Just to break this down, it costs (with styro, box, shipping via UPS with signature, maximum about $90-@120) per case to ship wine across the US via 2-Day Shipping (coast to coast). This includes adult signature ($2.00-$3.00 per package and 5-7% in insurance). Therefore the winery is profiting about $80-100 per case in freight alone.

Now I understand that wineries have to make money, but making 100% on shipping is absolutely absurd, especially when they are clearly making good money on wine. How much does it cost to make a "cult" wine or a wine of Grand Cru Classe status? Well, it is expensive. Consider the following: the French Oak barrel alone is 1800 euro, bottle $1.50/premier glass, $1.00 cork, $.50 capsule (all branded, grade A+) it can cost up to $20-35/bottle to produce excellent wine (grand cru classe) and have killer winemaker consulting in the process. Bear in mind this is single vineyard or estate fruit, not cuvee (sourced fruit from multiple vineyards).

Now Foodie, a winemaker and winery owner in his own right can confirm or adjust my guess estimated numbers, but a winery who is selling a wine for $150+ bottle on release is clearly able to produce wine from the best grapes in any wine region, acquire a premier winemaker consultant and package the wine in some sweet looking solution. At any number over $50/bottle, they should be in the gravy train. At $150/bottle, we'd estimate that they are making at least $50/bottle profit and at $250, they are making $150/bottle profit. So my question is this... yeah making good wine is not easy. Its an achievement, but is it worth making your customers feel stupid with their money to "tax" them on their love for good wine? Shouldn't they be working to keep their members on the list and not in the business of fixing attrition?

More and more people are dropping the cult wine phenomenon, not because of the wines aren't good, but because at some point in time, you realize that there are other esoteric brands, other wineries that produce good value and great wines...

Thoughts and comments?