Nacional - Myth or Magic?

[uncle tom]

In another thread, Axel asks me why I think the NN97's are overpriced - this seems worthy of a thread of it's own.

Firstly, I have no particular agenda with regard to Nacional - a healthy suspicion certainly, that the prices commanded may be seriously disproportionate to its merits; one that has resulted in a very small personal exposure to the wines, both drinking and owning; but I stand to be convinced, either way.

So what's the real story?

Firstly the facts (as I see them)

1) In the mid nineteen twenties, a part of the Noval Quinta that was naturally sandy was fumigated to remove any traces of Phylloxera, and planted with a mix of ungrafted vines. It was known that Phylloxera does not thrive in sandy soils.

2) There is no convincing argument to support the notion that ungrafted vines produce superior wine. The premium quality of Nacional appears to result from meticulous attention to cultivation, picking and vinification.

3) In the UK, Noval was a relatively unknown shipper at the time the Nacional vineyard was planted, but the owners had ambitions to gain part of the market traditionally enjoyed by the main British shippers, and sought ways to improve their standing.

4) The excellent vintage of 1931 was largely ignored by the British shippers, as they had large residual stocks of the 1927 vintage; the Great Depression having seriously affected sales. Noval sought to capitalise on this.

5) Despite Noval being able to sell a small part of their output for a much inflated price, other shippers did not try to offer exclusive premium variants for over sixty years after the launch of Nacional.

6) Although the Nacional wines are usually considered to be superior to the regular Noval (most notably in 1963), the difference is not always decisive. The evidence to support the Nacional '31's superiority is less than convincing.

7) Reports of disappointing Nacionals seem too frequent, and some are notably poor. Glowing reports on Nacional tend to originate from sighted rather than blind tastings, leading me to worry that it may be affected by the 'it was expensive, so it must be good' factor.

So secondly, getting back to Axel's question - why do I think that Nacional '97, (which sells for about five times the price of the regular N97) is overpriced, I would say simply:

It may well be a better wine, but the evidence to support that is a bit thin. With the regular N97 celebrated as a very good wine (and very highly priced) it seems likely to me that a blind comparison would probably show one (and possibly both) to be seriously overpriced.

- What do others think?

Tom

[DRT]

Firstly, I don't think it is at all relevant to compare the price of the regular Noval and the Nacional based simply on the quality of the wine. It just isn't the same market so is like comparing the price of an Armani suit with one from Asda. The criteria are just too different so the price comparison is meaningless.

Nacional vintages undoubtedly and unashamedly are priced for a very exclusive market based on their rarity and history. When they are good they are absolutely at the top of the tree. When they are not top notch they still tend to be good wines, although may be overtaken by others in terms of pure quality in a particular vintage.

The bottom line is that the former owners of Noval created a product and a marketing plan that allowed them to sell it at enormously inflated prices compared to "standard" VP. That machine still has momentum and when a good year comes along people will pay through the nose to have some of it. It s an exclusive product that not many can afford and for that reason alone people who can afford it will want it.

I like having Nacional around and hope it continues. Imagine how dull life would be if there were no Ferraris, Rolex watches or Virgin Atlantic Club Class in the world

Derek

PS: Incidentally, I drive a Saab 93, don't own a watch, travel in the back of the plane and will be drinking Morgan 91 tonight

Derek

[Glenn E.]

I suspect it is mostly - if not entirely - myth. Derek summed it up when he said "Nacional vintages undoubtedly and unashamedly are priced for a very exclusive market based on their rarity and history." Note that he did not say based on their quality. These are the Paris Hiltons of Port - they are famous because they are famous.

Nacional vintages are no doubt very good wines, but they are deliberately created to be rare and expensive in order to supply a very niche market. Much like the Nokia Vertu cell phone line, they are ultimately the answer to a question that no one was asking, but in answering the question have created a market.

I personally believe that all wines should only be rated blind. No matter how objective a judge believes himself (or herself) to be, human beings are inherently affected by knowledge. If you know that the wine you are tasting is a 1931 Noval Nacional, then everything you know about that vintage colors your judgement of the wine. The fact that wines can only rarely be identified in blind taste tests, even by experienced judges, proves the point to me. Ratings are done to place an objective value on the wine, and that cannot be done if you know which wine you are tasting.

Leave the mythology for when you're enjoying the wine with friends or family.

(Full disclosure: I have a bottle of 1970 Noval Nacional on order. So I, too, am buying into the hype.)

[DRT]

These are the Paris Hiltons of Port - they are famous because they are famous.

Glenn, I think I would credit Nacional as having substantially more class than Miss Hilton - can we compromise on Halle Berry?

(Full disclosure: I have a bottle of 1970 Noval Nacional on order. So I, too, am buying into the hype.)

My disclosure is one bottle each of Nacional 1963, 1964, 1967, 1978 and 1987.

[JacobH]

The reality behind the Nacional often seems surprisingly inconsequential, considering the premium of these Ports. For instance, I wonder how many Nacional drinkers, asked to choose between the Nacionals being made from:
i) grapes from the oldest vines in the vineyard (a la the Vargellas Vinha Velha)
ii) only Touriga Nacional
iii) grapes from pre-Phylloxera vines
and
iv) the truth
would pick the right ones? I would have thought that any of the other three might seem more likely. Of course, it would be impossible to market wines with the label of “more carefully made† so some story must be attached to them.

Tom, something that I am curious about is how release prices of the normal QdN VP and the Nacional have differed over the last 80-or-so years. At the moment, the Nacional seems to sell for around 10 times the price of a recent Vintage (something like £300-£400 v. £30-£40). Presumably this premium must have slowly increased over time; it would have been a bold move on Noval’s part to price their new premium Ports at 10 times the standard rate when they initiated them.

[Frederick Blais]

I tend to agree with most of your saying. NN is not immune to Phyloxera, the vines can survives on average 35 years before being replaced by a shoot growing just beside once its start to weaken. We can say that the vector of Phyloxera is slower in those parts of the Douro than other places that grow vines, in Alsace for example, after 7 years, an ungrafted vineyards is dead.

For the quality, I agree that it has been inconsistent and that it is easier to achieve great stuff anywhere when you control quantity and quality on small parcells. Apart from Bordeaux, there is no vineyard to my knowledge that can achieve such quality in such quantity.

For the price, they simply want to make this bottle a luxury product like too many examples set from LVMH recently

[uncle tom]

The release price of Nacional has rarely been committed to print - part of the mystique that Noval have crafted has been borne of their habit of releasing it only to merchants who ask for it nicely on the back of orders for other products, and even then it seems to be a 'price on application' product.

As far as I know, the only time you will get a price in black and white from Noval themselves, is the tourist retail pricelist at their premises in Portugal.

Tom

PS - my disclosure is that Nacional makes up less than 0.05% of my cellar - a single bottle of '83!

[DRT]

As far as I know, the only time you will get a price in black and white from Noval themselves, is the tourist retail pricelist at their premises in Portugal.

How does this make them any different to other shippers? The only prices shippers ever publish is the price that they sell their wines for from their own outlets, all of which are in Portugal

I have Suckling's book from 1990 and it has the then current retail and auction prices for most VPs. Here are some whch may be interesting:

Nacional 63: Retail £300, Auction £233
Fonseca 63: Retail £69, Auction £53
Noval 63: Retail £40, Auction £31

Fonseca 1927: Release price £0.20

[Glenn E.]

These are the Paris Hiltons of Port - they are famous because they are famous.

Glenn, I think I would credit Nacional as having substantially more class than Miss Hilton - can we compromise on Halle Berry?

That's hardly a compromise, Halle Berry is actually a good actress!

Paris Hilton is a lot smarter than she plays at being, and I picked her deliberately. If not for her last name and ability to generate hype/headlines on demand, she'd probably just be a good to very good model.

Sort of like a Port we all know with the last name of Nacional. (Though Nacional would probably still be considered an excellent Port, just not mind-blowingly so.)

[DRT]

I think we should take care here not to downgrade Nacional to some sort of average VP. I agree entirely with the view that based on quality alone the price doesn't stack up. But, as I have said, that isn't the point. Just because people cannot reconcile the price in their heads doesn't make it less of a wine than it is. Blind tasting works both ways

The fact remains that Nacional produces some staggeringly good wines that few producers can even dream of coming close to. I have just checked some data in my books and found that in 1990 only 17 Vintage Ports had been awarded 98, 99 or 100 points by Wine Spectator. 4 of those wines were Nacionals, 4 Fonseca, 3 Taylor, 2 Noval and 1 from each of Croft, Niepoort, Sandeman and Royal Oporto. If you have any faith in WS stats and ignore the Sandeman and Royal Oporto, both produced in the 1870s, Nacional accounts for more than 25% of the best VPs produced between 1927 and 1977. That's a remarkable contribution from a parcel of land that can only produce 250 cases per year.

[Glenn E.]

Understood, and I agree. It's clearly an excellent Port. But is it 10x the Port of the standard Noval? Your WS ratings say no... it is "merely" twice the Port of the standard Noval.

A question on WS though - do they rate wines blind or are they being affected by Ms. Hilton's fame when they rate her?

[Andy Velebil]

An interesting discussion and not having any prior NN experience until 2 years ago and that infamous tasting at Noval many of us here took part in. My overall impression was that although very good VP's, they are generally not worth the major price hike compared to their counter part. of course, if I had the money to buy them, then I wouldn't care, but realistically they arn't worth 10x's the price. I do think a little label biased comes into play, that is natural. but I can find many other top VP's for significantly less than NN's that would score the same, or within 1-2 points (and honestly that close is really splitting hairs on how a particular bottle happens to show that day).

The fact that the NN plot is very small and VERY well taken care of is really the main point, and what you are paying for. There is NO WAY to duplicate that much TLC in a large vineyard, its physically and financially impossible.

As for WS and their reviews....well lets just say i don't put a ton of faith in how they do things. Which is a product of how they review wines...which is basically a snap shot of how that wine was drinknig when they tasted it. i also don't care for the simple TN's and lets not forget about their little isssue with the fake restaurant that just was awarded an award from WS...but that is a whole other discussion.

actually NN doesn't make a ton of truly great wines. Look over the past 100 years...1931, 1963, 1970, 1994,1997, 2000, 2003 (did I forget any..and I purposly left out '64 and '96 as they are very good, but not quite top IMO). Compare that to say Fonseca or Taylors over the same years and they have a much better track record for producing high scoring VP's during that time.

noval was really smart and capitalized on a product way before the rest did and it payed off. Look at those trying to copy them now...and there are others that are and have planted ungrafted vines and plan to use them in the future for a high end VP.

Saying all that...if you offer me a glass I would gladly accept

[DRT]

actually NN doesn't make a ton of truly great wines. Look over the past 100 years...1931, 1963, 1970, 1994,1997, 2000, 2003 (did I forget any..and I purposly left out '64 and '96 as they are very good, but not quite top IMO). Compare that to say Fonseca or Taylors over the same years and they have a much better track record for producing high scoring VP's during that time.

You left out 1966, which scored 98 points on WS but I'll forgive you.

I am interested in the point you make in the above paragraph, Andy. If the vintages you have listed are what you consider to be "great wines" I'm not sure many others could match that number. Fonseca and Graham's? yes, definitely. Taylor? I'm not so sure. But I am willing to be convinced in a taylor v Nacional parallel vertical

[mosesbotbol]

Cache is worth a lot of money. Quality and price are seldom linear in any product.

As for a producer, Taylor is the best followed by Fonseca. No one has hit the mark more than Taylor. I can't think of a crappy Taylor or Fonseca vintage. Sure, some aren't epic, but none are bad.

[Andy Velebil]

Cache is worth a lot of money. Quality and price are seldom linear in any product.

As for a producer, Taylor is the best followed by Fonseca. No one has hit the mark more than Taylor. I can't think of a crappy Taylor or Fonseca vintage. Sure, some aren't epic, but none are bad.

Moses,
You are so right about price/quality not being linear. It amazes me how much money the NN from the late 70's to late 80's still fetch. It is crazy to pay that much for those years. Sure some may be decent, but they are in no way great. Yet they command prices into the hundreds of dollars.

Although its spiltting hairs on a personal preference, I think Fonseca is a little better than Taylors across the board

[RonnieRoots]

I wish I'd be able to give my opinion on the subject, but I have never tasted a Nacional, so I can't. But thenagain, I guess that says something too: I simply deny paying that sort of money for a bottle of port.

[Roy Hersh]

A fun thread.

I disagree with a number of suppositions here, and don't understand commenting about a Port one has never had ... but that is not the reason for my post, nor am I seeking an argument. I just would like to make a few points.

Having had over 2 dozen individual vintages of Nacional, many of those at least on a handful of occasions, I've found there was a lot of inconsisteny in quality as others have mentioned. However, that all changed in 1993 when Christian Seely and AXA took over Noval from Cristiano van Zeller. Since then, the consistency has been truly amazing with: 1994, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2003 all delivering quality at a VERY high level. Anybody who has ever put a 1994 Nacional in their mouth and not had an epiphany, should immediately switch to drinking Fino Sherry!

My point is that AXA has brought a total reversal of fortune to Quinta do Noval in general, and Nacional in particular. DRC is pricey too, but there is a reason ... scarcity. This is not the same as "perceived scarcity" of Chateau Latour or Haut Brion that routinely make 10,000+ cases in a fine vintage like 1982, 1989/'90, 2000 or even 2005.

Nacional is a VP that is the result of extraordinarily low yields and more so ... 200-250 cases produced for the entire world.

When they are "on" there is nothing like 'em. Ask anybody who has ever put a 1963 Nacional in their mouth ... how many better VPs they've ever had. Derek, Alex B., Andy? As much as I love the Fonseca/Graham's/Taylor 1963 VPs and a few others too ... none is in the same stratosphere as the Nacional. Then again, none comes close to the price either. But as Derek mentioned, that is why some wear a Rolex or drive a ....

Typed while sipping a simple 20 year old Tawny Port.

[RonnieRoots]

I disagree with a number of suppositions here, and don't understand commenting about a Port one has never had ...

I don't believe anybody does that in this thread? (At least, no-one who gives a judgement discloses never to have drunk the port.)

You are of course absolutely right in stating that AXA's take-over meant a tremendous leap in quality for Noval. Maybe, if I ever taste one of those ports, I'll be willing to pay up... but I doubt it. I'm happy to settle for less... Fonseca, Taylor...

[Andy Velebil]

Lets just look at since AXA took over.

Yes they have done lots of great things to Noval and brought it out of a major down period it was in...but was that all really AXA's doing? Remember they bought it in 1993 and a year later had great juice....before the take over Christiano was already fixing up the place...but that is another discussion. Back to the question at hand.

Of the ones Roy's mentioned since AXA took over, I've had all sans the 1999. And while awsome juice, The NN and regular Noval VP were still within a point or two of each other when we had them at the Quinta 2 years ago. and I prefered the 2003 regular bottling to the NN by a point. Hardly worth 5-10 times the price IMO. But like others said, when they are on, they are usually on top of the game.

But Derek is right, there is very little made and if you can afford them its always fun to have what others cannot. This is really about a totally cool marketing strategy that has been in place for many decades and one that has yet to be duplicated by any other Port producer. So my hat goes off to Noval for this.


(edit: I do have to correct myself. I actually thought the 1996 NN was an awsome VP and the best of any 1996 by far that I've had. It was the 1997 NN that I was not impressed with at all..for the price it commands (its still a 94 point wine in my notes). I think i was one of two people who mentioned that at the tasting and after I brought that up Mr. Seeley even stated he prefered the 1996 to the 1997).

[SushiNorth]

I've never had an NN, but I'm going to comment anyway.
I can get a port like Calem 94 for $30. That's pretty cheap. Most 94 wines will cost me ~$90*, or 3x the price. Are they 3x as good as Calem? Probably.

What about a Fonseca 94? That's a $200 wine, rated WS100, or about 2x the price of a good 1994. Is it twice as good as a warres or grahams in that category? Is it worth having two Grahams or Warres from 94? Debatable, but one might say that it is harder to climb above the quality at that $100 threshold, thus the rarity of achieving it is worth more $$s.

So now lets look at Nacional. It's 3x the price of Fonseca. It's also rated at 100, and you've all led me to believe that it has the potential to be the best port on the planet. Is it worth six bottles of a grahams or warres? Three bottles of a Fonseca? That's a measurement of happy experiences drinking Port. 6:1, 3:1. But if we go by the Fonseca concept that it's harder to achieve greatness at that level, thus costs more, then it's worth it. And if we go by the measure that it is a rare experience, again it may be worth it.

What this comes down to is that we each need to gauge our minimum level of quality necessary to have a thoroughly enjoyable experience, and then measure the value we place on raising that bar to extreme heights. When do we leap from Warres to Fonseca? And when do we leap again to NN?

Thus, in my mind, drinking Nacional on anything but the rarest of moments is a waste as I treasure the experience that surrounds the drinking of good port more than the elation of best-in-the-world. However, I would endorse drinking Nacional on rare occasions because that keeps them rare and special, and that too becomes an important experience. So even if I could afford to drink it regularly, I would not -- I'd wrap it in a halo of purple brilliance and relish in a once... or thrice ...in a lifetime experience. (i'm done rambling now)


* i've a lead on Dow's 94 for $73, rated 97 in WS. Anyone care?

[Glenn E.]

What we're really talking about here is marginal return. And for a luxury item like Port, everyone's marginal return is going to be different.

I'm one of those guys who just can't get past the fact that, for the price of a NN, I could have had 5 bottles of some other excellent Port. Or an entire horizontal from that year. The stratospheric price detracts from the experience for me, at least if I'm the one buying the bottle. And I'll be honest and add that if someone else provides me with a taste, the stratospheric price actually adds to the experience because I know it is something that I'd never be able to taste of my own accord.

At the extreme end of any marginal return curve, the value received for any increase in cost is miniscule. That's where we're at with NN. Even if a particular vintage of NN is not actually the best Port for that year, some people will be happy to buy it at it's extreme cost simply because they can, and they receive satisfaction from being able to purchase and consume something that very few others can also do.

It's the same reason that people buy Ferraris. If you look at them objectively, only a few Ferraris are actually the very best cars in their respective classes. Yet they routinely sell for 2-5 times as much as the very cars that beat them simply because they are Ferraris.

I'd still love to try a NN some day, and I'm bummed that there was a problem with the two 1970's I recently ordered so I'm not going to get them. But the reason there was a problem with that order is that I spent a week trying to convince myself that $350/bottle (which is highway robbery for a 1970 NN) wasn't totally outrageous for a bottle of wine. I just couldn't do it, even at what is less than half the going rate for those bottles. The marginal return just wasn't there for me until it was too late.

[jdaw1]

In too many vintages Nacional is poor or unremarkable (e.g., ’87). Those vintages should be drunk only by those who should or want to taste everything: the port gurus; the want-to-be port gurus; and the port-loving hobbyists. And very rarely. And at somebody else’s expense.

In a few vintages Nacional is fantastic, surpassing the best of the others (e.g., ’94, ’67, ’63, and in its time, reputedly, ’31). If one is as rich as Croesus, such that a few gross cost a trivial proportion of one’s wealth, then one can drink these often. If one is neither Bill Gates nor Warren Buffett, then these Nacionals should be drunk rarely, with the full paraphernalia of maximum appreciation: good guests, meaning both other people and other bottles.

That’s my theory and I’m sticking to it.

[Alex Bridgeman]

What an interesting thread to read through, with a real variety of thoughts although opinions as to the answer to the question of "Is Nacional too expensive?" seem remarkably close.

Moses commented that perceived quality and price are rarely a linear relationship. I strongly agree with this suggestion, which can be illustrated through a quick look at wine searcher - is Fonseca '66 (a fabulous wine) at £112 really worth three times as much as Graham 1985 (also a fantatstic wine) at £41 per bottle? In terms of quality, I would argue that the Fonseca is not 3 times as good as the Graham but there may be a perception that it is. This means that if the Nacional is truly slightly better than other ports then you would expect to pay substantially more for that slight increase in quality.

Then other factors come into play. Scarcity being a big influence on price. Part of the reason that the Fonseca '66 is three times the price of the Graham '85 is that there is simply less Fonseca '66 around in the market. Fishing in a smaller pool of bottles does encourage sellers to aspire to higher prices. Nacional is certainly scarce, with about 3,000 bottles being produced in a normal vintage with the release (at least of new vintages) being limited to roughly 50% of production in order to ensure sufficient stocks remain in the Quinta's wine library.

(As an aside, until AXA took over control of Noval, the Nacional vintages were not sold to merchants and customers. Instead, they were awarded as a freebie along the lines of "buy 3 cases of Noval and get a bottle of Nacional for free". AXA changed this as they preferred to market the Nacional as a seperate label.)

So, there are two influences at work, a scarcity factor and a perceived quality factor. Given that the scarcity factor is simply a question of the number of the small number of bottles available and the large number of people who would like a bottle, I don't propose to say any more about the quantity of bottles available.

It is interesting to consider the cause of the large (at least "large" in terms of the population who understand and appreciate port) number of people who wish to buy Nacional. I would suggest that part of this is the perceived quality of the port but a part - perhaps even a large part - is because of the exclusivity and because of the myth and romance associated with the port and this particular block of Noval terroir. When the Nacional block was first replanted and the fabulous '31 was vinified, Noval did a wonderful job of marketing the legend of Nacional. "Made from grapes grown on their true Portuguese rootstocks, vines able to survive for a few short years only because of the special soil in which they are planted. Tiny production because of the constant struggle by the vines to survive the attack of the louse results in deeply flavoured grapes and outstandingly concentrated port. Only available in tiny quantities and to the select few long term loyal customers of Quinta do Noval."

Obviously, I am paraphrasing, but I believe that every serious port drinker in the world would want to try a Nacional vintage, if only to see if it was worth all the fuss and the money. How many of us would not pay $40 / £40 / ┚¬40 for a bottle of Nacional of unknown vintage if we came across an old dusty bottle at the back of a wine shop? What if you only had £40 and there was a bottle of Taylor 1992 next to it also for £/$/┚¬ 40? I would probably choose the Nacional.

So then we turn to the question of quality. Are the Nacional wines deserving of their reputation for outstanding quality? My personal experience is unreservedly "yes". Nacional has been through a couple of odd patches and we will probably never know the background and decisions behind these, but there are a long string of vintages - including both top and reputedly mediocre vintages - where Nacional is the best port produced. Going on my experience (and falling back on Suckling where I have limited experience), I would provide the following reviews as evidence for this proposal:

1931 - My opinion was that the Noval was better than the Nacional; (according to Suckling, these were the two best ports of the year)
1932-1946 - Was there any Nacional shipped in this period? Very odd if there was not.
1947 - Good, but the Cockburn is better imo
1950 - Suckling has the Nacional as the best of this vintage and higher than the Noval
1955 - I believe that there was a '55 Nacional shipped, but I can't find a tasting note from anyone
1958 - Nacional is a lovely wine and far better than anything else I have experienced from 1958, or any note I can find
1960 - Suckling disses the 1960 Nacional, but I thought it was fabulous and far better than any other 1960 I have tasted
1962 - Reputedly, Nacional is at least on a par with other ports shipped from this vintage (I have not tasted the '62)
1963 - A vintage of fantastic ports, but supreme for me is the Nacional
1964 - Tasted twice, both times showing class as the best '64 I have come across
1966 - At the "Deeper Underground" offline this was vying for top-spot among the shippers
1967 - A monumental wine, far stronger than any other '67 port
1970 - I really liked this wine when tasted as part of a 1970 horizontal, but most others didn't like it as much as me
1971-1986 - This was a sticky patch for Nacional and a period where I have not tried any vintage other than the 1980, which was "middle of the pack" against its peers
1987 - My experience of this is that it is a huge wine, young and black and still many years from being ready and probably the best port from this underrated vintage
1994+ - Having tasted the recent vintages side by side with the Noval vintages on two separate occasions, I can say that my opinion is that both are stunning with the Nacional generally being the better of the two, although sometimes only just.

Note that some of these opinions are based on sighted tastings and some on blind tastings. I would summarise my experience to say that where I have tasted a Nacional port it has been the best or among the best in the ports from that year. This is more consistent than any of its competitors, who did not ship in some of these years (1958, 1964, 1967, 1996).

But what has happened at the Quinta to cause these wines to demonstrate consistent quality in my opinion? Recently, since 1993, I am convinced that selection has become more stringent and that yields have been reduced. Noval has also been willing to declassify entire vintages of Nacional in the last decade or so - no 1995 or 2006 Nacionals were made. However, in order to produce good port through good vineyard and vinification practices, you have to start with good raw materials. It is my opinion that the Nacional block - through its combination of poor soil, good microclimate and struggling vines - has the magic combination to produce potentially magnificent port.

So in summary, to answer the question "Is Nacional worth the money?", my answer would be "Sometimes, if you can afford it for those special occasions." The proof of this is that at the prices that Nacional commands, there are willing buyers and sellers. I recently was faced with a choice, with limited funds available to me, would I like 1 bottle of Nacional 1966 or 4 bottles of Fonseca 1966. With reasonable stocks of the Fonseca, I chose to buy the bottle of Nacional.

[DRT]

I recently was faced with a choice, with limited funds available to me, would I like 1 bottle of Nacional 1966 or 4 bottles of Fonseca 1966. With reasonable stocks of the Fonseca, I chose to buy the bottle of Nacional.

You went back the next day to buy the Fonseca's - didn't you?

[g-man]

I've never had an NN, but I'm going to comment anyway.
I can get a port like Calem 94 for $30. That's pretty cheap. Most 94 wines will cost me ~$90*, or 3x the price. Are they 3x as good as Calem? Probably.

What about a Fonseca 94? That's a $200 wine, rated WS100, or about 2x the price of a good 1994. Is it twice as good as a warres or grahams in that category? Is it worth having two Grahams or Warres from 94? Debatable, but one might say that it is harder to climb above the quality at that $100 threshold, thus the rarity of achieving it is worth more $$s.

Yes. =) btw 140$/bottle (probably) at auction inclusive of 20% buyers at the upcoming hart davis auction