Beyond Classification: Château Quintus, Wine Passion, and Reimagining Saint-Émilion’s Legacy: Nils Vaincot

0:00 We should go back to the basics and just remember to everyone that wine is all about pleasure. Just opening a bottle with the good people at the good moment. We don't care about the price. We don't care about the classification, the label, or how prestigious it is. It's just a simple product crafted by humans. Sit back and grab a glass. It's Wine Talks with Paul Kaye. Hey, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Kaye, and we are in studio today in beautiful Southern California, about to have a conversation with Niels van Gogh. Actually, a surprise guest. Just heard he was in town last week, and so we were able to schedule this morning's podcast. He is the national sales manager for Château Quintas, Quintas, right? And Saint-Émilion. Welcome to the show. Thank you.

0:48 Good to have you here. What a pleasure to be here. Yeah. Yeah, well, you're in this fancy studio, you know. That's good, that's good. Yeah. I can ask you a question. Tomorrow morning at 6 o'clock, I go to the gym. That's my day. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. You obviously go to the gym. A little bit. You know, I'm spending a lot of time at the restaurant. Well, yeah, that's harder. That's what I was going to ask you. Like, how do you do it? And then in America, anywhere you go, there's a gym, right? They're everywhere. And most hotels have a gym. But in France, that's not the case. Yeah, you're right. That's why I love spending time here in the US. All the hotels have the best gym compared to France. Yeah, it's much different. It's a good, it's a good break, particularly when you're traveling. Yeah. Just to, you know, separate, just to turn off the brain. Yeah. Yeah.

1:35 So what's, what's this trip about? You're here for 2 weeks. What are we doing? Yeah, I'm here for 2 weeks. In fact, the main purpose of my, my trip here today, is being the official partner of the Oscar ceremony. I mean, Quintus have been highlighted yesterday night at the Academy Awards, which have been— That's crazy. Such a beautiful thing for— So for the listeners in Oscar, what'd you say? Oscar? Oscar ceremony. Oscar ceremony. French accent, Oscars, right? But was that your first one? Yeah, it was the first time actually, but that was for us in the group in general, the fourth time in a row. So what does Château Quintas have to do with it? I mean, Prince Robert of Luxembourg is the actual owner and chairman of the company. And each year we try to change the wineries we highlight so that we can benefit of, yeah, beautiful. So you were a sponsor? Did they pour the wines at the Oscars or at one of the parties? All the parties linked to the Oscars ceremony have been poured some Quintas wine this year. That's amazing. Beautiful. And did you go to the parties? I've been there. Yeah, of course. It was not so bad, actually. I mean, that was quite amazing for us because I'm Armenian by nationality. I heard a lot of people here are Armenian. Yes. I've been to Mission. You know about Mission Wine and Spirits? I have coffee with them most Tuesdays. Great. All right. I was in Glendale. I've been to Sherman Oaks as well. I heard they got a shop as well in Pasadena. Yeah, right.

3:03 I'm going to visit them tomorrow. The Sinners movie that won the Academy Award, or a few, won 4 awards, I think. Last night. Yeah, absolutely. Michael B. Jordan has been awarded for that. Yeah. The producer is an Armenian guy. So we were very excited for him. His name is Sebohanyan, that he won. So we're excited for him. But so tell me, you know, when Duclos, the negotiant in Los Angeles, called and said you were in town, you only came for the Oscars. Is that primarily? Yeah, primarily. But as you may know, the Oscars ceremony is hosting several different events. Before the ceremony. But then I took the opportunity to visit some accounts, just say hi to some clients, doing some tasting, staff training as well, masterclass.

3:53 So yeah, I'm in town just to highlight Quintus, share the passion, drink some wine, open some bottles. I mean, it's a rough life. Yeah, not so bad. I mean, I think you must be passionate to do this life. You have to be fascinated with wine, for one. It's a product. You know, I have these conversations. We'll talk about it right now. That is so unique. And you don't know how unique it is until, for instance, you go to a place like Wine Paris and you see 6,000 vendors. It's crazy. And you see all that passion there that's going around. Tell me about what's happening with Chef Quintas with this environment in the wine world. I have my opinions of it.

4:36 Generally Bordeaux is complaining about the wine sales. How is the château doing? Or does it affect a level of quality like Quintas doesn't even matter? Oh, not really. Actually, I mean, to talk about château Quintus, it could be interesting to just go back on how it has been created, first of all, because Quintus is quite new in the wine industry because it has been created, totally created in 2011. That's very young. Yeah, which was the very first vintage. In fact, Château Quintus belongs to Domaine Clarence Dillon Company, which owns and supports Château Haut-Brion, Château La Mission Haut-Brion. And you received, I think, a few years ago, maybe 2 years ago, Guillaume-Alexandre Marx, which is the sales director of the company. That's right. Yeah. Happy to be there. Now it's my turn. So, yeah, Château Quintus belongs to Domaine Clarence Dillon, owning Aubrion, La Mission Aubrion, and now Château Quintus. Quintus has been created by the idea of Prince Robert of Luxembourg, by acquiring not one, not two, but three different estates, three different Grand Cru Classé located in the village of Saint-Émilion, with just outstanding terroirs. And the goal was to create a patchwork of these beautiful terroirs, made a fusion of them to create Château Quintus. So Quintus is the purest expression of Saint-Émilion wine. Crafted by Aubryon Hands.

5:56 That's a pretty interesting thing for the listeners, you know, the Saint-Émilion being on the Right Bank and then Château Aubryon and Miecin-Aubryon on the Left Bank. Château Aubryon, of course, being a classified first growth, 1855. Yeah, that's fairly pedigreed, you know, uh, history there. And then you take that technology to the Right Bank where I don't know what the mix, the cépage here is, but it's Merlot and Cabernet Franc, I'm guessing. Of course, um, Quintus is absolutely not the Aubryon of the Right Bank or the little brother from Haut-Brion. Quintessa have its own singularity. It have, of course, a different blend than the one we can find on the Left Bank. And first of all, because of the terroir. As you may know, Left Bank in Bordeaux is mainly driven by the gravels. Gravels means more Cabernet Sauvignon. On the Right Bank of Bordeaux, you've got much more limestone and clay. It means you're going to find more Merlot, but also some Cabernet Franc this time. Not Sauvignon. So yeah, Quintus is a perfect blend of a dominant of Merlot, which drives the wine, but also some delicious Cabernet Franc growing on the top of what we call Le Plateau, the highest part of Saint-Émilion, where the soils are 100% limestone and gives to the wines the beautiful freshness, good minerality, a good tension. And even if the Cabernet Franc is not the major grape variety in the blend, It drives the Grand Vin from Saint-Émilion. It's so interesting.

7:24 So you're up by the Chevaux Blancs side or the La Gaffelière side? We are exactly located at the top southwest of the plateau from Saint-Émilion. So if you've been to Saint-Émilion or Bordeaux in general, you know that Bordeaux is quite a very flat area. And once you come to Saint-Émilion, you see kind of big hill. Big hill, come on. I mean, we are not the Rhône Valley. Big hill for us is around 62 to 75 meters. But that's a hill for us. It's a kind of— we call it Le Plateau. It's a limestone rock, the Moselle rock on it. And on this limestone plateau, you can find the top 10, 12 of the best châteaux from Saint-Émilion. So the neighboring estate of Château Quintus, or directly Château Bel Air Monange, Château Ausone, Château Angelus.

8:15 We've got Château Canon as well. We've got Beauséjour-Bécaud in front of us. Uh, yeah, we've got some— when you walked into the studio here, there were 3 bottles of Aussonne that someone just ordered for me recently. Yes. Crazy. But you know, for the listeners, I just wanted to say that when you do visit Bordeaux, it's a very large swath of land. Left Bank is very long and takes a few hours actually to go from one side to the other, a couple hours. But if you were to, if you were to say what, what village would, would be in your mind? If you think of Bordeaux and it's Saint-Émilion in my mind. Like if I was to picture as an American what Bordeaux might be, I would envision Saint-Émilion. The quaint town, the cobblestone roads, the quaint village around whence wine is grown. Whereas on the Left Bank, you got a long road and you've got all these little villages in between.

9:10 Yeah, you're right. There is the Route de Château on the Left Bank, and you can cross all the beautiful and most famous appellations, starting from the city center of Bordeaux, then crossing Margaux. After that, you got Saint-Julien. After that, you got Pauillac, and you finish by Saint-Estèphe. It takes a full day. Yeah, it takes an hour and a half to go to the top. Exactly. So, yes, Saint-Émilion and the Right Bank is much different. Saint-Émilion, of course, is, first of all, classified UNESCO place in the world, which benefits, of course, of beautiful highlights. The village, a small medieval village, is just beautiful. Downtown, I mean, the center of the village is just crazy beautiful to see. But Saint-Émilion is so small, and I'm sure you've been there and you know that there are so many producers, so many on a very small place. So each 50 or 100 meters, you've got a new producer. So this could be probably a bit difficult to understand as a foreign consumer. But yeah, the classification is also here for that. But we just talked a little bit previously, just before to start the podcast, talking about this. Nowadays, the classification, I'm not going to say it means nothing, but some of the main and most famous estates have left the classification. Quintus actually is a Saint-Émilion Grand Cru, and I have to be honest with you, We don't really care about the classification today. Now, the classification also integrates some

10:43 specificities that are not directly linked with the quality of the wine. And we have to not forget that wine is about passion first, creating something from the berries, creating something from the land, and adapting our methods to the global warming coming. I mean, classification don't mean a lot actually for us. And I think that some of, or if it's not a lot of estates in Saint-Émilion, I understand that. So now some people left. It's interesting. It's an interesting thought. Let's kind of pound on that a little bit. The classification of Bordeaux, 1855, Napoleon III, we talked about Eugénie having participated in that. You know, it was really sort of a marketing thing in the first place. It was a commerce-driven exposition that Napoleon wanted to put on. He told the négociants to rate the wines. Absolutely. And what's interesting to me about the classification of 1855, it wasn't about the ground. It was about the château. Yeah. And in Saint-Émilion or the— on the Right Bank, the original classification dealt with the ground.

11:56 So what's the quality of the ground? Yeah. Correct. So then, but then you fast forward the wine business a little bit and, you know, Napa Valley has this, you know, you go up there, you get a hotel, you tour, you go on the buses, you do all the stuff. And you didn't really do that in Bordeaux. No, true. Before. No, we started now. We started, we are a bit late, but of course California is far, far behind us. Yeah. Well, now California's suffering greatly because of the, the cost of doing that. I can tell you now that tasting room traffic is down 30 or 40% because it's too expensive to go there. You, you, if you go there as a couple, you know, it's $4,000 or $5,000 weekend just, just to show up, you know, to drive, even if you drove it 6 hours. But the point I'm making is the classification of the right bank, which I think started as an idea to sort of support the idea of classifications, 1855, everybody, everybody pointed to that classification. The right bank didn't have it. They did it in 1955 in the Graves region. They have their own.

12:58 But then it looks, it sounds like recently, and this is why Cheval Blanc left and Angelus left, probably others, is it became a commercial classification. A bit, yes. I think now, I mean, nowadays there are too many classifications. You got the ones from Saint-Émilion, the Grand Cru, the Grand Cru Classé A, B, then you got the first growth classified 1855, then you got the Cru Bourgeois. Uh, the Cru Bourgeaux Exceptionnel. Yeah, so it just gets too much. But then there's, there's also though, there's always been discussion in America to do something like that in Napa. In fact, um, you know, if you go up the road, like just as you go from Pouillac to Saint-Julien, you know, keep going up, the same thing happens in the Napa Valley. You go from Oak Knoll and you keep going up and up and Oakville, then you end up in Rutherford and you keep going up. And they're talking about maybe cutting those in half, or they've discussed it, and making Separate this to us.

13:54 And maybe the consumer doesn't care. I think so. I mean, we should go back to the basics and just remember to everyone that wine is all about pleasure. Just opening a bottle with the good people at the good moment. We don't care about the price. We don't care about the classification, the label, or how prestigious it is, or the last rate it have been rated. I mean, it just— A simple project crafted by humans. And yeah, do you think the rating system has defeated itself? In other words, do you think that it has run its course and it's less important, or is it still sort of a viable retail? We still have some markets that are interested about the classification and that where the classification helps, but probably less than it used to be. Yeah, I think so. And when I was selling wine a lot, they used to ask in particularly the early days of my, my father's business and my business, there weren't any classification, there were no ratings anyway. And then they came out, you know, when Parker started doing the big Napa cabs and things, a lot of the vendors would come and say, do you want to know the ratings? And I would say no. I give it my own rating. Yeah. Shouldn't every consumer just give it their own rating? And I think you're right. Yeah. I mean, you're going to trust the palate of someone else, but wine is very subjective. You're going to like something, I'm going to dislike it. And, you know, it is very personal. It is.

15:27 It's very interesting because I sell a lot of, um, my, my, my extenuating clients that stuck with me after I sold the company. They've all settled on the regulars, right? So Austin Hope, which is a big giant Paso Robles Cabernet, um, they— I sell a lot of it because they just remember it and they, they associate themselves with the bottle. And I think that's what it's about. Tell me about Quintas. It's only 14 years old. How has the market received it? 15 years old. Has the market received the idea of of the wine and the personality of the wine. Quintus, as it's linked to Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon, benefited from beautiful highlight worldwide, which is a pretty good thing. Then, as I said it previously, Quintus is the baby of Aubryon, the Aubryon from the right bank. So it have to fight amongst the best one. And for that, I got a good anecdote for you because As Prince Robert and the teams are totally convinced, as I am, of the quality of Château Quintus, we all decided in 2022 to do a big blind tasting that has been made in Oswald's Private Club in London.

16:48 And this blind tasting used to put in opposition Château Quintus against probably the big monsters of Saint-Émilion, like Château Figeac, Château Pavie, Château Ausone, Château Angelus, and Cheval Blanc. And this blind tasting was a contest from 2011 vintage to 2018, to have a global opinion and a very objective wine. So, you know what? Only 4 wines— So we asked the people during this blind tasting to rate the wines on 100 points. And you know what? Only 4 wines had the perfect score of 100 on 100, and 3 of them were Château Quintus wines, '15, '16, and '18.

17:36 Wow. That's pretty impressive. Yeah. In a blind tasting with educated palates. Absolutely. People knew what they were doing. Yeah. It was among the people tasting the wines were some outstanding journalists, famous wine buyers from all over the world, critics. Yeah. So that's pretty interesting. Good samples. Yeah. Do you think people in this group, for instance, very educated palates, they understand the complexities, they understand structure. And so sometimes I used to find when I had ratings come in here just by wines that they were, they were on my level, excellent, but not necessarily the fan favorite because, you know, let's say, let's face it, the American palate, for instance, likes a little are residual sugar in there, the little opulence that they used to. But if you take 3 of the 4 top marks from educated palates, you're talking about some serious structure and some serious fruit balance, acid balance, and just crafting nice wines. You're right.

18:42 Quintess is all of that. I think is— I mean, Quintess is a kind of modern wine. That have all the heritage from the Left Bank, from Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon. But what I like with Quintus is that we don't have to— we don't must respect all the tradition and authenticity from the past like we must do on Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon. As Château Quintus story is quite new in the wine industry, we can permit us to be a bit more modern in the way we communicate, in the way we shape the bottle. Look at this. Here is the bottle of Château Quintus. Oh yeah, it's a little squarish. Don't really look like a typical Bordeaux wine. As you can see, the shoulders are larger, even the bottle is quite heavy. And you've got heavy glass.

19:23 Got it. This is a 5-pound bottle right here. Got an anecdote on the shape of this bottle. You know what? The oldest bottle of Château Haut-Brion ever found was found by a diver. Really? Deep under the Indian Ocean. In a ship that sank. And then this guy came up at the surface with a bottle with no label, no cork, no wine inside. But on the top, we could read Château Haut-Brion. So we bought this bottle on the auction, and then we probably stored it at the château for a few years. And then once the project Château Quintus was born, Prince Robert of Luxembourg has the great idea to shape the bottle of Château Quintus exactly the same as this oldest bottle of Château Aubryon ever found. That's amazing story. What a great story.

20:11 And so that bottle on display at Château Aubryon? Now, yes. Yes. Yeah. And you're probably the first to know it. We're going to open, in fact, a new hospitality department which has just been created like a few weeks ago. So now people can visit Château Aubryon. We're going to build for them some crazy experiences around wine history and all the past and things we store at Château Aubryon. Because maybe you know it, but Prince Robert is a big fan of history, mythology as well. And he used to buy many things linked to his Château Aubryon, but not only. So, I mean, I can't spoil everything. Yeah, right. I hope you can come and visit us. Well, we're going to be coming for sure. It's interesting because it wasn't that long ago that we were on the Left Bank. And just for fun, because I knew better, we started to walk up the road starting in Poulillac just to see what if we could get in anywhere.

21:12 Yeah. And you couldn't. I remember we knocked on the door, you know, fermé, that kind of thing. Now Bordeaux is opening more and more its doors. I think the châteaux have understood that hospitality is very important as well. We are facing a challenging context. Well, let's put it this way. On the sales. So hospitality is going to be part now of the sales strategy. Let's put it this way, and I think this is really important. The success of my father's company early on, which lasted, you know, the value of what we did lasted probably through 2010, 2012. And I just wrote a little article this morning on the subject. When they started bringing in this 50-cent-a-liter stuff from Europe and putting it in a bottle and making it look nice. And then the consumer wasn't fooled eventually.

22:04 But the point of that club originally was the experience of this guy selecting wines for you, having tasted everything that was available new that month and finding the best values. And there was a relationship between my father and myself later in the years between the client and the vendor. And in fact, I shook the hands of almost every customer I ever got because I was at a booth somewhere. And I always believed that the success of the company was because we had a relationship. And Napa does that. Not as successful today because it's not as busy, but I believe the wine business needs to go that direction because— That's a very interesting point. Because I totally agree with you, and mostly for Bordeaux that I represent, the estates have to rebuild relationships with their consumers.

23:06 We've been too far from them for years. Bordeaux has seen some beautiful years in the past, but nowadays it's going to be more and more challenging for everyone, for many reasons: context, prices, for many different reasons. But yeah, the key point I think will be to create some new links with our consumers and to build again some relationship of trust between us and them. It's very slow. I mean, here you're doing a masterclass. Maybe there's 12 people in it, 15, 20 people. Yeah, 12 to 20. Yeah. And then that person— it's kind of an interesting thing. It's really social networking before social networking, you know.

23:50 Today's social networking, one tells 10, tells 10, tells 10, tells 10, you've told 100,000 people, which is the premise of social networking. Well, it's the same thing as a masterclass. If you tell 20 people about Château Quintas and they go back to the restaurant or the store and somebody walks in and they see this cool bottle. They left as ambassador. Yeah. Of course. And then that person then has to tell someone. If they don't buy directly, they will talk to their friends, to their family. Yeah, this is how you build the brand as well. That's part of the job. That's not the only thing to do, but this is part of it. Yeah. And I firmly believe, because what's in the bottle is what's telling the story, and that has to obviously be very good, or at least be associated to the people to tell the story. But one great example, in my opinion, is Château Bailly, the way they've handled their visitor center, The way they've changed the fermentation room. It's beautiful. I've been lucky to visit it. Yeah. And so when I open a bottle of Aubayet at home and my friends that were on this trip the last time we were there, their brain goes back to that day. And that could happen anywhere, anytime with any wine, right? That memory is made. Yeah.

25:02 That's why we decided also to open a nice, I mean, a very high-end hospitality center in Château Aubryon. We're getting curious now to see what this is going to be about. You're going to come? Yeah, you need to come and visit. Yeah, so you should open the doors, um, maybe next year for the season. Yeah, so you were at Wine Paris. We were there. Uh, I wasn't feeling very good, but you know, it's an incredible show. It's— I guess it's fast becoming one of the great wine shows of the world. Yeah, I hadn't been to one like that since 1993. We went to Vinexpo in Bordeaux. Yeah, previously was Vinexpo, exactly. But it's a different group, right? I think so. Yeah, it was Vinexpo. Yeah. So when you're there, what are you doing as a job? What's the relationship you're building? When I'm on the booth, you mean? Yes. There are two things. First of all, creating link with the B2B. So with our negotiant, you know, but the way to distribute the wine is a bit unusual compared to the other part of the world. We, the château, sell wines to the wine merchant, then the wine merchant sell it on the national network or by the importers all over the world. And then these importers are going to share it with the cavists, with the restaurants, the hotels, things like that. So we're quite far from the last consumer.

26:23 So being able to meet them directly in Wine Paris, first of all, you earn maybe 6 months of appointments because everyone's there. Yeah, right. That's true. It's not so bad for everyone, I think. So first of all, We meet the professionals, the négociants, our first clients. And then we have the opportunity to meet also the clients from our négociants, the sommeliers. First of all, we can see the importers as well. So yeah, it's a beautiful place where everyone's meeting, sharing its passion for wine, doing the business, and making, I mean, things go ahead. It seems to me, and I wrote this up after I left. Let me see if I can articulate this properly, because it is like the consumer having that moment at a restaurant where the sommelier explains a wine or that they had visited, and when they taste that wine again, their memory gets triggered. It's the same thing at a show like that at a different level. But I came away saying, I don't care how much AI how much social networking, how much content you're creating on the fly.

27:33 Nothing replaces that handshake. You're right. That you made at the booth. Wine Paris as well is also kind of speed dating. So you have to be ready for that because people have generally a long journey in front of them. So yeah, you have to be precise, quick, and yeah, it's hard work. Oh, I mean, you're saying the same. No, it's not really hard work. I would say it's It's very exciting to be there, I would say. Were you pouring in the Bordeaux booth where you could taste? Yeah, absolutely. I didn't see— We were located— In fact, we had two booths, one for our wine merchant company, Clarence Dillon Wines, and another one where I was located on the second floor with the Champagne region on the PFV, Primum Familiae Vini booth, the group we are part of. Yeah, I was telling one of my collector clients, I said, he goes, I want to go next year. I said, it's really from a consumer standpoint, it would be overwhelming.

28:34 But man, when he walked into that one Bordeaux booth where all the left, mostly Left Bank, that's why I asked the question. Everybody was there and you could taste whatever you wanted. I mean, if it was Haut-Brion or Château Bailly or Lafitte or Mouton, it was all there. It was like a candy store. Yeah. You know, and I have to tell you, in LA, the people that vend these now, so I wanna just for the listeners point out that the négociant methodology has been around Bordeaux since its inception as a wine merchant, meaning many, many vendors in Los Angeles carry the wines of Bordeaux, France, and they can all carry the same stuff. Lafitte is carried by many people. Aubriands is carried by many people. It's an open market. Absolutely.

29:17 Yeah. And compared to a Napa wine where once you sign on with a distributor, They're usually exclusive and that's the end of it. So it's kind of interesting deal that's different. Yeah, that's what I said previously. Bordeaux way to distribute the wine is an open market. Yeah, it's really interesting. If you're a sommelier, for example, you can have, I don't know, 20 négociants coming to you selling you the same wines. So the way when I choose, when somebody asks me for some Haut-Brion, for instance, and I choose the vendor for them, I tend to explain to the client that I want to make sure that we're getting authentic wines. And so it needs to be the most direct route from the winery to their cellar. Yeah. And that we know we can protect the provenance that it came from, uh, Obriano, Quintas, to the négociant, to their cellar. And that's the most important feature. This used to be a big problem, the fake bottles. But nowadays with the technology, we have some specific things that I can tell, of course, on the label, on the bottle, on the glass, to make sure and to identify the bottle once you get it. You know, you're in the neighborhood of Rudy. You know Rudy Kirwan, the guy, the famous profiteer from fake wines? Of course. He was right here. You're literally 2 miles away from it. Come on.

30:36 And they found his house here, and the windows were covered with foil. And they found his recipes. Have you ever hosted him? No, but my friend had dinner with him in Singapore. He's back in Singapore or something. Anyway, it's not why we're here. Let's talk about this. So it's interesting to me that you can— well, I can understand the backing of a Château Haut-Brion, Mission Haut-Brion, you know, going to the Right Bank, starting a winery. But it still takes time. I mean, you still have to find your footing, find out what you want to represent, find out what that terroir is gonna be. Are we still in the early stages of what this wine's gonna be? Oh, in my opinion, starting from 2015, Quintus is something absolutely serious. The wine is just outstanding. On the very first vintages, the wine have been really well produced by the teams, but I can tell Starting from 2015, wow, that's something else. On the nose alone. It's a great vintage anyway. Yeah, beautiful. '16 as well. I took a bottle of '16 with me, so if you want just to share a glass, I'd be delighted to. Yes, I would love to taste it.

31:50 What was your personal track to get this? Were you in the wine trade before this job? What were you doing? Yeah, I grew up in the vines in the Médoc on my father's side. Some of my family were involved in the wine industry, so I grew up in the vine. And then, I mean, from a year to another, I finally decided to make that job. So I started my journey in the wine industry at the fantastic Château de Reignac, maybe you heard about this one? Oh, yeah, of course. Owned by the Vattelot family, and their son Quentin lives there in Los Angeles. Anyway, so I started there as an apprenticeship for a year and a half, something like that. Then I switched to Chanel Group. Some people know that Chanel owns Château Rosan-Séglaire, Château Canon, Château Berliquet as well, and most recently, Domaine de l'Île in Porquerolles, small Iceland in south of France. Anyway, I was working 4 years with them, not with the estate, but for their one merchant company. The name is Ulysse Cazabonne. It's a négociant.

32:52 Then I moved to Dourt Group, an iconic Iconic Group in Bordeaux, owning 8 estates in total. 4 years as well, and more recently joining 2 years ago Domaine Clavin-Syllan as sales manager for Château Quintus. Wow, congratulations. That's a pretty fast track to do all that. Driven by passion. By passion. Let's talk about that for a second. I had Monsieur Clouet on the show. I was at Château Cheval Blanc and Got to sit with him and have lunch in the vineyard, which was amazing. But I also had a gentleman named Zaya Unan here sitting where you're sitting, an Iranian immigrant to America, amazing gentleman, brilliant engineer who wanted to get into the luxury brands of the world. Okay. So he has his own Cuban cigar line. He has his own scotch line. And he bought, and I thought this was very interesting, he went right to Saint-Émilion. Now he has Château Zaya.

33:54 I heard about it. That's why, I mean, I heard more recently because I didn't really know about that estate, but all the wine shop and liquor shop I visited during my trip here, I seen this label. It's a golden one. Golden black. Yeah, I've seen it. Okay, that's so interesting. I'll tell you why. I never tasted this estate. Well, it's new to America and it's distributed by a very young, small group of importer and distributor. Okay. But here, but here's two things. One, I thought it was fascinating that he wants to build a luxury brand of everything like LVMH or Chanel. I see. So that's his goal. Now, he's, he's very wealthy. He's made a lot of money in engineering. And so the first thing he did on the wine side was go to Sant'Emilion. And I forgot how many hectares he has. Quite a bit. Okay. Three different properties.

34:44 And then cigars and all that kind of stuff. But his point to me was, because of my background, his background, he created jet engines, you know, for General Electric, stuff like this, was all I had to do is pick up the phone and call anybody I want and say, you're going to get my wines. And when you tell me you saw them here, I didn't. I've never seen them on the shelf. But Shadow Quintus? No. Oh, sorry. Zaya. Château Zaya. So that's why that was the question. Like, how did you— you have heard of it, which is pretty fascinating. But anyway, the point I'm making is that Mission Wine Shop, where again? Yeah, he would go to Mission for sure. Remedy, probably somewhere else as well. I don't remember.

35:24 Maybe at Wallis. So why do you think the Chanels and the LVMHs of the world, are they still pursuing wineries and Because I heard that some are selling off because that sector is just not that profitable anymore, as profitable as it was. Or is it part of the bigger picture of a luxury brand to have a château like this? Yeah, probably. I mean, I'm not in their strategy, but I mean, it's also an investment buying an estate, developing it. And once you get money to help your salesperson, your team on the ground, on the field, to produce the best wine as they can.

36:07 Most of the time it works. Wine is just all about time as well. We have to be patient. Quintus, for example, Quintus have been born in 2011. That's fascinating. So new in the wine industry. So we have to, we must have a very long-term vision. We're just a step in this wine industry. So I probably going to be there for, I don't know, the next 30 years in the wine industry, 40 years maybe. But then, I mean, the château, still here, you know. So the story continues. We must have a long-term vision. So I think that for this big and main group like Chanel, you said, or I don't know, LVMH, they have this long-term vision. They have this long-term vision. You know, there's no other— I think of this all the time— there's no other product that's the reverse of what consumerism is. If you ask Oddany Global, that group out of the Rhône who's working on, you know, helping wineries meet the demands of the modern consumer.

37:13 But wine is to be a representation of its time and its place always, right? And so you don't look at the market and say, oh, they want sweeter, they want drier, they want this and this. You can, you can make some small adjustments, but your job is still to, and so the consumer has to react to the product rather than the product reacting to the consumer, in my opinion, of an honest wine. There's a whole segment of the market that doesn't do that. Unfortunately, they don't listen to the market. Good. Yeah, we do. We try to— I mean, being first of all on the market here on the field, on the ground, doing the masterclass or meeting some sommeliers all over the world help us also to understand the needs of each market. Sometimes from Asia to Europe or from Europe to US, can be very different. So we have to adapt ourselves, but then we don't have to forget where we're from. We don't have to forget what we want to create as well. So, you know, wine is also— it's a philosophy, but it's also all about creating emotion.

38:17 And when you create emotion, it's also the feeling of the winemaker most of the time. So this is what we try to do in general. For our 3 estates. And for that, but I'm sure Guillaume must have told you this a few years ago, but in Château Aubryon, we have the fabulous family Delmas, actually represented by Jean-Philippe Delmas, which are among them since a very long time. They were here, I mean, the grandfather of Jean-Philippe was in Château Aubryon before Clarence Dillon came to purchase the estate in 1935. '75. So that's been a while. Yeah. Interesting. 100 years. Yeah. That's amazing.

39:01 The emotion part is the most important. I think it's a critical term. Yeah. And you've done this a long time. I've done this a long time. And there are some wines that you just put to your nose and you go, oh my gosh, this is extraordinary emotional. And I think the novice wine drinker understands that, doesn't know how to express it. But we'll get that sensation and go, wait a minute, there's something very powerful here. So, but here's the challenge I see. You must like football or soccer. Sure. Right? Baseball's probably not part of your regular. Yeah, yeah. Totally. It doesn't matter whether it's football, American football, baseball, or lacrosse.

39:47 If I go to the local stadium in Saint-Émilion and I watch a game, a match, and there's how many? 50,000? I'm not sure. With all due respect, I'm not sure you're going to enjoy your time. And you know what? Southwest of France is more driven by the rugby. Okay, well, okay, let's call it rugby then. Yeah, the sporty bit of The sport really is, is kind of insignificant. The reason I bring it up is like, okay, Dodger Stadium here can hold, I think, 55,000 people. Yeah. Well, those 55,000 people, all of them got in their car, drove, put up with the parking problem, walked to their seat and sit in the sun for 9 innings, 3 hours to watch a baseball game. And every one of them has a different perspective on that game. Some don't even care. Some go for the hot dogs. You're right.

40:42 Some go and analyze every single play and every single player and every single pitch. So how— this is sort of a rhetorical question, but how do we get all the people in the stadium? Yeah, good question. Right. With a different opinion. I don't know how you do it. No, I think we don't have to be snob with the wine, of course. People know a lot, some sommeliers, some passionate people, but wine is also just a drink to share at the beginning and to give emotion, as we said, to give pleasure to people, to do wine and food pairing as well. So if people just enjoy the wine by itself, it's fine. Just take it down to that level. That's it. Open that bottle up and just let people enjoy it. Take a seat. I feel like a glass right now. As soon as we're done with this, you're going to open it. Yeah. But you said something important just then about the knowledgeable somms, etc.

41:44 I went to lunch the other day with Lorenzo Pasquini. All right. Of Château d'Yquem. Yeah. And he was in town recently. Yeah, right. And there was a gentleman across the way. And I won't name any names and I won't bring his picture out, but I thought to myself, he's the exact reason why people are intimidated. A little older than me, but one of those guys that just will bore you to death. I think you have to adapt yourself to the people you are talking to. I mean, I used to work at the beginning of my career in hospitality, so I used to do the visit, the tours and everything. And from a group to another, you can have passionate people that know much more than you. And the next group, I mean, on the afternoon, could be just like tourists just coming to visit and enjoying the place with the children on the back. So you have to adapt yourself. And the more simple you are with people, the more easy it will be to them to understand your wine.

42:46 So yeah, I think one is— So you have to live this sort of difference every time it happens. I mean, that you, you are in a room and you never know what level you're going to speak to. That's sometimes the more challenging during the masterclass. That's why I'd like to start by asking people where they're from. Oh, that's a good idea. What are the different knowledge of everyone so that I'm not going to be boring for them or I'm not going to give, I don't know, too many specific and technical explanation. Find out who you're talking to, right? Yeah, I'm going to just— I want them to have a good time to understand for sure. Let me get a couple of glasses. So this is— what's the cépage? What's the blend of this? Typical from the Right Bank. As I said, it's— Right Bank is mainly driven by clay and limestone. And this is what we have in Château Quintus. Quintus, in fact— oh, I'm going to try to explain it as best because some people are going to watch us, but some people are just going to hear me. That's true. Château Quintus is located on a promontory at the top southwest of Saint-Émilion. So it means that the château is located on the top of the hill and it creates a kind of pyramid where the two expositions belong to Château Quintus, which is a pretty good thing for us compared to the other estates. Both on the northern area and the southern area, which is very nice because nowadays with the global warming, You know that we are facing some crazy challenging vintages. 2022 has been

44:18 so hot, 2024 much more rainy. So it permits the team of Château Quintus to adapt themselves and to pick sometimes a bit more of the northern part to get the freshness, the minerality, the tension on a very hot and warm vintage. And on the other hand, for the rainy vintage, picking sometimes a bit more of the southern part to get some alcohol degree, to get some, I could say, powerful and more full-bodied part in the blend. So Quintus blends, the Grand Vins, and especially the 2016 is 70% Merlot and 30% Cabernet Franc. It aged for 12 months in oak barrels with around 35 to 39% of new oak. And here it is, 10 years old. Wow. Well, let's see what you got.

45:03 That sounds very enticing or delicious. I love that noise. Yeah. Wow. Quintus '16. This is '16? Yeah. Look at the color, how deep it is. Well, the complexity in the nose is amazing, but it's still showing a lot of youth from that. That's a wine which is perfectly drinkable now, but which— The color is beautiful. That you can keep in the cellar for a few more years. Yeah. The Grand Vin especially, I picked with me 2 bottles, but decided to open the Grand Vin. The Grand Vin Specialized wine, which is dedicated for gastronomy, in my opinion, that's a wine we need to pair with something.

45:47 You know, the acid in the Cabernet Franc is perfect at the end. I'm fond of that. Yeah. With some beef. The acidity shows pretty well here. Sure. Thanks for bringing that up. Cheers. Thanks for hosting me. Pleasure to meet you. That's fascinating. Well, it satisfied my desire for a glass of wine, that's for sure. You know, it's funny, I have collectors and, you know, it's not too many Burgundy collectors, but mostly Bordeaux collectors. And that's why that you show that there's Costes-Estournel out there, there's Aussonne out there ready for pickup. And there's something about the Bordeaux side of the world that just creates this enthusiasm. And maybe it's the emotion, maybe that's what it is. Absolutely. I think so. I think we also need to tell the people that once they travel to France, they should come and say hi to us. Come and visit. They don't have to be shy or whatever. They can just knock at the door, book an appointment, and make a tour with us. I mean, that's the only way to really understand the product, the philosophy of the winemakers, but also the philosophy of the Domaine Clavenzillon in general. That's a good point, and we'll wrap up with this. We're already out of time after I ask you this question. But, you know, tourism, you know, wine tourism is on the rise.

47:09 Yeah. And it goes back to that experiential idea that we were talking about where people need to have this experience. But all over the world, it's on the rise. There are groups in Armenia where MyHeritage is putting together wine tours. And it seems to me that that— like when I travel, of course, I'm in the industry, but my friends that travel with me expect to go visit a winery. Yeah. It's just, and they'll do whatever it takes. We were in Bari in, in the, in the Puglia and I rented a van. It was like an hour and 25 minute drive to get this little tiny winery with this little room and, and taste wine with the winemaker. And they were, they loved it. 3 hours worth of driving just to taste the expression of this area.

47:54 And I think that's an important part of what's going to be happening here. Yeah, I think it's part of Bordeaux mood. I mean, there are so many things to do in Bordeaux, of course, and around. We are very close to the Atlantic Sea, the Atlantic Ocean, which is, by the way, beautiful. We've got the land area with the beautiful forest. You've got the Bassin d'Arcachon. But of course, you can't come and stop in Bordeaux without visiting an estate, without visiting a château. We are lucky to have some beautiful estates where the wines are such outstanding and beautiful. But we're also lucky because mostly Château Haut-Brion and La Mission Haut-Brion are located very close to the city center now. In the past, it used to be in the countryside. Now, as Bordeaux has grown and grown, now the estates are surrounded by the city. Okay, here we go.

48:47 Now I'm going to remind you that nobody— going to be tricky for me. I'm going to give you 3 questions. I'm going to try my best. I'm going to give you 3 answers. And so far, basically, and I can only do this with French folks because all the wines are French. Do someone French. He's a French doctor. Yeah. But anyway, mathematically, you have a 33% chance of getting it right. 33%, all right. And that's basically what happens. Come on, you never know. I'm ready, let's go. Okay, so this is a list of human ailments. In this case, we're going to pick nervous depression. Nervous depression. Can you imagine that?

49:33 Nervous depression with wine, and wine's going to fix it. So there's not only a wine that goes with it— I'll give you the 3 choices— there's a dosage, like a doctor would give you a prescription. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so you could either have a Medoc red, a glass of champagne, or Côte de Beaune. Which one of those would help you with nervous depression and why? Really, the question is why? Nervous depression? I'll say champagne. Champagne is a party wine. Ah, there you go. See, that's a good reason. Yeah, I think so. But it's the wrong answer. Come on. It's the midriff? It's the midriff, yeah. Here's what it said. Because the glycerin it contains combines in the intestine with the phosphates of the fermented grape juice— you didn't know this, did you?— to form glycerol phosphates of natural lime, which have tonic virtues and which do not interfere with the functional integrity of the nervous system. Did you know this? I'm not sure it helps. I heard about that. And the dosage is 1 or 2 glasses before and during meals So consider that a bottle a day, basically 2 glasses, 3 meals. Well, not so bad. Good portion. Of course you're going to feel better. Of course. Yeah. You're not going to have nervous depression. I mean, Niels, it's such an honor to have you here. And so wish you luck on the rest of your trip and that we accomplish the things that we're trying to do here with alerting the public to wines like this. A gorgeous

51:04 Quintus. Quintus. Quintus. Quintus. Yeah. Why do I say it that? Quintus. Quintus. There is another anecdote about Quintus. As we purchased 3 different estates to create Château Quintus, they used to have previous names. It was difficult to do a mix of these names, so we decided to rename the estate for Quintus. A long time ago, the Gallo-Romans that used to create the village of Saint-Émilion, they also used to name their 5th 5th child, Quintus. And 4th in the group— Must be Latin for 4th. Yeah, 4th in the group, in the range of wine, we've got Château Aubryon red, Château Aubryon white, La Mission Aubryon red, white, and the 5th child, Quintus. So it gives a tribute, first of all, to this gallo-roman. So as a sommelier, if you want to show up the bottle and just explain to your consumers, you come, you explain the story, and then they know where they put their foot. You're in the village of Saint-Émilion, because of the Carole Roman story, but it's also directly linked to the two big producers from the Left Bank, Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon. Wow, that is a really fun story. And then the other bottle you brought was the second label. The other bottle I took with me is the Dragon of Quintus, which is the second label, actually.

52:12 Such an outstanding wine, and in my opinion, probably one of the best value Fumonis you can find in Bordeaux. And it's younger vines, barrel select. How do you define it? It's a different brand altogether. Younger vines, not only. In fact, as I told you, as Quintus is located on the kind of promontory, we have a kind of Burgundy way to produce the wine. As you know, in Burgundy, in the valley, you got the Chablis villages, and then the more you go to the top, the more you got the beautiful wines. So it's quite the same for Quintus, not because we want to copy the Burgundy wines, absolutely not, but because of the topology of the soil. The more you go to the top of this hill, the more you have the mozzarrock limestone, where you can have some beautiful expression of the Cabernet Franc on it. So it means that on the lower area, we have a third wine, which is the Saint-Émilion Quintus. Anyway, that's an exclusivity of distribution. On the slopes, we produce the Dragon de Quintus, and on the top, you've got the Grand Vin. Okay, so it's a separate brand with a separate mission and a separate purpose. Yeah, absolutely. It's not only two different prices, it's also 2 different moments to taste them.

53:21 I took with me the 2020, which is perfectly drinkable now. 2020 Château Quintus is a bit young in my opinion. So it's also different ways to open the wine, different ways to enjoy them. Dragon is more like the easy one. You got people, friends coming last minute at home. Don't know what to open, just pop up the bottle and that's beautiful. And you look French and you got a château and you got a Bordeaux, it's cool. Again, pleasure to have you here. And I'm going to bring some in and I'm going to recommend this to my collector clients that would round out their collection and provide wines. They're very peculiar about what they pour their guests. And they could be proud to pour this. All right. Thank you for hosting me. It was a pleasure to meet you. Pleasure to share the passion of the wine, Bordeaux, but also talk bit about Château Quintus here. And once again, if people want to come and meet us at the château anytime they come and stop in France, that's an open invitation. Come on.

54:24 Cheers. Cheers.