The 62nd Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges wine auction held last Sunday raised a staggering ‹€3,603,000, a 45% increase on last year. The generosity of the 2022 vintage meant that 160 barrels were put up for sale compared to 109 last year.
Burgundy is a wine region that becomes clearer the longer you spend physically in it. To understand the topography of the wine region and why the appellations and their wines are what they are, you need to actually go there and tread the terroir. To get to grips with Burgundy’s wine trade, the people, the culture and the customs then you need to seize every opportunity to visit with both hands.
So, when I got the chance to attend the annual Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges auction as a guest of Maison Edouard Delaunay earlier this month, it was chance that I was never going to turn down. The Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges, like its better known ‘cousin’ the Hospices de Beaune, is a Bourgogne institution, ripe with fascinating history, ritual and foibles that you only fully understand by taking part.
The wonderous revival of Maison Edouard Delaunay
Laurent Delaunay has had a circuitous route in buying back the family domaine
No explanation of the weekend could begin without a word on our hosts. The story of the revival and extraordinary acclaim of Maison Edouard Delaunay deserves some good column inches.
Current owner, Laurent Delaunay, is the fifth generation of family winemakers and négociants. Great grandfather, Edouard Delaunay, progressed his own father’s wine business one step further by moving his family from Nantes to Burgundy and establishing the négociant firm in 1893. Over the next century, successive generations grew the business, not only in terms of vineyards and production, but also international reach and fame.
In 1993 however, due to circumstances beyond anyone’s control, the vineyards and winery had to be sold and Delaunay and his wife Cathérine found themselves setting up a new venture in Languedoc. Both functioned as consultant winemakers across the region before they eventually acquired vineyards of their own and launched the hugely successful Les Jamelles brand. Success followed success and they were eventually able to acquire a merchant firm that left them looking after the distribution for a number of independent producers Burgundy.
This move built a large network of close clients and allies throughout Burgundy and, when in 2017 Delaunay had the opportunity to buy back the Maison Edouard Delaunay name and winery, he had plenty of goodwill to help with the re-establishment of this famous old name.
Award-winning return to form
Within just a few years, under the watchful eye of cellar master and winemaker Christophe Briotet, the wines coming out of Maison Edouard Delaunay had a large following of devoted drinkers. Awards followed, with Briotet being awarded the IWC’s Red Winemaker of the Year award in 2020 and 2022, and White Winemaker of the Year in 2021.
Thanks to the varied journey Delaunay and winemaking wife Cathérine have taken to arrive back in their Burgundian home, they can boast an unique network of grape growers that supply them with some of the finest quality grapes across Burgundy. This includes a concentration on biodynamic, organic, and HVE-certified growers as the maison looks to future proof its newly-reclaimed place amongst the finest producers in the region.
The rise and rise of the Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges auction
The caves of the Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges where the pre-auction tasting took place
The Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges auction is the lesser known, more northern equivalent of the Hospices de Beaune auction. The Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges charity is officially older, having been set up in 1290 (Beaune was 1443). It has since been granted gifts of 12.5 hectares of vineyards from local families over the years. This gift included many lots of Premier Cru vineyards, mostly in Nuits-St-Georges and a small pocket in nearby Gevrey-Chambertin. Over the years the wines produced were either consumed at the Hospices or more often sold to raise funds for the hospital itself. Maison Edouard Delaunay was always highly involved, often being the sole purchaser of the Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges wines right up until the inaugural auction in 1961.
The 2023 edition marked the 62nd wine auction, which looked to raise money for the Hospices and other local hospitals. There was also a special auction lot to raise money for Les Blouses Roses, a local association founded 80 years ago to provide care and support for both hospitalised children and the elderly patients that are in need of long-term care.
How the auction weekend works
We arrived on the Saturday morning, fresh from a battle with the motorway from Lyon Airport. After some slight difficulty with the sat nav and not an insignificant amount of being castigated by irate local drivers, we eventually found the Hospices itself, the setting for the barrel tasting that precedes the auction on the Sunday afternoon. Delaunay was there to greet us and his enthusiasm for the auction weekend was clear from the off. He took us down to the cellar room where the 2022 vintage was waiting in a total of 160 pièces (the Burgundian 227-litre barrel). A comparatively modest number of barrels compared to the famed auction in Beaune, it reflects the production from 12.5 hectares compared to nearly 5 times that for its southern counterpart.
There were 19 different wines to try, with 18 reds and one sole white cuvée. The first thing that hit me was that we were actually trying the wines straight out of the barrel. I’ve worked with Bordeaux Wines for over a decade and attended Primeur tastings on numerous occasions, where you’re fully aware you’re usually tasting a wine that has been made specifically for the press testing week. For these samples in the Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges to be drawn straight from the barrel the morning of the tasting makes decision making for the potential buyers the day after a lot more straightforward.
We tried our way through all 19 barrels, making our notes and comments along the way. Although I was comfortably not in any position to be bidding on anything the day after, I still wanted to test my palate and see if I could pick the best of the ‘runners and riders’ and left with a few to keep my eye on when the gavel was drawn on the Sunday.
The big day itself and the scores on the doors
Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges auction, March 12, 2023
Sunday’s auction itself, as you would fully expect, starts with lunch. Speeches were held, laughs were shared, beautiful wine was poured, and I was thrilled to actually be taking part in the weird and wonderful chanting and dancing (yes, the one with the hands!) that clearly left most newbies, including myself the first time they cracked it out, completely bemused! As someone who has run a few wine dinners myself, I can tell you it’s not the worst idea to get your punters well fed and a little bit tipsy before entering the bidding room.
As we filed into the room itself and famed auctioneer Hugues Cortot got the action underway, the old trader in me was both impressed and dismayed at certain participants’ varied auction techniques. Luckily Delaunay can call upon the expertise of his wife Cathérine. “I get too stressed,” smiled Delaunay, “but Cathérine really enjoys it and has nerves of steel. There is no doubt who should hold the paddle.”
After just under two hours of auction, the final lot was sold and the scores were in. 2023’s auction was a record breaker, raising a fabulous €3,603,000, up 45% from 2022. The 160 regular lots went in a range of €11,000 to €55,000 at an average price of €22,519 per barrel.
The highest price went, as expected, to a Nuits-Saint-Georges 1er Cru Les Saint-Georges. The ‘Cuvée Georges Faiveley’ went for an historic high of €55,000. Another 1er Cru Saint-Georges cuvée, the old-vine Hugues Perdrizet (one of my picks I might add!), went for €40,000 which was an impressive return for such a new cuvée to the market.
The special barrel for Les Blouses Roses, the so called Cuvée des Bienfaiteurs, went as a silent auction. This unique blend of the estate’s Premiers Crus eventually fetched an impressive €64,580, at an equivalent bottle price of €213. Those of you lucky enough will no doubt see the occasional bottle at charity dinners around the world in the years to come.
“This was a great result” beamed Delaunay. “The Hospices made a record amount of money, yet the average price per bottle was lower than the year before as we had more on offer, so the consumer will have greater value. It really has been win-win today.”
And so to next year
Laurent Delaunay: “win win”
One thing that Delaunay himself is keen to push is that this is not a closed shop. The official rule is that the barrels, once purchased, have to be transported to a local négociant cellar to finish their ageing before being bottled the year after. But nearly all major players in the region welcome clients all across the world to join them in the bidding process and offer their cellar to successful bidders.
“It must be bottled with the historic Hospices de Nuits-Saint-Georges label but it can include both the purchaser and the bottler on the label,” explained Delaunay. “We are very pleased to see more and more clients looking to buy their own barrels. As recently as 2017 some barrels were going unsold, but just a few years on we’re now seeing much greater interest. We’re now buying only 30% for ourselves and 70% are directly for some of our accounts around the world.”
With prices and prestige at the more famous Hospices de Beaune continuing to rise, the wines at the Hospices de Nuits-Georges auction still offer a great value option, at least as far as premier cru Burgundian wines go. More so, it’s fabulous to see this cultural link to the region’s past going form strength to strength. With the commitment and enthusiasm of characters like Laurent and Cathérine Delaunay, the records look set to tumble for many years to come.
The wines of Maison Edouard Delaunay are imported by Bancroft Wines and Honest Grapes. For more information about Maison Edouard Delaunay please contact Emma Roberts on emma@eviva.co.uk
Mike Turner is a freelance writer, presenter, and educator and regular contributor for The Buyer. He also runs a wine events business, Feel Good Grapes (www.feelgoodgrapes.com), that explores and discusses the idea of sustainability in the wine trade.
