Counterfeits

[Axel P]

I am sitting over a bottle of 30y old Fonseca which neither has the structure nor the depth and the length of what I would expect from a bottle like this.

Because of this I am very close to believe that this might be a counterfeit bottle. It does not have a bottling date on it...

Did anyone ever had experience with this kind or other Port bottles he or she was suspicious about?

Axel

[jdaw1]

Please post pictures.

[JacobH]

I am sitting over a bottle of 30y old Fonseca which neither has the structure nor the depth and the length of what I would expect from a bottle like this.

Because of this I am very close to believe that this might be a counterfeit bottle. It does not have a bottling date on it...

Did anyone ever had experience with this kind or other Port bottles he or she was suspicious about?

If there is any counterfeiting of Ports, I do wonder if it would happen to a 30-year-old tawny. I can understand someone, for instance, relabelling and re-corking something like a Noval 1970 and selling it as a Nacional 1963, yielding at least a 95% profit, with a low chance of being caught. But to produce a realistic Fonseca 30-year-old would involve the same process being performed on something like a 20-year-old with a result that the net profit (and the profit margin) will be much, much lower.

[DRT]

Axel,

As far as I am aware Fonseca have not produced a 30yr tawny for quite a few years as they do not have sufficient stocks of old wines to produce one. I have a bottle of Fonseca 30 yr old that was bottled in the 1980's and the bottle is a very distinctive shape. As Jdaw suggests, it would be good if you could post pictures.

Derek

[Axel P]

... will do and would have done when my digicam comes back.

Axel

[Michael M.]

What Jacob said. I wonder where would be a reasonable profit for the effort.

[Alex Bridgeman]

I am sitting over a bottle of 30y old Fonseca which neither has the structure nor the depth and the length of what I would expect from a bottle like this.

Because of this I am very close to believe that this might be a counterfeit bottle. It does not have a bottling date on it...

Did anyone ever had experience with this kind or other Port bottles he or she was suspicious about?

Axel

I suspect that you have an old bottle which has not been well looked after. What was the source?

I have had my suspicions in the past about bottles which I have seen offered, but never yet tried anything (other than a Croft '33, which patently wasn't) which I have been convinced was counterfeit. My believe is that at the moment, there is relatively little counterfeit port in the market with what there is being mainly aimed at the top priced brands such as the '45 Taylor.

[JacobH]

(other than a Croft '33, which patently wasn't)

For anyone else who (like me) had forgotten this story, see here!