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

It is crazy interesting to me that a winery as young as Quintus, in such an established and historical area as Saint Emilion, can make such waves when virtually in it's infancy as a winery. Michel Roland (we just lost him), the famed oenologist once told a friend of mine that now that it is established she can grow wine grapes at her vineyard, it will take 100 years to know what it really can do.
Enter the Chateau Quintus, a winery in the famed Right Bank Bordeaux appelation; Saint Emilion. The fertile ground where Chateau Cheval Blanc, Chateau Angelus and Petrus call home, is now the birthplace of the upstart Chateau Quintus. Up start only in the sense that it is a youngin' having only been established in 2011. To have been able to create such concentrated, complex wine in such a short time would have been unheard of in the earlier days of Bordeaux; meaning, how could this happen? It has taken dozens of years for other Chateau to learn of their own pedigree...hear the story here.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/ghXyTJCZe0M
#wine #Bordeaux #SaintÉmilion #ChâteauQuintus #PaulKalemkiarian #NilsVaincot #winetasting #terroir #GrandCru #wineclassification #RightBank #LeftBank #Merlot #CabernetFranc #Oscars #winetourism #hospitality #blindtasting #DomaineClarenceDillon #wineemotion #masterclass
00:00:00,032 --> 00:00:03,676
We should go back to the basics and just remember to
2
00:00:03,949 --> 00:00:07,707
everyone that wine is all about pleasure. Just opening a bottle with the good
3
00:00:07,739 --> 00:00:10,950
people at the good moment. We don't care about the price. We don't care about
4
00:00:10,950 --> 00:00:14,483
the classification, the label, or how prestigious it is. It's
5
00:00:14,483 --> 00:00:18,031
just a simple product crafted by humans.
6
00:00:18,738 --> 00:00:21,997
Sit back and grab a glass. It's Wine
7
00:00:22,029 --> 00:00:23,795
Talks with Paul Kaye.
8
00:00:26,187 --> 00:00:29,377
Hey, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Kaye, and we are in studio today in
9
00:00:29,409 --> 00:00:33,240
beautiful Southern California, about to have a conversation with Niels van
10
00:00:33,337 --> 00:00:37,104
Gogh. Actually, a surprise guest. Just heard he was in town last week,
11
00:00:37,120 --> 00:00:40,166
and so we were able to schedule this morning's podcast. He is the
12
00:00:40,695 --> 00:00:44,446
national sales manager for Château Quintas, Quintas,
13
00:00:45,039 --> 00:00:48,422
right? And Saint-Émilion. Welcome to the show. Thank you.
14
00:00:48,887 --> 00:00:51,778
Good to have you here. What a pleasure to be here. Yeah. Yeah, well, you're
15
00:00:51,778 --> 00:00:55,478
in this fancy studio, you know. That's good, that's good. Yeah.
16
00:00:55,736 --> 00:00:59,497
I can ask you a question. Tomorrow morning at 6 o'clock, I
17
00:00:59,497 --> 00:01:02,841
go to the gym. That's my day. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. You obviously
18
00:01:03,999 --> 00:01:06,426
go to the gym. A little bit. You know, I'm spending a lot of time
19
00:01:06,426 --> 00:01:10,048
at the restaurant. Well, yeah, that's harder. That's what I was going to ask you.
20
00:01:10,096 --> 00:01:13,026
Like, how do you do it? And then in America, anywhere you go, there's a
21
00:01:13,155 --> 00:01:17,002
gym, right? They're everywhere. And most hotels have a gym. But in France, that's
22
00:01:17,002 --> 00:01:20,437
not the case. Yeah, you're right. That's why I love spending time here in the
23
00:01:20,437 --> 00:01:24,027
US. All the hotels have the best gym compared to France. Yeah,
24
00:01:24,043 --> 00:01:27,634
it's much different. It's a good, it's a good break, particularly when you're
25
00:01:27,634 --> 00:01:31,482
traveling. Yeah. Just to, you know, separate, just
26
00:01:31,482 --> 00:01:35,329
to turn off the brain. Yeah. Yeah.
27
00:01:35,649 --> 00:01:38,839
So what's, what's this trip about? You're here for 2 weeks. What are we doing?
28
00:01:39,176 --> 00:01:42,462
Yeah, I'm here for 2 weeks. In fact, the main purpose of my, my trip
29
00:01:42,542 --> 00:01:46,265
here today, is being the official partner of the
30
00:01:46,265 --> 00:01:49,926
Oscar ceremony. I mean, Quintus have been highlighted yesterday night
31
00:01:50,263 --> 00:01:53,923
at the Academy Awards, which have been— That's crazy. Such a beautiful thing
32
00:01:54,020 --> 00:01:56,749
for— So for the listeners in Oscar, what'd you say?
33
00:01:57,552 --> 00:02:01,164
Oscar? Oscar ceremony. Oscar ceremony. French
34
00:02:01,164 --> 00:02:04,938
accent, Oscars, right? But was that your first one? Yeah,
35
00:02:05,034 --> 00:02:07,924
it was the first time actually, but that was for us in the group in
36
00:02:07,988 --> 00:02:11,672
general, the fourth time in a row. So what does Château Quintas have to
37
00:02:11,720 --> 00:02:14,747
do with it? I mean, Prince Robert of
38
00:02:15,247 --> 00:02:19,015
Luxembourg is the actual owner and chairman of the company. And
39
00:02:19,353 --> 00:02:23,007
each year we try to change the wineries we
40
00:02:23,233 --> 00:02:26,969
highlight so that we can benefit of, yeah, beautiful. So you
41
00:02:26,969 --> 00:02:30,754
were a sponsor? Did they pour the wines at the Oscars or at one of
42
00:02:30,754 --> 00:02:33,569
the parties? All the parties linked to the Oscars ceremony
43
00:02:34,879 --> 00:02:38,693
have been poured some Quintas wine this year. That's amazing. Beautiful. And did
44
00:02:38,693 --> 00:02:42,331
you go to the parties? I've been there. Yeah, of course. It was not so
45
00:02:42,380 --> 00:02:45,794
bad, actually. I mean, that was quite amazing
46
00:02:46,451 --> 00:02:50,282
for us because I'm Armenian by nationality. I heard a lot
47
00:02:50,314 --> 00:02:53,985
of people here are Armenian. Yes. I've been to Mission. You know about
48
00:02:53,985 --> 00:02:57,688
Mission Wine and Spirits? I have coffee with them most Tuesdays. Great. All right. I
49
00:02:57,688 --> 00:03:01,439
was in Glendale. I've been to Sherman Oaks as well. I heard they
50
00:03:01,439 --> 00:03:03,299
got a shop as well in Pasadena. Yeah, right.
51
00:03:03,379 --> 00:03:08,733
I'm
52
00:03:08,733 --> 00:03:09,663
going to visit them tomorrow. The Sinners movie that won the Academy Award, or a
53
00:03:09,663 --> 00:03:12,424
few, won 4 awards, I think. Last night. Yeah, absolutely. Michael B. Jordan has been
54
00:03:12,634 --> 00:03:16,121
awarded for that. Yeah. The producer is an Armenian guy.
55
00:03:17,073 --> 00:03:19,942
So we were very excited for him. His name is Sebohanyan,
56
00:03:21,340 --> 00:03:25,036
that he won. So we're excited for him. But so tell
57
00:03:25,036 --> 00:03:28,715
me, you know, when Duclos, the
58
00:03:28,540 --> 00:03:31,369
negotiant in Los Angeles, called and said you were in town,
59
00:03:32,695 --> 00:03:36,152
you only came for the Oscars. Is that primarily? Yeah, primarily.
60
00:03:36,578 --> 00:03:40,014
But as you may know, the Oscars ceremony is hosting several different events.
61
00:03:42,237 --> 00:03:45,176
Before the ceremony. But then I
62
00:03:46,188 --> 00:03:49,979
took the opportunity to visit some accounts, just say hi to
63
00:03:49,979 --> 00:03:53,127
some clients, doing some tasting, staff training as well, masterclass.
64
00:03:53,673 --> 00:03:57,303
So yeah, I'm in town just to highlight Quintus, share the passion,
65
00:03:57,673 --> 00:04:01,463
drink some wine, open some bottles. I mean, it's a rough life. Yeah, not so
66
00:04:01,463 --> 00:04:05,093
bad. I mean, I think you must be
67
00:04:05,142 --> 00:04:08,708
passionate to do this life. You have to be fascinated with
68
00:04:08,820 --> 00:04:12,610
wine, for one. It's a product.
69
00:04:13,092 --> 00:04:16,656
You know, I have these conversations. We'll talk about it right now. That
70
00:04:16,881 --> 00:04:20,638
is so unique. And you don't know how unique it is until, for
71
00:04:20,638 --> 00:04:23,689
instance, you go to a place like Wine Paris and you see
72
00:04:23,689 --> 00:04:27,430
6,000 vendors. It's crazy. And you see all that passion
73
00:04:27,783 --> 00:04:31,573
there that's going around. Tell me about what's happening with Chef Quintas
74
00:04:32,022 --> 00:04:35,667
with this environment in the wine world. I have my opinions of it.
75
00:04:36,918 --> 00:04:40,509
Generally Bordeaux is complaining about the wine sales. How is
76
00:04:40,605 --> 00:04:44,324
the château doing? Or does it affect a level of
77
00:04:44,372 --> 00:04:48,155
quality like Quintas doesn't even matter? Oh, not really. Actually, I
78
00:04:48,155 --> 00:04:51,217
mean, to talk about château Quintus, it could be interesting to
79
00:04:52,003 --> 00:04:55,738
just go back on how it has been created, first of all, because Quintus is
80
00:04:55,770 --> 00:04:59,585
quite new in the wine industry because it has been created, totally
81
00:04:59,602 --> 00:05:03,195
created in 2011. That's very young. Yeah, which was
82
00:05:03,307 --> 00:05:07,048
the very first vintage. In fact, Château Quintus belongs to Domaine
83
00:05:07,144 --> 00:05:10,612
Clarence Dillon Company, which owns and
84
00:05:10,612 --> 00:05:13,871
supports Château Haut-Brion, Château La Mission Haut-Brion.
85
00:05:14,465 --> 00:05:17,805
And you received, I think, a few years ago, maybe 2 years ago,
86
00:05:17,917 --> 00:05:21,754
Guillaume-Alexandre Marx, which is the sales director of the company. That's right. Yeah. Happy
87
00:05:21,754 --> 00:05:25,495
to be there. Now it's my turn. So, yeah, Château
88
00:05:25,527 --> 00:05:29,264
Quintus belongs to Domaine Clarence Dillon, owning Aubrion, La Mission Aubrion,
89
00:05:29,280 --> 00:05:33,057
and now Château Quintus. Quintus has been created by the idea
90
00:05:33,057 --> 00:05:36,399
of Prince Robert of Luxembourg, by acquiring not one, not two,
91
00:05:36,769 --> 00:05:40,310
but three different estates, three different Grand Cru Classé located in the
92
00:05:40,616 --> 00:05:44,287
village of Saint-Émilion, with just outstanding terroirs. And the goal
93
00:05:44,416 --> 00:05:47,685
was to create a patchwork of these beautiful terroirs,
94
00:05:48,506 --> 00:05:52,195
made a fusion of them to create Château Quintus. So Quintus is the purest expression
95
00:05:52,308 --> 00:05:55,652
of Saint-Émilion wine. Crafted by Aubryon Hands.
96
00:05:56,389 --> 00:06:00,157
That's a pretty interesting thing for the listeners, you know, the Saint-Émilion being on the
97
00:06:00,157 --> 00:06:03,603
Right Bank and then Château Aubryon and Miecin-Aubryon on the
98
00:06:03,779 --> 00:06:07,595
Left Bank. Château Aubryon, of course, being a classified
99
00:06:07,627 --> 00:06:10,881
first growth, 1855. Yeah, that's fairly
100
00:06:10,913 --> 00:06:14,391
pedigreed, you know, uh, history there.
101
00:06:14,840 --> 00:06:18,062
And then you take that technology to the Right Bank where I
102
00:06:18,062 --> 00:06:21,781
don't know what the mix, the cépage here is, but it's Merlot
103
00:06:21,813 --> 00:06:25,628
and Cabernet Franc, I'm guessing. Of course, um, Quintus is absolutely not
104
00:06:25,661 --> 00:06:29,075
the Aubryon of the Right Bank or the little brother from Haut-Brion.
105
00:06:29,828 --> 00:06:32,040
Quintessa have its own singularity.
106
00:06:32,617 --> 00:06:36,447
It have, of course, a different blend than the
107
00:06:36,479 --> 00:06:39,525
one we can find on the Left Bank. And first of all, because of the
108
00:06:39,589 --> 00:06:43,099
terroir. As you may know, Left Bank in Bordeaux is
109
00:06:43,115 --> 00:06:46,288
mainly driven by the gravels. Gravels means more
110
00:06:46,577 --> 00:06:49,975
Cabernet Sauvignon. On the Right Bank of Bordeaux, you've got much more
111
00:06:50,023 --> 00:06:53,437
limestone and clay. It means you're going to find more Merlot, but also some
112
00:06:53,693 --> 00:06:57,354
Cabernet Franc this time. Not Sauvignon. So yeah, Quintus
113
00:06:57,482 --> 00:07:01,146
is a perfect blend of a dominant of Merlot, which drives the wine,
114
00:07:01,563 --> 00:07:05,259
but also some delicious Cabernet Franc growing on the top of what we call Le
115
00:07:05,259 --> 00:07:09,003
Plateau, the highest part of Saint-Émilion, where the soils are
116
00:07:09,003 --> 00:07:12,602
100% limestone and gives to the wines the beautiful freshness, good
117
00:07:12,667 --> 00:07:16,410
minerality, a good tension. And even if the Cabernet Franc is
118
00:07:16,507 --> 00:07:20,315
not the major grape variety in
119
00:07:20,363 --> 00:07:23,958
the blend, It drives the Grand Vin from Saint-Émilion. It's so interesting.
120
00:07:24,022 --> 00:07:27,824
So you're up by the Chevaux Blancs side or the La Gaffelière
121
00:07:27,873 --> 00:07:31,367
side? We are exactly located at the top
122
00:07:31,367 --> 00:07:34,990
southwest of the plateau from Saint-Émilion.
123
00:07:35,038 --> 00:07:38,597
So if you've been to Saint-Émilion or Bordeaux in general, you know that
124
00:07:38,597 --> 00:07:42,264
Bordeaux is quite a very flat area. And once you
125
00:07:42,297 --> 00:07:46,107
come to Saint-Émilion, you see kind of big hill. Big hill,
126
00:07:46,316 --> 00:07:49,003
come on. I mean, we are not the Rhône Valley. Big hill for us is
127
00:07:49,003 --> 00:07:50,924
around 62 to 75 meters. But that's a hill for us.
128
00:07:52,858 --> 00:07:56,598
It's a kind of— we call it Le Plateau. It's a limestone rock, the
129
00:07:56,614 --> 00:08:00,275
Moselle rock on it. And on this limestone
130
00:08:00,307 --> 00:08:02,924
plateau, you can find the top 10, 12
131
00:08:04,224 --> 00:08:07,788
of the best châteaux from Saint-Émilion. So the
132
00:08:07,788 --> 00:08:11,496
neighboring estate of Château Quintus, or directly Château Bel
133
00:08:11,545 --> 00:08:15,141
Air Monange, Château Ausone, Château Angelus.
134
00:08:15,382 --> 00:08:19,218
We've got Château Canon as well. We've got Beauséjour-Bécaud in front of us.
135
00:08:19,652 --> 00:08:23,262
Uh, yeah, we've got some— when you walked into the studio here, there were 3
136
00:08:23,262 --> 00:08:26,631
bottles of Aussonne that someone just ordered for me recently. Yes. Crazy.
137
00:08:27,176 --> 00:08:30,401
But you know, for the listeners, I just wanted to say that when you do
138
00:08:30,401 --> 00:08:33,931
visit Bordeaux, it's a very large swath of land. Left
139
00:08:33,995 --> 00:08:37,236
Bank is very long and takes a few hours actually to go from one side
140
00:08:37,236 --> 00:08:40,332
to the other, a couple hours. But if you were to, if you were to
141
00:08:40,332 --> 00:08:44,135
say what, what village would, would be in your
142
00:08:44,135 --> 00:08:47,619
mind? If you think of Bordeaux and it's
143
00:08:47,749 --> 00:08:51,091
Saint-Émilion in my mind. Like if I was to picture
144
00:08:51,802 --> 00:08:55,629
as an American what Bordeaux might be, I
145
00:08:55,678 --> 00:08:58,923
would envision Saint-Émilion. The quaint town,
146
00:09:00,223 --> 00:09:03,636
the cobblestone roads, the quaint village
147
00:09:03,701 --> 00:09:07,292
around whence wine is grown. Whereas on the Left
148
00:09:07,341 --> 00:09:10,862
Bank, you got a long road and you've got all these little villages in between.
149
00:09:10,929 --> 00:09:14,750
Yeah, you're right. There is the Route de Château
150
00:09:15,232 --> 00:09:18,957
on the Left Bank, and you can cross all the beautiful and most
151
00:09:19,005 --> 00:09:22,762
famous appellations, starting from the city center of Bordeaux, then crossing Margaux. After
152
00:09:22,778 --> 00:09:26,214
that, you got Saint-Julien. After that, you got Pauillac, and you finish by Saint-Estèphe. It
153
00:09:26,214 --> 00:09:29,602
takes a full day. Yeah, it takes an hour and a half to go to
154
00:09:29,602 --> 00:09:33,295
the top. Exactly. So, yes, Saint-Émilion and the Right
155
00:09:33,295 --> 00:09:35,912
Bank is much different. Saint-Émilion, of course, is,
156
00:09:36,827 --> 00:09:40,615
first of all, classified UNESCO place in
157
00:09:40,615 --> 00:09:44,113
the world, which benefits, of course, of beautiful
158
00:09:44,113 --> 00:09:47,739
highlights. The village, a small medieval village, is just beautiful.
159
00:09:47,900 --> 00:09:51,398
Downtown, I mean, the center of the village is just crazy
160
00:09:51,831 --> 00:09:55,666
beautiful to see. But Saint-Émilion is so small, and I'm sure
161
00:09:55,666 --> 00:09:59,421
you've been there and you know that there are so many producers, so
162
00:09:59,453 --> 00:10:03,128
many on a very small place. So each 50 or 100 meters, you've got a
163
00:10:03,240 --> 00:10:06,529
new producer. So this could be probably a bit difficult to understand
164
00:10:06,979 --> 00:10:10,588
as a foreign consumer. But
165
00:10:10,588 --> 00:10:14,357
yeah, the classification is also here for that. But we
166
00:10:14,357 --> 00:10:17,885
just talked a little bit previously, just before to start the podcast,
167
00:10:18,222 --> 00:10:20,916
talking about this. Nowadays, the classification,
168
00:10:21,894 --> 00:10:25,294
I'm not going to say it means nothing, but some of
169
00:10:25,759 --> 00:10:29,111
the main and most famous estates have left the
170
00:10:29,111 --> 00:10:32,863
classification. Quintus actually is a Saint-Émilion
171
00:10:32,959 --> 00:10:36,712
Grand Cru, and I have to be honest with you, We don't really
172
00:10:36,825 --> 00:10:39,904
care about the classification today. Now,
173
00:10:40,738 --> 00:10:42,728
the classification also integrates some
174
00:10:43,818 --> 00:10:47,572
specificities that are not directly linked with the quality of the
175
00:10:47,636 --> 00:10:51,454
wine. And we have to not forget that wine
176
00:10:51,502 --> 00:10:53,892
is about passion first,
177
00:10:55,095 --> 00:10:58,367
creating something from the berries, creating something from the land,
178
00:10:58,944 --> 00:11:02,457
and adapting our methods to the global warming coming.
179
00:11:03,532 --> 00:11:06,545
I mean, classification don't mean a lot actually for us.
180
00:11:07,203 --> 00:11:10,601
And I think that some of, or if it's not
181
00:11:11,707 --> 00:11:15,314
a lot of estates in Saint-Émilion, I understand that. So
182
00:11:15,474 --> 00:11:19,273
now some people left. It's interesting. It's an interesting thought. Let's
183
00:11:19,786 --> 00:11:23,617
kind of pound on that a little bit. The classification
184
00:11:23,649 --> 00:11:26,951
of Bordeaux, 1855, Napoleon III, we talked
185
00:11:26,951 --> 00:11:30,591
about Eugénie having participated in that. You know, it was
186
00:11:30,623 --> 00:11:33,703
really sort of a marketing thing in the first place. It was a
187
00:11:33,751 --> 00:11:36,655
commerce-driven exposition that
188
00:11:37,281 --> 00:11:40,794
Napoleon wanted to put on. He told the négociants to rate the
189
00:11:40,874 --> 00:11:44,211
wines. Absolutely. And what's interesting to me
190
00:11:44,500 --> 00:11:48,078
about the classification of 1855, it wasn't about the ground. It was about the
191
00:11:48,094 --> 00:11:51,864
château. Yeah. And in Saint-Émilion or the— on the Right Bank,
192
00:11:52,441 --> 00:11:55,891
the original classification dealt with the ground.
193
00:11:56,629 --> 00:12:00,385
So what's the quality of the ground? Yeah. Correct. So then, but
194
00:12:00,385 --> 00:12:03,997
then you fast forward the wine business a little bit and, you know,
195
00:12:04,013 --> 00:12:07,047
Napa Valley has this, you know, you go up there, you get a hotel, you
196
00:12:07,127 --> 00:12:09,904
tour, you go on the buses, you do all the stuff. And you didn't really
197
00:12:10,017 --> 00:12:13,853
do that in Bordeaux. No, true. Before. No, we started now. We started, we are
198
00:12:13,853 --> 00:12:17,577
a bit late, but of course California is far, far behind us. Yeah.
199
00:12:17,963 --> 00:12:21,639
Well, now California's suffering greatly because of the, the
200
00:12:21,639 --> 00:12:24,575
cost of doing that. I can tell you now that tasting room
201
00:12:25,120 --> 00:12:28,920
traffic is down 30 or 40% because it's too expensive
202
00:12:28,936 --> 00:12:31,982
to go there. You, you, if you go there as a couple, you know, it's
203
00:12:31,982 --> 00:12:35,686
$4,000 or $5,000 weekend just, just to show up, you know, to
204
00:12:35,686 --> 00:12:39,165
drive, even if you drove it 6 hours. But the point I'm making is
205
00:12:39,678 --> 00:12:42,836
the classification of the right bank, which I think
206
00:12:43,846 --> 00:12:47,678
started as an idea to sort of support the
207
00:12:47,710 --> 00:12:51,397
idea of classifications, 1855, everybody, everybody pointed to that
208
00:12:51,397 --> 00:12:54,668
classification. The right bank didn't have it. They did it in
209
00:12:54,668 --> 00:12:57,700
1955 in the Graves region. They have their own.
210
00:12:58,774 --> 00:13:02,463
But then it looks, it sounds like recently, and this is why
211
00:13:02,463 --> 00:13:06,248
Cheval Blanc left and Angelus left, probably others, is it
212
00:13:06,248 --> 00:13:09,985
became a commercial classification. A bit, yes. I
213
00:13:10,001 --> 00:13:13,562
think now, I mean, nowadays there are too many classifications. You got the
214
00:13:13,610 --> 00:13:17,315
ones from Saint-Émilion, the Grand Cru, the Grand Cru Classé A, B,
215
00:13:17,860 --> 00:13:21,661
then you got the first growth classified 1855, then you got the
216
00:13:21,709 --> 00:13:25,495
Cru Bourgeois. Uh, the Cru Bourgeaux Exceptionnel. Yeah, so it
217
00:13:25,495 --> 00:13:29,297
just gets too much. But then there's, there's also though, there's always
218
00:13:29,330 --> 00:13:32,699
been discussion in America to do something like that in Napa.
219
00:13:33,180 --> 00:13:36,533
In fact, um, you know, if you go up the road, like just as you
220
00:13:36,533 --> 00:13:39,983
go from Pouillac to Saint-Julien, you know, keep going up,
221
00:13:40,721 --> 00:13:44,411
the same thing happens in the Napa Valley. You go from Oak Knoll and you
222
00:13:44,411 --> 00:13:46,978
keep going up and up and Oakville, then you end up in Rutherford and you
223
00:13:46,978 --> 00:13:50,668
keep going up. And they're talking about maybe cutting those in half, or they've
224
00:13:50,668 --> 00:13:53,621
discussed it, and making Separate this to us.
225
00:13:54,520 --> 00:13:57,812
And maybe the consumer doesn't care. I think so. I mean,
226
00:13:58,213 --> 00:14:01,890
we should go back to the basics and just remember
227
00:14:01,890 --> 00:14:05,487
to everyone that wine is all about pleasure. Just opening a bottle
228
00:14:05,840 --> 00:14:09,036
with the good people at the good moment. We don't care about the price. We
229
00:14:09,036 --> 00:14:12,231
don't care about the classification, the label, or how prestigious it is,
230
00:14:13,050 --> 00:14:15,924
or the last rate it have been rated. I mean,
231
00:14:16,919 --> 00:14:20,500
it just— A simple project crafted by humans.
232
00:14:21,094 --> 00:14:23,792
And yeah, do you think the rating system has
233
00:14:25,269 --> 00:14:28,817
defeated itself? In other words, do you think that it has run its
234
00:14:28,946 --> 00:14:32,703
course and it's less important, or is it still sort of a viable
235
00:14:33,217 --> 00:14:36,990
retail? We still have some markets that are interested
236
00:14:36,990 --> 00:14:40,201
about the classification and that where the
237
00:14:40,201 --> 00:14:43,943
classification helps, but probably less
238
00:14:44,055 --> 00:14:46,994
than it used to be. Yeah, I think so. And
239
00:14:48,294 --> 00:14:51,827
when I was selling wine a lot, they used to ask
240
00:14:52,742 --> 00:14:56,275
in particularly the early days of my, my father's business and my business,
241
00:14:57,543 --> 00:15:01,156
there weren't any classification, there were no ratings anyway. And then they
242
00:15:01,156 --> 00:15:04,849
came out, you know, when Parker started doing the big Napa cabs
243
00:15:04,849 --> 00:15:08,462
and things, a lot of the vendors would come and say,
244
00:15:08,623 --> 00:15:11,963
do you want to know the ratings? And I would say no. I give it
245
00:15:11,963 --> 00:15:15,640
my own rating. Yeah. Shouldn't every consumer just give it their own rating? And I
246
00:15:15,688 --> 00:15:19,349
think you're right. Yeah. I mean, you're going to trust the palate of
247
00:15:19,381 --> 00:15:23,074
someone else, but wine is very subjective. You're going to like something, I'm
248
00:15:23,218 --> 00:15:26,735
going to dislike it. And, you know, it is very personal. It is.
249
00:15:27,971 --> 00:15:31,776
It's very interesting because I sell a lot of, um, my, my,
250
00:15:31,985 --> 00:15:35,357
my extenuating clients that stuck with me after I sold the company.
251
00:15:37,348 --> 00:15:41,118
They've all settled on the regulars, right? So Austin Hope, which is a
252
00:15:41,294 --> 00:15:44,423
big giant Paso Robles Cabernet,
253
00:15:45,289 --> 00:15:48,626
um, they— I sell a lot of it because they
254
00:15:48,738 --> 00:15:52,268
just remember it and they, they associate themselves with the
255
00:15:52,284 --> 00:15:54,739
bottle. And I think that's what it's about. Tell me about Quintas.
256
00:15:56,311 --> 00:16:00,129
It's only 14 years old. How has the market received it? 15
257
00:16:00,129 --> 00:16:03,817
years old. Has the market received the idea of of the
258
00:16:03,817 --> 00:16:07,326
wine and the personality of the wine. Quintus,
259
00:16:07,823 --> 00:16:11,172
as it's linked to Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon,
260
00:16:11,524 --> 00:16:14,457
benefited from beautiful highlight worldwide,
261
00:16:16,956 --> 00:16:20,786
which is a pretty good thing. Then, as I said it previously, Quintus is
262
00:16:20,978 --> 00:16:24,279
the baby of Aubryon, the Aubryon from the right bank. So
263
00:16:24,920 --> 00:16:28,284
it have to fight amongst the best one. And for that, I got a good
264
00:16:28,653 --> 00:16:32,323
anecdote for you because As Prince Robert and the teams
265
00:16:33,542 --> 00:16:36,956
are totally convinced, as I am, of the quality of Château
266
00:16:36,988 --> 00:16:39,633
Quintus, we all decided in
267
00:16:39,810 --> 00:16:42,824
2022 to do a big blind tasting
268
00:16:44,780 --> 00:16:48,114
that has been made in Oswald's Private Club in London.
269
00:16:48,851 --> 00:16:52,026
And this blind tasting used to
270
00:16:52,875 --> 00:16:55,745
put in opposition Château Quintus against
271
00:16:56,050 --> 00:16:59,175
probably the big monsters of Saint-Émilion,
272
00:16:59,239 --> 00:17:03,039
like Château Figeac, Château Pavie, Château Ausone, Château Angelus,
273
00:17:03,055 --> 00:17:06,742
and Cheval Blanc. And this blind tasting was a
274
00:17:06,742 --> 00:17:09,787
contest from 2011 vintage to
275
00:17:09,787 --> 00:17:13,619
2018, to have a global opinion and a very objective
276
00:17:13,635 --> 00:17:17,338
wine. So, you know
277
00:17:17,402 --> 00:17:21,153
what? Only 4 wines— So we
278
00:17:21,233 --> 00:17:24,856
asked the people during this blind tasting to rate
279
00:17:24,936 --> 00:17:28,768
the wines on 100 points. And you know what? Only 4 wines had the
280
00:17:28,768 --> 00:17:31,689
perfect score of 100 on 100, and 3 of them
281
00:17:32,716 --> 00:17:35,862
were Château Quintus wines, '15, '16, and '18.
282
00:17:36,568 --> 00:17:39,730
Wow. That's pretty impressive. Yeah. In a blind tasting with
283
00:17:39,859 --> 00:17:42,972
educated palates. Absolutely. People knew what they were doing. Yeah.
284
00:17:43,630 --> 00:17:47,049
It was among the people tasting the wines
285
00:17:48,044 --> 00:17:51,816
were some outstanding journalists, famous
286
00:17:51,816 --> 00:17:55,509
wine buyers from all over the world, critics. Yeah. So
287
00:17:55,509 --> 00:17:58,514
that's pretty interesting. Good samples. Yeah. Do you think people
288
00:17:59,446 --> 00:18:03,270
in this group, for instance, very educated palates, they understand the complexities,
289
00:18:03,302 --> 00:18:07,126
they understand structure. And so sometimes I used to find
290
00:18:07,319 --> 00:18:11,095
when I had ratings come in here just by wines that they were,
291
00:18:11,175 --> 00:18:14,903
they were on my level, excellent, but not necessarily the
292
00:18:14,935 --> 00:18:18,775
fan favorite because, you know, let's say, let's face it, the American palate,
293
00:18:18,791 --> 00:18:22,592
for instance, likes a little are residual sugar in there, the little opulence
294
00:18:22,752 --> 00:18:26,582
that they used to. But if you take 3
295
00:18:26,582 --> 00:18:30,251
of the 4 top marks from educated palates, you're
296
00:18:30,251 --> 00:18:33,744
talking about some serious structure and some serious
297
00:18:33,856 --> 00:18:37,622
fruit balance, acid balance, and
298
00:18:37,622 --> 00:18:40,362
just crafting nice wines. You're right.
299
00:18:42,189 --> 00:18:45,778
Quintess is all of that. I think is— I mean, Quintess is a kind of
300
00:18:45,890 --> 00:18:49,626
modern wine. That have all the heritage from the Left Bank, from Aubryon and
301
00:18:49,658 --> 00:18:53,491
La Mission Aubryon. But what I like with Quintus is that we don't
302
00:18:53,507 --> 00:18:57,067
have to— we don't must respect all
303
00:18:57,372 --> 00:19:01,204
the tradition and authenticity from the
304
00:19:01,204 --> 00:19:04,941
past like we must do on Aubryon and La Mission Aubryon. As Château Quintus story
305
00:19:04,973 --> 00:19:08,437
is quite new in the wine industry, we can permit us to be a
306
00:19:08,742 --> 00:19:12,574
bit more modern in the way we communicate, in the way we shape the bottle.
307
00:19:12,655 --> 00:19:15,879
Look at this. Here is the bottle of Château Quintus. Oh yeah, it's a little
308
00:19:15,879 --> 00:19:19,624
squarish. Don't really look like a typical Bordeaux wine. As you can see, the shoulders
309
00:19:19,721 --> 00:19:23,305
are larger, even the bottle is quite heavy. And you've got heavy glass.
310
00:19:23,919 --> 00:19:27,226
Got it. This is a 5-pound bottle right here. Got an anecdote on the shape
311
00:19:27,226 --> 00:19:30,163
of this bottle. You know what? The oldest bottle of Château
312
00:19:30,260 --> 00:19:34,018
Haut-Brion ever found was found
313
00:19:34,018 --> 00:19:37,744
by a diver. Really? Deep under
314
00:19:37,744 --> 00:19:41,575
the Indian Ocean. In a ship that sank. And then this
315
00:19:41,607 --> 00:19:45,456
guy came up at the surface with a bottle with no label, no cork,
316
00:19:45,472 --> 00:19:49,304
no wine inside. But on the top, we could read Château
317
00:19:49,304 --> 00:19:53,089
Haut-Brion. So we bought this bottle on the auction, and then we probably
318
00:19:53,089 --> 00:19:56,681
stored it at the château for a few years. And then once the
319
00:19:56,681 --> 00:20:00,354
project Château Quintus was born, Prince Robert of Luxembourg has the
320
00:20:00,370 --> 00:20:03,449
great idea to shape the bottle of Château Quintus
321
00:20:03,962 --> 00:20:07,587
exactly the same as this oldest bottle of Château Aubryon ever
322
00:20:07,587 --> 00:20:10,683
found. That's amazing story. What a great story.
323
00:20:11,822 --> 00:20:15,368
And so that bottle on display at Château Aubryon?
324
00:20:16,074 --> 00:20:19,892
Now, yes. Yes. Yeah. And you're probably the first to know
325
00:20:19,924 --> 00:20:23,646
it. We're going to open, in fact, a new
326
00:20:24,031 --> 00:20:27,818
hospitality department which has just been created like a
327
00:20:28,026 --> 00:20:31,347
few weeks ago. So now people
328
00:20:32,053 --> 00:20:35,797
can visit Château Aubryon. We're going to build
329
00:20:35,830 --> 00:20:39,622
for them some crazy experiences around wine history and all
330
00:20:39,622 --> 00:20:43,387
the past and things we store at Château Aubryon. Because maybe
331
00:20:43,387 --> 00:20:47,026
you know it, but Prince Robert is a big fan of history, mythology as well.
332
00:20:47,171 --> 00:20:50,843
And he used to buy many things linked to his Château Aubryon, but not only.
333
00:20:51,213 --> 00:20:54,805
So, I mean, I can't spoil everything. Yeah,
334
00:20:54,821 --> 00:20:58,478
right. I hope you can come and visit us. Well, we're going to be coming
335
00:20:58,478 --> 00:21:01,324
for sure. It's interesting because it wasn't that long ago that we were on the
336
00:21:01,324 --> 00:21:04,953
Left Bank. And just for
337
00:21:04,969 --> 00:21:08,712
fun, because I knew better, we started to walk up the road
338
00:21:08,728 --> 00:21:12,358
starting in Poulillac just to see what if we could get in anywhere.
339
00:21:12,599 --> 00:21:16,213
Yeah. And you couldn't. I remember we knocked on the door, you know,
340
00:21:16,599 --> 00:21:20,229
fermé, that kind of thing. Now Bordeaux is opening more and more its
341
00:21:20,229 --> 00:21:23,859
doors. I think the
342
00:21:23,859 --> 00:21:27,216
châteaux have understood that hospitality is very important as well.
343
00:21:27,682 --> 00:21:31,003
We are facing a challenging context.
344
00:21:31,532 --> 00:21:34,788
Well, let's put it this way. On the sales. So hospitality is going to be
345
00:21:34,916 --> 00:21:38,589
part now of the sales strategy. Let's put it this way,
346
00:21:38,765 --> 00:21:42,534
and I think this is really important. The success of my father's company early
347
00:21:42,534 --> 00:21:46,223
on, which lasted, you
348
00:21:46,383 --> 00:21:49,398
know, the value of what we did lasted probably through
349
00:21:49,414 --> 00:21:53,087
2010, 2012. And I just wrote a little article
350
00:21:53,119 --> 00:21:56,119
this morning on the subject. When they started bringing in this
351
00:21:56,889 --> 00:22:00,676
50-cent-a-liter stuff from Europe and putting it in a bottle and making it look
352
00:22:00,676 --> 00:22:03,628
nice. And then the consumer wasn't fooled eventually.
353
00:22:04,591 --> 00:22:08,025
But the point of that club originally was the
354
00:22:08,025 --> 00:22:11,748
experience of this guy selecting wines for you,
355
00:22:12,117 --> 00:22:15,872
having tasted everything that was available new that month
356
00:22:16,225 --> 00:22:19,947
and finding the best values. And there was a relationship between my father
357
00:22:20,316 --> 00:22:23,364
and myself later in the years between the client
358
00:22:24,470 --> 00:22:28,061
and the vendor. And in
359
00:22:28,077 --> 00:22:31,748
fact, I shook the hands of almost every customer I ever got
360
00:22:32,021 --> 00:22:35,564
because I was at a booth somewhere. And I always believed
361
00:22:36,189 --> 00:22:39,636
that the success of the company was because we had a
362
00:22:39,636 --> 00:22:43,243
relationship. And Napa does that.
363
00:22:44,124 --> 00:22:47,892
Not as successful today because it's not as busy, but I believe
364
00:22:47,892 --> 00:22:51,226
the wine business needs to go that direction because—
365
00:22:51,579 --> 00:22:54,961
That's a very interesting point. Because I totally agree with you,
366
00:22:55,330 --> 00:22:58,503
and mostly for Bordeaux that I
367
00:22:58,551 --> 00:23:02,125
represent, the estates have
368
00:23:02,157 --> 00:23:05,812
to rebuild relationships with their consumers.
369
00:23:06,565 --> 00:23:08,296
We've been too far from them for years.
370
00:23:10,732 --> 00:23:14,498
Bordeaux has seen some beautiful years in the past, but nowadays it's
371
00:23:14,498 --> 00:23:17,592
going to be more and more challenging for everyone, for many reasons:
372
00:23:18,024 --> 00:23:21,807
context, prices, for many different reasons.
373
00:23:22,592 --> 00:23:26,248
But yeah, the key point I think will be to create some
374
00:23:26,521 --> 00:23:29,856
new links with our consumers and to build again
375
00:23:29,888 --> 00:23:33,400
some relationship of trust between us
376
00:23:34,298 --> 00:23:38,146
and them. It's very slow. I mean, here you're doing a masterclass.
377
00:23:38,643 --> 00:23:42,460
Maybe there's 12 people in it, 15, 20 people. Yeah, 12 to 20. Yeah. And
378
00:23:42,540 --> 00:23:45,570
then that person— it's kind of an interesting thing.
379
00:23:46,324 --> 00:23:49,210
It's really social networking before social networking, you know.
380
00:23:50,092 --> 00:23:53,866
Today's social networking, one tells 10, tells 10, tells 10, tells 10, you've told
381
00:23:53,866 --> 00:23:57,542
100,000 people, which is the premise of social networking. Well, it's the same thing as
382
00:23:57,559 --> 00:24:01,300
a masterclass. If you tell 20 people about Château Quintas
383
00:24:03,403 --> 00:24:06,614
and they go back to the restaurant or the store and somebody walks in and
384
00:24:06,614 --> 00:24:10,291
they see this cool bottle. They left as ambassador. Yeah. Of course.
385
00:24:10,564 --> 00:24:13,534
And then that person then has to tell someone. If they don't buy directly, they
386
00:24:13,534 --> 00:24:17,034
will talk to their friends, to their family. Yeah, this is how you
387
00:24:17,050 --> 00:24:20,838
build the brand as well. That's part of the job. That's not
388
00:24:20,838 --> 00:24:24,497
the only thing to do, but this is part of it. Yeah. And
389
00:24:24,754 --> 00:24:28,509
I firmly believe, because what's in the bottle is what's telling the story,
390
00:24:28,541 --> 00:24:32,153
and that has to obviously be very good, or at least be associated to the
391
00:24:32,153 --> 00:24:35,892
people to tell the story. But one
392
00:24:36,005 --> 00:24:39,616
great example, in my opinion, is Château Bailly, the way they've
393
00:24:39,616 --> 00:24:43,273
handled their visitor center, The way they've changed the fermentation room. It's
394
00:24:43,273 --> 00:24:46,847
beautiful. I've been lucky to visit it. Yeah. And so when I open a
395
00:24:46,911 --> 00:24:50,726
bottle of Aubayet at home and my friends that were on this trip the last
396
00:24:50,822 --> 00:24:54,605
time we were there, their brain goes back to
397
00:24:54,605 --> 00:24:58,259
that day. And that could happen anywhere, anytime with any
398
00:24:58,291 --> 00:25:01,577
wine, right? That memory is made. Yeah.
399
00:25:02,779 --> 00:25:06,353
That's why we decided also to open a nice, I mean,
400
00:25:06,706 --> 00:25:09,479
a very high-end hospitality center in Château Aubryon.
401
00:25:10,760 --> 00:25:14,548
We're getting curious now to see what this is going to be about. You're going
402
00:25:14,565 --> 00:25:17,015
to come? Yeah, you need to come and visit.
403
00:25:18,420 --> 00:25:22,034
Yeah, so you should open the doors, um, maybe next year
404
00:25:22,083 --> 00:25:25,811
for the season. Yeah, so you were at Wine Paris. We were there. Uh,
405
00:25:26,101 --> 00:25:29,910
I wasn't feeling very good, but you know, it's an incredible show. It's—
406
00:25:29,975 --> 00:25:33,703
I guess it's fast becoming one of the great wine shows of the world. Yeah,
407
00:25:34,091 --> 00:25:37,784
I hadn't been to one like that since 1993. We went to Vinexpo in Bordeaux.
408
00:25:37,834 --> 00:25:41,516
Yeah, previously was Vinexpo, exactly. But it's a different group, right? I think so. Yeah,
409
00:25:41,532 --> 00:25:45,364
it was Vinexpo. Yeah. So when you're there, what
410
00:25:45,364 --> 00:25:49,180
are you doing as a job? What's the relationship you're building? When I'm on the
411
00:25:49,212 --> 00:25:53,044
booth, you mean? Yes. There are two things. First of
412
00:25:53,044 --> 00:25:56,667
all, creating link with the B2B. So with
413
00:25:56,667 --> 00:26:00,338
our negotiant, you know, but the way to distribute the wine is a bit unusual
414
00:26:00,338 --> 00:26:03,898
compared to the other part of the world. We, the château,
415
00:26:03,978 --> 00:26:07,778
sell wines to the wine merchant, then the wine merchant sell it on
416
00:26:07,810 --> 00:26:11,117
the national network or
417
00:26:12,064 --> 00:26:15,550
by the importers all over the world. And then these importers are going to share
418
00:26:15,598 --> 00:26:19,420
it with the cavists, with the restaurants, the hotels, things
419
00:26:19,436 --> 00:26:23,066
like that. So we're quite far from the last consumer.
420
00:26:23,130 --> 00:26:26,230
So being able to meet them directly in Wine Paris, first of all,
421
00:26:27,001 --> 00:26:30,599
you earn maybe 6 months of appointments because everyone's there. Yeah, right.
422
00:26:30,679 --> 00:26:34,389
That's true. It's not so bad for everyone, I think. So
423
00:26:34,389 --> 00:26:38,066
first of all, We meet the professionals, the négociants,
424
00:26:38,146 --> 00:26:41,918
our first clients. And then we have the opportunity to meet
425
00:26:41,918 --> 00:26:45,675
also the clients from our négociants, the sommeliers.
426
00:26:46,429 --> 00:26:50,105
First of all, we can see the importers as well. So yeah, it's a
427
00:26:50,122 --> 00:26:53,942
beautiful place where everyone's meeting, sharing its passion for wine,
428
00:26:54,857 --> 00:26:58,469
doing the business, and making, I mean, things go
429
00:26:58,469 --> 00:27:02,258
ahead. It seems to me, and I wrote this up
430
00:27:02,546 --> 00:27:06,315
after I left. Let me see if I can articulate this
431
00:27:06,315 --> 00:27:09,875
properly, because it is like the consumer
432
00:27:10,340 --> 00:27:14,109
having that moment at a restaurant where the sommelier explains a
433
00:27:14,269 --> 00:27:18,118
wine or that they had visited, and when they taste that
434
00:27:18,118 --> 00:27:21,951
wine again, their memory gets triggered. It's the same thing at a
435
00:27:21,951 --> 00:27:25,704
show like that at a different level. But I came away saying,
436
00:27:26,522 --> 00:27:29,851
I don't care how much AI how much social
437
00:27:29,851 --> 00:27:32,846
networking, how much content you're creating on the fly.
438
00:27:33,473 --> 00:27:37,192
Nothing replaces that handshake. You're right.
439
00:27:37,482 --> 00:27:40,735
That you made at the booth. Wine Paris as well is also kind of speed
440
00:27:40,799 --> 00:27:44,149
dating. So you have to be ready for that because people have generally
441
00:27:44,906 --> 00:27:46,951
a long journey in
442
00:27:47,064 --> 00:27:50,531
front of them. So yeah, you have to be precise, quick,
443
00:27:51,111 --> 00:27:54,850
and yeah, it's hard work. Oh, I mean, you're saying the same. No,
444
00:27:55,537 --> 00:27:59,047
it's not really hard work. I would say it's It's very exciting to be there,
445
00:27:59,144 --> 00:28:02,984
I would say. Were you pouring in the Bordeaux booth where you could
446
00:28:03,048 --> 00:28:06,679
taste? Yeah, absolutely. I didn't see— We were located— In fact,
447
00:28:06,920 --> 00:28:10,536
we had two booths, one for our wine merchant company,
448
00:28:10,600 --> 00:28:14,408
Clarence Dillon Wines, and another one where
449
00:28:14,456 --> 00:28:17,654
I was located on the second floor with the Champagne region
450
00:28:18,730 --> 00:28:21,703
on the PFV, Primum Familiae Vini booth, the
451
00:28:21,703 --> 00:28:25,478
group we are part of. Yeah, I was telling one of my
452
00:28:25,478 --> 00:28:29,270
collector clients, I said, he goes, I want to go next year. I
453
00:28:29,270 --> 00:28:33,078
said, it's really from a consumer standpoint, it would be overwhelming.
454
00:28:34,155 --> 00:28:37,658
But man, when he walked into that one Bordeaux booth where all the left, mostly
455
00:28:37,674 --> 00:28:41,385
Left Bank, that's why I asked the question. Everybody was there and you could
456
00:28:41,385 --> 00:28:45,209
taste whatever you wanted. I mean, if it was Haut-Brion or Château Bailly
457
00:28:45,225 --> 00:28:48,728
or Lafitte or Mouton, it was all there. It was like a
458
00:28:48,937 --> 00:28:52,659
candy store. Yeah. You know, and I have to tell you, in LA,
459
00:28:54,054 --> 00:28:57,502
the people that vend these now, so I wanna just for the listeners point out
460
00:28:57,502 --> 00:29:01,254
that the négociant methodology has been around
461
00:29:01,350 --> 00:29:04,718
Bordeaux since its inception as a wine merchant,
462
00:29:04,734 --> 00:29:08,550
meaning many, many vendors in Los Angeles carry
463
00:29:09,945 --> 00:29:13,601
the wines of Bordeaux, France, and they can all carry the same stuff. Lafitte is
464
00:29:13,714 --> 00:29:17,498
carried by many people. Aubriands is carried by many people. It's an open market. Absolutely.
465
00:29:17,546 --> 00:29:21,090
Yeah. And compared to a Napa wine where once you sign on with a
466
00:29:21,090 --> 00:29:24,794
distributor, They're usually exclusive and that's the end of it. So it's kind of
467
00:29:24,794 --> 00:29:28,194
interesting deal that's different. Yeah, that's what I said
468
00:29:28,226 --> 00:29:32,059
previously. Bordeaux way to distribute the wine is an open market.
469
00:29:32,139 --> 00:29:35,828
Yeah, it's really interesting. If you're a sommelier, for example, you can have, I don't
470
00:29:35,828 --> 00:29:39,099
know, 20 négociants coming to you selling you the same wines.
471
00:29:39,613 --> 00:29:43,365
So the way when I choose, when somebody asks me for some
472
00:29:43,365 --> 00:29:47,022
Haut-Brion, for instance, and I choose the vendor for them,
473
00:29:48,433 --> 00:29:52,201
I tend to explain to the client that I
474
00:29:52,201 --> 00:29:55,119
want to make sure that we're getting authentic wines. And so it needs to be
475
00:29:55,119 --> 00:29:58,807
the most direct route from the winery to their
476
00:29:58,856 --> 00:30:02,704
cellar. Yeah. And that we know we can protect the provenance that
477
00:30:02,704 --> 00:30:06,264
it came from, uh, Obriano, Quintas, to the
478
00:30:06,472 --> 00:30:10,241
négociant, to their cellar. And that's the most important feature. This
479
00:30:10,241 --> 00:30:13,993
used to be a big problem, the fake bottles. But nowadays with the technology, we
480
00:30:13,993 --> 00:30:17,765
have some specific things that I can tell, of course, on the
481
00:30:17,781 --> 00:30:21,395
label, on the bottle, on the glass, to make sure and to identify the
482
00:30:21,395 --> 00:30:24,736
bottle once you get it. You know, you're in the neighborhood of
483
00:30:25,234 --> 00:30:28,414
Rudy. You know Rudy Kirwan, the guy, the famous
484
00:30:29,410 --> 00:30:33,185
profiteer from fake wines? Of course. He was right here. You're
485
00:30:33,185 --> 00:30:36,381
literally 2 miles away from it. Come on.
486
00:30:36,654 --> 00:30:40,316
And they found his house here, and the windows were covered
487
00:30:40,349 --> 00:30:44,008
with foil. And they found his recipes. Have you ever
488
00:30:44,040 --> 00:30:47,699
hosted him? No, but my friend had dinner with him
489
00:30:48,036 --> 00:30:51,503
in Singapore. He's back in Singapore or something. Anyway, it's not why we're here. Let's
490
00:30:51,503 --> 00:30:55,274
talk about this. So it's interesting to me that you
491
00:30:55,274 --> 00:30:59,110
can— well, I can understand the backing of a
492
00:30:59,110 --> 00:31:02,881
Château Haut-Brion, Mission Haut-Brion, you
493
00:31:02,881 --> 00:31:06,235
know, going to the Right Bank, starting a winery. But it still
494
00:31:06,347 --> 00:31:10,150
takes time. I mean, you still have to find your
495
00:31:10,182 --> 00:31:13,599
footing, find out what you want to represent, find out what that
496
00:31:13,631 --> 00:31:17,096
terroir is gonna be. Are we still in the early
497
00:31:17,096 --> 00:31:20,674
stages of what this wine's gonna be? Oh, in my opinion,
498
00:31:20,722 --> 00:31:24,316
starting from 2015, Quintus is
499
00:31:24,316 --> 00:31:27,941
something absolutely serious. The wine is just outstanding. On the very
500
00:31:27,941 --> 00:31:31,615
first vintages, the wine have been really well produced by the
501
00:31:31,615 --> 00:31:35,326
teams, but I can tell Starting
502
00:31:35,358 --> 00:31:39,000
from 2015, wow, that's something else. On the nose alone. It's a
503
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:42,439
great vintage anyway. Yeah, beautiful. '16 as well. I took a
504
00:31:42,439 --> 00:31:46,153
bottle of '16 with me, so if you want just to share a
505
00:31:46,153 --> 00:31:48,898
glass, I'd be delighted to. Yes, I would love to taste it.
506
00:31:50,690 --> 00:31:54,450
What was your personal track to get this? Were you in the wine trade
507
00:31:54,482 --> 00:31:58,242
before this job? What were you doing? Yeah, I grew up in the vines
508
00:31:58,758 --> 00:32:02,297
in the Médoc on my father's side. Some of my
509
00:32:02,345 --> 00:32:06,048
family were involved in the wine industry, so I grew up in the
510
00:32:06,048 --> 00:32:09,799
vine. And then, I mean, from a year to another, I finally decided to
511
00:32:09,799 --> 00:32:13,069
make that job. So I started my journey in the wine industry
512
00:32:13,566 --> 00:32:17,141
at the fantastic Château de Reignac, maybe you heard about this one? Oh, yeah, of
513
00:32:17,157 --> 00:32:20,908
course. Owned by the Vattelot family, and their son Quentin
514
00:32:20,940 --> 00:32:24,242
lives there in Los Angeles. Anyway, so I started there as an
515
00:32:24,242 --> 00:32:27,915
apprenticeship for a year and a half, something like that. Then I switched
516
00:32:27,915 --> 00:32:31,736
to Chanel Group. Some people know that Chanel owns
517
00:32:32,090 --> 00:32:35,831
Château Rosan-Séglaire, Château Canon, Château Berliquet as
518
00:32:35,943 --> 00:32:39,605
well, and most recently, Domaine de l'Île in
519
00:32:39,637 --> 00:32:43,378
Porquerolles, small Iceland in south of France. Anyway, I was
520
00:32:43,491 --> 00:32:47,296
working 4 years with them, not with the estate, but for
521
00:32:47,328 --> 00:32:51,118
their one merchant company. The name is Ulysse Cazabonne. It's a négociant.
522
00:32:52,563 --> 00:32:56,174
Then I moved to Dourt Group, an iconic Iconic
523
00:32:56,174 --> 00:32:59,987
Group in Bordeaux, owning 8 estates in total. 4 years
524
00:33:00,084 --> 00:33:03,545
as well, and more recently joining 2 years ago Domaine
525
00:33:03,545 --> 00:33:07,311
Clavin-Syllan as sales manager for Château Quintus. Wow, congratulations. That's a
526
00:33:07,311 --> 00:33:11,124
pretty fast track to do all that. Driven by passion.
527
00:33:11,717 --> 00:33:14,458
By passion. Let's talk about that for a second.
528
00:33:16,028 --> 00:33:19,650
I had Monsieur Clouet on the show. I was at
529
00:33:19,650 --> 00:33:22,346
Château Cheval Blanc and Got to sit with him and
530
00:33:23,647 --> 00:33:27,358
have lunch in the vineyard, which was amazing. But I
531
00:33:27,358 --> 00:33:31,134
also had a gentleman named Zaya Unan here sitting
532
00:33:31,134 --> 00:33:34,781
where you're sitting, an Iranian immigrant to America, amazing
533
00:33:35,135 --> 00:33:38,814
gentleman, brilliant engineer who wanted
534
00:33:38,910 --> 00:33:42,542
to get into the luxury brands of the
535
00:33:42,606 --> 00:33:46,414
world. Okay. So he has his own Cuban cigar line. He has his
536
00:33:46,478 --> 00:33:50,140
own scotch line. And he bought, and I thought this was very interesting,
537
00:33:50,253 --> 00:33:53,722
he went right to Saint-Émilion. Now he has Château Zaya.
538
00:33:54,333 --> 00:33:57,883
I heard about it. That's why, I mean, I heard more recently
539
00:33:57,883 --> 00:34:01,577
because I didn't really know about that estate, but all the wine shop and liquor
540
00:34:01,577 --> 00:34:05,031
shop I visited during my trip here, I seen this label.
541
00:34:05,850 --> 00:34:09,544
It's a golden one. Golden black. Yeah, I've seen it. Okay,
542
00:34:09,608 --> 00:34:13,446
that's so interesting. I'll tell you why. I never tasted this estate. Well, it's
543
00:34:13,446 --> 00:34:16,978
new to America and it's distributed by a very young, small
544
00:34:16,978 --> 00:34:20,542
group of importer and distributor. Okay. But here, but
545
00:34:20,590 --> 00:34:24,330
here's two things. One, I thought it was fascinating that
546
00:34:24,523 --> 00:34:27,958
he wants to build a luxury brand of everything
547
00:34:28,151 --> 00:34:31,811
like LVMH or Chanel. I see. So that's his goal.
548
00:34:32,565 --> 00:34:36,081
Now, he's, he's very wealthy. He's made a lot of money in engineering. And so
549
00:34:36,081 --> 00:34:39,372
the first thing he did on the wine side was go to Sant'Emilion. And I
550
00:34:39,388 --> 00:34:43,048
forgot how many hectares he has. Quite a bit. Okay. Three different properties.
551
00:34:44,110 --> 00:34:47,821
And then cigars and all that kind of stuff. But his point to
552
00:34:47,821 --> 00:34:50,841
me was, because of my background, his background,
553
00:34:51,435 --> 00:34:55,034
he created jet engines, you know, for
554
00:34:55,034 --> 00:34:58,633
General Electric, stuff like this, was all I had to do is pick up the
555
00:34:58,649 --> 00:35:02,424
phone and call anybody I want and say, you're going to get my
556
00:35:02,424 --> 00:35:06,200
wines. And when you tell me you saw them here, I didn't. I've never
557
00:35:06,200 --> 00:35:09,831
seen them on the shelf. But Shadow Quintus? No.
558
00:35:10,216 --> 00:35:13,909
Oh, sorry. Zaya. Château Zaya. So that's why that was the
559
00:35:13,909 --> 00:35:17,586
question. Like, how did you— you have heard of it, which is pretty fascinating.
560
00:35:17,699 --> 00:35:21,375
But anyway, the point I'm making is that Mission Wine Shop, where again? Yeah, he
561
00:35:21,375 --> 00:35:24,763
would go to Mission for sure. Remedy, probably somewhere else as well. I don't remember.
562
00:35:24,844 --> 00:35:28,264
Maybe at Wallis. So why do you think the
563
00:35:28,280 --> 00:35:31,539
Chanels and the LVMHs of the world, are they
564
00:35:32,631 --> 00:35:36,371
still pursuing wineries and Because I heard that
565
00:35:36,627 --> 00:35:40,378
some are selling off because that sector is
566
00:35:40,490 --> 00:35:43,743
just not that profitable anymore, as profitable as it was.
567
00:35:44,481 --> 00:35:48,199
Or is it part of the bigger picture of a luxury brand to have a
568
00:35:48,199 --> 00:35:51,709
château like this? Yeah, probably. I mean, I'm not in their
569
00:35:51,709 --> 00:35:55,555
strategy, but I mean, it's also an investment
570
00:35:55,555 --> 00:35:57,639
buying an estate, developing it.
571
00:35:59,867 --> 00:36:03,521
And once you get money to help your salesperson, your
572
00:36:03,569 --> 00:36:06,584
team on the ground, on the field, to produce the best wine as they can.
573
00:36:07,242 --> 00:36:11,077
Most of the time it works. Wine is just all about time
574
00:36:11,173 --> 00:36:14,928
as well. We have to be patient. Quintus, for example, Quintus have been
575
00:36:15,442 --> 00:36:19,101
born in 2011. That's fascinating. So new in the wine industry.
576
00:36:19,470 --> 00:36:23,273
So we have to, we must have a very long-term
577
00:36:23,305 --> 00:36:27,092
vision. We're just a step in this wine industry.
578
00:36:27,894 --> 00:36:31,360
So I probably going to be there for, I don't know, the next
579
00:36:31,665 --> 00:36:35,340
30 years in the wine industry, 40 years maybe. But then, I mean, the château,
580
00:36:36,383 --> 00:36:39,847
still here, you know. So the story continues. We
581
00:36:40,151 --> 00:36:43,936
must have a long-term vision. So I think that for this big and main group
582
00:36:43,936 --> 00:36:47,577
like Chanel, you said, or I don't know, LVMH, they have this
583
00:36:47,689 --> 00:36:50,768
long-term vision. They have this long-term vision. You know, there's no other—
584
00:36:51,522 --> 00:36:55,290
I think of this all the time— there's no other product
585
00:36:57,632 --> 00:37:01,400
that's the reverse of what consumerism is. If you
586
00:37:01,400 --> 00:37:05,093
ask Oddany Global, that group out of the Rhône who's
587
00:37:05,238 --> 00:37:09,027
working on, you know, helping wineries meet the demands of
588
00:37:09,332 --> 00:37:10,408
the modern consumer.
589
00:37:13,041 --> 00:37:16,028
But wine is to be a
590
00:37:16,156 --> 00:37:19,753
representation of its time and its place always,
591
00:37:20,010 --> 00:37:23,350
right? And so you don't look at the market and say,
592
00:37:23,864 --> 00:37:26,674
oh, they want sweeter, they want drier, they want this and this. You can, you
593
00:37:26,674 --> 00:37:30,367
can make some small adjustments, but your job is still to, and so the
594
00:37:30,367 --> 00:37:34,140
consumer has to react to the product rather than the product reacting to the
595
00:37:34,140 --> 00:37:37,978
consumer, in my opinion, of an honest wine. There's a
596
00:37:37,994 --> 00:37:41,784
whole segment of the market that doesn't do that. Unfortunately, they
597
00:37:41,784 --> 00:37:45,124
don't listen to the market. Good. Yeah, we do.
598
00:37:46,184 --> 00:37:49,797
We try to— I mean, being first of all on the market here on the
599
00:37:49,797 --> 00:37:53,602
field, on the ground, doing the masterclass or meeting some sommeliers all over
600
00:37:53,666 --> 00:37:57,167
the world help us also to understand the needs of each market. Sometimes from
601
00:37:57,215 --> 00:38:00,956
Asia to Europe or from Europe to US, can be
602
00:38:00,956 --> 00:38:04,467
very different. So we have to adapt ourselves, but then
603
00:38:04,900 --> 00:38:08,667
we don't have to forget where we're from. We don't have to forget
604
00:38:08,667 --> 00:38:12,354
what we want to create as well. So, you know, wine is also—
605
00:38:12,899 --> 00:38:16,714
it's a philosophy, but it's also all about creating emotion.
606
00:38:17,307 --> 00:38:20,818
And when you create emotion, it's also the feeling of the
607
00:38:20,914 --> 00:38:24,633
winemaker most of the time. So this is what we
608
00:38:24,842 --> 00:38:28,658
try to do in general. For our 3 estates. And for
609
00:38:28,658 --> 00:38:32,442
that, but I'm sure Guillaume must have told you this a few years ago,
610
00:38:32,474 --> 00:38:36,211
but in Château Aubryon, we have the fabulous family Delmas,
611
00:38:36,564 --> 00:38:39,803
actually represented by Jean-Philippe Delmas, which are
612
00:38:40,893 --> 00:38:44,469
among them since a very long time. They were here, I mean,
613
00:38:44,822 --> 00:38:48,398
the grandfather of Jean-Philippe was in Château Aubryon
614
00:38:48,510 --> 00:38:52,054
before Clarence Dillon came to purchase the
615
00:38:52,054 --> 00:38:55,823
estate in 1935. '75. So that's been a while. Yeah.
616
00:38:56,608 --> 00:38:59,206
Interesting. 100 years. Yeah. That's amazing.
617
00:39:01,098 --> 00:39:04,946
The emotion part is the most important. I think it's a critical term.
618
00:39:05,251 --> 00:39:09,051
Yeah. And you've done this a long time.
619
00:39:09,099 --> 00:39:12,306
I've done this a long time. And there are some wines that you just put
620
00:39:12,306 --> 00:39:16,139
to your nose and you go, oh my gosh, this is extraordinary emotional.
621
00:39:16,572 --> 00:39:20,244
And I think the novice wine drinker understands that, doesn't know how to
622
00:39:20,244 --> 00:39:23,952
express it. But we'll get that sensation and go, wait a minute,
623
00:39:24,353 --> 00:39:27,885
there's something very powerful here. So, but here's
624
00:39:28,271 --> 00:39:31,835
the challenge I see. You must like football or soccer.
625
00:39:32,140 --> 00:39:35,641
Sure. Right? Baseball's probably not part of your regular.
626
00:39:35,914 --> 00:39:39,462
Yeah, yeah. Totally. It
627
00:39:39,607 --> 00:39:42,850
doesn't matter whether it's football, American football,
628
00:39:42,979 --> 00:39:45,853
baseball, or lacrosse.
629
00:39:47,972 --> 00:39:51,679
If I go to the local stadium in Saint-Émilion and I
630
00:39:51,711 --> 00:39:54,856
watch a game, a match, and there's how many?
631
00:39:54,921 --> 00:39:58,692
50,000? I'm not sure. With all due respect, I'm not sure
632
00:39:58,692 --> 00:40:01,131
you're going to enjoy your time.
633
00:40:03,426 --> 00:40:05,769
And you know what?
634
00:40:06,187 --> 00:40:09,958
Southwest of France is more driven by the rugby. Okay,
635
00:40:10,022 --> 00:40:13,842
well, okay, let's call it rugby then. Yeah, the sporty bit of The sport really
636
00:40:13,955 --> 00:40:17,584
is, is kind of insignificant. The reason I bring it up is like, okay,
637
00:40:17,969 --> 00:40:21,726
Dodger Stadium here can hold, I think, 55,000
638
00:40:21,726 --> 00:40:24,986
people. Yeah. Well, those 55,000 people, all of them
639
00:40:25,676 --> 00:40:29,128
got in their car, drove, put up with the parking problem,
640
00:40:29,674 --> 00:40:33,512
walked to their seat and sit in the sun for 9 innings, 3 hours
641
00:40:34,186 --> 00:40:38,024
to watch a baseball game. And every one of them has a different perspective
642
00:40:38,024 --> 00:40:41,783
on that game. Some don't even care. Some go for the hot dogs. You're right.
643
00:40:42,201 --> 00:40:46,041
Some go and analyze every single play and every single
644
00:40:46,073 --> 00:40:49,528
player and every single pitch. So how— this is sort of a
645
00:40:49,528 --> 00:40:53,304
rhetorical question, but how do we get all the people in the
646
00:40:53,304 --> 00:40:57,000
stadium? Yeah, good question. Right. With a different
647
00:40:57,000 --> 00:41:00,760
opinion. I don't know how you do it. No, I think
648
00:41:00,760 --> 00:41:04,262
we don't have to be snob with the wine, of course.
649
00:41:04,632 --> 00:41:08,308
People know a lot, some sommeliers, some passionate people, but
650
00:41:09,753 --> 00:41:13,430
wine is also just a drink to share at the beginning
651
00:41:13,767 --> 00:41:17,460
and to give emotion, as we said, to give pleasure to
652
00:41:17,460 --> 00:41:20,414
people, to do wine and food pairing as well. So
653
00:41:22,132 --> 00:41:25,921
if people just enjoy the wine by itself, it's fine. Just take
654
00:41:25,921 --> 00:41:29,517
it down to that level. That's it. Open that bottle up and just let people
655
00:41:29,517 --> 00:41:33,094
enjoy it. Take a seat. I feel like a glass right now. As soon as
656
00:41:33,126 --> 00:41:35,643
we're done with this, you're going to open it. Yeah. But
657
00:41:37,519 --> 00:41:40,677
you said something important just then about the knowledgeable somms,
658
00:41:40,741 --> 00:41:42,424
etc.
659
00:41:44,572 --> 00:41:48,179
I went to lunch the other day with Lorenzo Pasquini. All right. Of
660
00:41:48,339 --> 00:41:51,898
Château d'Yquem. Yeah. And
661
00:41:52,524 --> 00:41:56,211
he was in town recently. Yeah, right. And there was a gentleman across the
662
00:41:56,211 --> 00:42:00,049
way. And I won't name any names and I won't
663
00:42:00,049 --> 00:42:03,743
bring his picture out, but I thought to myself, he's the
664
00:42:03,743 --> 00:42:06,698
exact reason why people are intimidated.
665
00:42:07,839 --> 00:42:11,565
A little older than me, but one of those guys that just
666
00:42:12,111 --> 00:42:15,629
will bore you to death. I think you have to adapt
667
00:42:15,629 --> 00:42:19,147
yourself to the people you are talking to. I mean, I
668
00:42:19,420 --> 00:42:23,018
used to work at the beginning of my career in hospitality, so I used to
669
00:42:23,018 --> 00:42:26,789
do the visit, the tours and everything. And from a group to another, you
670
00:42:26,789 --> 00:42:30,636
can have passionate people that know much more than you. And
671
00:42:30,669 --> 00:42:34,308
the next group, I mean, on the afternoon, could be just like tourists just coming
672
00:42:34,340 --> 00:42:37,626
to visit and enjoying the place with the children on the back. So
673
00:42:38,588 --> 00:42:42,387
you have to adapt yourself. And the more simple you are with people, the more
674
00:42:42,580 --> 00:42:45,513
easy it will be to them to understand your wine.
675
00:42:46,700 --> 00:42:50,467
So yeah, I think one is— So you have to live this sort
676
00:42:50,467 --> 00:42:54,155
of difference every time it happens. I mean, that you, you are in a room
677
00:42:54,460 --> 00:42:57,362
and you never know what level you're going to speak to.
678
00:42:58,292 --> 00:43:01,932
That's sometimes the more challenging during the masterclass. That's why I'd like
679
00:43:02,237 --> 00:43:05,893
to start by asking people where they're from. Oh,
680
00:43:06,005 --> 00:43:08,827
that's a good idea. What are the different knowledge of everyone so that
681
00:43:09,517 --> 00:43:13,141
I'm not going to be boring for them or I'm not going to give, I
682
00:43:13,141 --> 00:43:16,989
don't know, too many specific and technical explanation. Find
683
00:43:16,989 --> 00:43:20,557
out who you're talking to, right? Yeah, I'm going to just— I want them to
684
00:43:20,557 --> 00:43:24,388
have a good time to understand for sure. Let
685
00:43:24,388 --> 00:43:26,480
me get a couple of glasses. So
686
00:43:28,348 --> 00:43:32,131
this is— what's the cépage? What's the blend of this? Typical
687
00:43:32,131 --> 00:43:35,963
from the Right Bank. As I said, it's— Right Bank is mainly driven by clay
688
00:43:36,060 --> 00:43:39,293
and limestone. And this is what we have in Château Quintus. Quintus, in fact— oh,
689
00:43:39,875 --> 00:43:43,496
I'm going to try to explain it as best because
690
00:43:43,529 --> 00:43:45,893
some people are going to watch us, but some people are just going to hear
691
00:43:45,893 --> 00:43:49,720
me. That's true. Château Quintus
692
00:43:50,057 --> 00:43:53,783
is located on a promontory at the
693
00:43:53,863 --> 00:43:57,476
top southwest of Saint-Émilion. So it means
694
00:43:57,540 --> 00:44:00,672
that the château is located on the top of the hill and it creates a
695
00:44:00,672 --> 00:44:04,092
kind of pyramid where the two expositions
696
00:44:04,365 --> 00:44:07,336
belong to Château Quintus, which is a pretty good thing for us compared to the
697
00:44:07,336 --> 00:44:10,789
other estates. Both on the northern area and the
698
00:44:10,789 --> 00:44:14,483
southern area, which is very nice because nowadays with the global warming, You know
699
00:44:14,499 --> 00:44:18,226
that we are facing some crazy challenging vintages. 2022 has been
700
00:44:18,258 --> 00:44:21,921
so hot, 2024 much more rainy. So it permits the team of
701
00:44:21,937 --> 00:44:25,423
Château Quintus to adapt themselves and to pick sometimes a bit more of the
702
00:44:25,423 --> 00:44:29,198
northern part to get the freshness, the minerality, the tension on a very
703
00:44:29,246 --> 00:44:32,941
hot and warm vintage. And on the other hand, for the
704
00:44:32,941 --> 00:44:36,733
rainy vintage, picking sometimes a bit more of the southern part
705
00:44:36,733 --> 00:44:39,303
to get some alcohol degree, to get some, I
706
00:44:40,974 --> 00:44:44,795
could say, powerful and more full-bodied part in the
707
00:44:44,827 --> 00:44:47,781
blend. So Quintus blends, the Grand Vins,
708
00:44:48,439 --> 00:44:51,955
and especially the 2016 is 70% Merlot
709
00:44:52,468 --> 00:44:55,807
and 30% Cabernet Franc. It aged for 12 months in oak barrels
710
00:44:56,160 --> 00:44:59,821
with around 35 to 39% of new
711
00:44:59,997 --> 00:45:03,304
oak. And here it is, 10 years old. Wow. Well, let's see what you got.
712
00:45:03,609 --> 00:45:07,028
That sounds very enticing or
713
00:45:07,077 --> 00:45:10,221
delicious. I love that noise. Yeah.
714
00:45:12,288 --> 00:45:15,895
Wow. Quintus '16. This is '16? Yeah.
715
00:45:16,056 --> 00:45:19,598
Look at the color, how deep it is. Well,
716
00:45:19,887 --> 00:45:23,429
the complexity in the nose is
717
00:45:23,429 --> 00:45:27,277
amazing, but it's still showing a lot of youth from that.
718
00:45:27,758 --> 00:45:31,445
That's a wine which is perfectly drinkable now, but which— The
719
00:45:31,525 --> 00:45:34,939
color is beautiful. That you can keep in the cellar for a few more years.
720
00:45:35,115 --> 00:45:38,658
Yeah. The Grand Vin especially, I picked with me 2 bottles, but
721
00:45:38,658 --> 00:45:42,428
decided to open the Grand Vin. The Grand Vin Specialized wine, which is dedicated
722
00:45:42,428 --> 00:45:46,009
for gastronomy, in my opinion, that's a wine we need to pair with something.
723
00:45:47,069 --> 00:45:49,975
You know, the acid in the Cabernet Franc is perfect at the end. I'm fond
724
00:45:49,975 --> 00:45:52,737
of that. Yeah. With some beef. The acidity shows pretty well here.
725
00:45:53,507 --> 00:45:57,184
Sure. Thanks for bringing that up. Cheers. Thanks for hosting me. Pleasure to
726
00:45:57,184 --> 00:45:59,416
meet you. That's fascinating.
727
00:46:00,958 --> 00:46:04,522
Well, it satisfied my desire for a glass of wine, that's for sure.
728
00:46:07,073 --> 00:46:10,838
You know, it's funny, I have collectors and, you know, it's
729
00:46:10,918 --> 00:46:14,650
not too many Burgundy collectors, but mostly Bordeaux collectors. And that's why that
730
00:46:14,747 --> 00:46:18,351
you show that there's Costes-Estournel out there, there's Aussonne out
731
00:46:18,351 --> 00:46:22,036
there ready for pickup. And there's
732
00:46:22,036 --> 00:46:25,640
something about the Bordeaux side of the world that
733
00:46:25,656 --> 00:46:29,309
just creates this enthusiasm. And maybe it's the emotion,
734
00:46:29,501 --> 00:46:33,186
maybe that's what it is. Absolutely. I think so. I think we also need
735
00:46:33,186 --> 00:46:36,918
to tell the people that once they travel to France, they should come and say
736
00:46:36,934 --> 00:46:40,674
hi to us. Come and visit. They don't have to be
737
00:46:41,428 --> 00:46:45,186
shy or whatever. They can just knock at the door, book an
738
00:46:45,218 --> 00:46:49,055
appointment, and make a tour with us. I mean, that's the only way to really
739
00:46:49,135 --> 00:46:52,620
understand the product, the philosophy of the
740
00:46:52,684 --> 00:46:56,104
winemakers, but also the philosophy of the Domaine
741
00:46:56,136 --> 00:46:59,974
Clavenzillon in general. That's a good point, and we'll wrap up
742
00:46:59,974 --> 00:47:03,683
with this. We're already out of time after I ask you this question. But,
743
00:47:06,011 --> 00:47:09,431
you know, tourism, you know, wine tourism is on the rise.
744
00:47:09,784 --> 00:47:13,365
Yeah. And it goes back to that experiential idea that we were talking about
745
00:47:13,397 --> 00:47:17,090
where people need to have this experience. But all over the world, it's on the
746
00:47:17,090 --> 00:47:20,269
rise. There are groups in Armenia where MyHeritage is
747
00:47:20,783 --> 00:47:24,476
putting together wine tours. And it seems to me
748
00:47:24,476 --> 00:47:28,185
that that— like when I travel, of course, I'm in the industry,
749
00:47:28,249 --> 00:47:32,023
but my friends that travel with me expect to
750
00:47:32,023 --> 00:47:35,459
go visit a winery. Yeah. It's just, and they'll do whatever it takes.
751
00:47:36,262 --> 00:47:39,682
We were in Bari in, in the, in the Puglia and I
752
00:47:39,874 --> 00:47:42,684
rented a van. It was like an hour and 25 minute drive to get this
753
00:47:42,765 --> 00:47:46,538
little tiny winery with this little room and, and taste
754
00:47:46,538 --> 00:47:50,327
wine with the winemaker. And they were, they loved it. 3 hours worth of driving
755
00:47:50,327 --> 00:47:54,100
just to taste the expression of this area.
756
00:47:54,582 --> 00:47:58,244
And I think that's an important part of what's going to be happening here. Yeah,
757
00:47:58,260 --> 00:48:01,327
I think it's part of Bordeaux mood. I mean, there are so many things to
758
00:48:01,327 --> 00:48:04,748
do in Bordeaux, of course, and around. We are very close to the
759
00:48:04,764 --> 00:48:08,361
Atlantic Sea, the Atlantic Ocean, which is,
760
00:48:08,955 --> 00:48:12,649
by the way, beautiful. We've got the land area with the
761
00:48:12,649 --> 00:48:16,198
beautiful forest. You've got the Bassin d'Arcachon. But of course, you
762
00:48:16,246 --> 00:48:19,731
can't come and stop in Bordeaux without visiting an
763
00:48:19,731 --> 00:48:23,296
estate, without visiting a château. We are lucky
764
00:48:23,810 --> 00:48:27,471
to have some beautiful estates where the wines are such outstanding
765
00:48:28,530 --> 00:48:32,352
and beautiful. But we're also lucky because mostly Château
766
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:36,109
Haut-Brion and La Mission Haut-Brion are located very close to the city
767
00:48:36,109 --> 00:48:39,786
center now. In the past, it used to be in the countryside. Now, as Bordeaux
768
00:48:39,786 --> 00:48:43,014
has grown and grown, now the estates are
769
00:48:43,014 --> 00:48:46,594
surrounded by the city. Okay, here we go.
770
00:48:47,487 --> 00:48:51,190
Now I'm going to remind you that nobody—
771
00:48:51,222 --> 00:48:53,938
going to be tricky for me. I'm going to give you 3 questions. I'm going
772
00:48:53,954 --> 00:48:54,989
to try my best. I'm going to give you 3 answers.
773
00:48:57,180 --> 00:49:00,500
And so far, basically,
774
00:49:01,747 --> 00:49:05,529
and I can only do this with French folks because all the
775
00:49:05,529 --> 00:49:09,006
wines are French. Do someone French. He's a French doctor. Yeah. But
776
00:49:09,071 --> 00:49:12,838
anyway, mathematically, you have a 33% chance of
777
00:49:12,854 --> 00:49:16,699
getting it right. 33%, all right. And that's basically what happens. Come
778
00:49:16,699 --> 00:49:20,470
on, you never know. I'm ready, let's go. Okay, so
779
00:49:21,578 --> 00:49:25,301
this is a list of human ailments. In this case, we're going to
780
00:49:25,365 --> 00:49:25,702
pick
781
00:49:30,100 --> 00:49:33,647
nervous depression. Nervous depression. Can you imagine that?
782
00:49:33,711 --> 00:49:36,584
Nervous depression with wine, and wine's going to fix it. So there's not only a
783
00:49:36,600 --> 00:49:40,082
wine that goes with it— I'll give you the 3 choices— there's a
784
00:49:40,852 --> 00:49:44,682
dosage, like a doctor would give you a prescription. Yeah, absolutely. Okay,
785
00:49:44,698 --> 00:49:48,223
so you could either have a Medoc red, a
786
00:49:48,223 --> 00:49:52,037
glass of champagne, or Côte de Beaune. Which
787
00:49:52,133 --> 00:49:55,883
one of those would help you with nervous depression and
788
00:49:55,979 --> 00:49:59,649
why? Really, the question is why? Nervous depression? I'll say champagne. Champagne is a party
789
00:49:59,681 --> 00:50:03,158
wine. Ah, there you go. See, that's a good reason.
790
00:50:03,430 --> 00:50:07,100
Yeah, I think so. But it's the wrong answer. Come on. It's the
791
00:50:07,100 --> 00:50:10,627
midriff? It's the midriff, yeah. Here's what it said.
792
00:50:11,846 --> 00:50:15,469
Because the glycerin it contains combines in the intestine with the
793
00:50:15,533 --> 00:50:19,301
phosphates of the fermented grape juice— you didn't know this, did you?— to form
794
00:50:19,317 --> 00:50:23,133
glycerol phosphates of natural lime, which have
795
00:50:23,229 --> 00:50:26,949
tonic virtues and which do not interfere with the functional integrity of the
796
00:50:26,949 --> 00:50:30,364
nervous system. Did you know this? I'm not sure it
797
00:50:30,364 --> 00:50:34,147
helps. I heard about that. And the dosage is 1 or
798
00:50:34,147 --> 00:50:37,354
2 glasses before and during meals So consider
799
00:50:37,995 --> 00:50:40,287
that a bottle a day, basically 2 glasses,
800
00:50:42,243 --> 00:50:45,994
3 meals. Well, not so bad. Good portion. Of
801
00:50:45,994 --> 00:50:49,714
course you're going to feel better. Of course. Yeah. You're
802
00:50:49,714 --> 00:50:53,288
not going to have nervous depression. I mean, Niels, it's such an honor to have
803
00:50:53,288 --> 00:50:55,917
you here. And so wish you luck on the rest of your trip and that
804
00:50:55,933 --> 00:50:59,027
we accomplish the things that we're trying to do here
805
00:50:59,637 --> 00:51:03,117
with alerting the public to wines like this. A gorgeous
806
00:51:04,193 --> 00:51:07,983
Quintus. Quintus. Quintus. Quintus. Yeah. Why do I say
807
00:51:07,983 --> 00:51:11,499
it that? Quintus. Quintus. There is another anecdote about
808
00:51:11,499 --> 00:51:15,193
Quintus. As we purchased 3 different estates to
809
00:51:15,193 --> 00:51:18,886
create Château Quintus, they used to have previous names. It was difficult to do a
810
00:51:18,886 --> 00:51:22,355
mix of these names, so we decided to rename the estate for
811
00:51:22,355 --> 00:51:25,856
Quintus. A long time ago, the Gallo-Romans that used to
812
00:51:25,888 --> 00:51:29,598
create the village of Saint-Émilion, they also used to name their 5th
813
00:51:29,650 --> 00:51:33,443
5th child, Quintus. And 4th in the group—
814
00:51:33,459 --> 00:51:36,400
Must be Latin for 4th. Yeah, 4th in the group, in the range of wine,
815
00:51:36,496 --> 00:51:40,122
we've got Château Aubryon red, Château Aubryon white, La
816
00:51:40,122 --> 00:51:43,937
Mission Aubryon red, white, and the 5th child, Quintus. So it
817
00:51:43,937 --> 00:51:47,267
gives a tribute, first of all, to this gallo-roman. So as a sommelier, if you
818
00:51:47,979 --> 00:51:51,815
want to show up the bottle and just explain to your consumers, you
819
00:51:51,831 --> 00:51:55,424
come, you explain the story, and then they know where they put their foot. You're
820
00:51:55,473 --> 00:51:59,036
in the village of Saint-Émilion, because of the Carole Roman story, but
821
00:51:59,292 --> 00:52:02,515
it's also directly linked to the two big producers from the Left Bank, Aubryon and
822
00:52:02,547 --> 00:52:05,785
La Mission Aubryon. Wow, that is a really fun story. And then the other bottle
823
00:52:05,785 --> 00:52:09,183
you brought was the second label. The other bottle I took with me is the
824
00:52:09,215 --> 00:52:11,908
Dragon of Quintus, which is the second label, actually.
825
00:52:12,918 --> 00:52:16,638
Such an outstanding wine, and in my opinion, probably one of the best value Fumonis
826
00:52:16,654 --> 00:52:20,373
you can find in Bordeaux. And it's younger vines,
827
00:52:21,062 --> 00:52:24,849
barrel select. How do you define it? It's a different brand altogether. Younger
828
00:52:24,849 --> 00:52:28,271
vines, not only. In fact, as I told you, as Quintus is
829
00:52:28,368 --> 00:52:32,062
located on the kind of promontory, we have a kind of Burgundy way to produce
830
00:52:32,062 --> 00:52:34,938
the wine. As you know, in Burgundy, in the valley, you got the Chablis villages,
831
00:52:35,291 --> 00:52:37,669
and then the more you go to the top, the more you got the beautiful
832
00:52:37,701 --> 00:52:41,219
wines. So it's quite the same for Quintus, not because we want to copy the
833
00:52:41,219 --> 00:52:45,010
Burgundy wines, absolutely not, but because of the topology
834
00:52:45,010 --> 00:52:48,047
of the soil. The more you go to the top of this hill, the more
835
00:52:48,047 --> 00:52:51,819
you have the mozzarrock limestone, where you can have some beautiful
836
00:52:52,556 --> 00:52:56,373
expression of the Cabernet Franc on it. So it means that on
837
00:52:56,405 --> 00:53:00,061
the lower area, we have a third wine, which is the Saint-Émilion
838
00:53:00,077 --> 00:53:03,829
Quintus. Anyway, that's an exclusivity of distribution. On the slopes,
839
00:53:03,941 --> 00:53:07,549
we produce the Dragon de Quintus, and on the top, you've got the Grand
840
00:53:08,687 --> 00:53:12,472
Vin. Okay, so it's a separate brand with a separate mission and a
841
00:53:12,472 --> 00:53:16,192
separate purpose. Yeah, absolutely. It's not only two
842
00:53:16,448 --> 00:53:20,024
different prices, it's also 2 different moments to taste them.
843
00:53:21,779 --> 00:53:25,016
I took with me the 2020, which is perfectly drinkable now.
844
00:53:25,338 --> 00:53:29,102
2020 Château Quintus is a bit young in my opinion. So it's
845
00:53:29,102 --> 00:53:32,221
also different ways to open the wine, different ways
846
00:53:32,494 --> 00:53:36,192
to enjoy them. Dragon is more like
847
00:53:36,257 --> 00:53:40,025
the easy one. You got people, friends coming last minute at home.
848
00:53:41,265 --> 00:53:44,743
Don't know what to open, just pop up the bottle and that's beautiful. And you
849
00:53:44,807 --> 00:53:48,438
look French and you got a château and you got a Bordeaux, it's cool. Again,
850
00:53:48,454 --> 00:53:50,972
pleasure to have you here. And I'm going to bring some in and I'm going
851
00:53:50,972 --> 00:53:54,772
to recommend this to my collector clients that would round out
852
00:53:54,772 --> 00:53:57,531
their collection and provide wines.
853
00:53:58,316 --> 00:54:02,005
They're very peculiar about what they
854
00:54:02,005 --> 00:54:05,629
pour their guests. And they could be proud to
855
00:54:05,693 --> 00:54:09,301
pour this. All right. Thank you for hosting me. It was a
856
00:54:09,301 --> 00:54:13,054
pleasure to meet you. Pleasure to share the passion of the wine, Bordeaux, but
857
00:54:13,054 --> 00:54:16,876
also talk bit about Château Quintus here. And once again, if
858
00:54:16,941 --> 00:54:20,751
people want to come and meet us at the château anytime they come and stop
859
00:54:20,816 --> 00:54:23,835
in France, that's an open invitation. Come on.
860
00:54:24,755 --> 00:54:25,466
Cheers. Cheers.



