2024 Bordeaux En Primeur

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Our Master Sommelier, Yohann Jousselin, joined by a couple of Hong Kong Sommeliers, has just returned from the annual En Primeur Bordeaux tastings. Below, is the vintage report, compiled by Yohann during his trip.

Overall Impression from the Week
A much more positive outcome than expected, with great wines across all Bordeaux appellations. Some stunning whites and superb to exceptional Grand Vins stood out. 2024 is a vintage lacking consistency between appellations — a year that truly required being present to taste, as quality varied significantly from one château to another.

The whites were overall more consistent, with impressive examples such as Duhart Milon Blanc, Pavillon Blanc, and Pape Clément Blanc.

Some very good deals should arise from this campaign on the reds, as pricing is expected to be attractive. While many great wines were produced in 2024, label selection will be key due to quality variations and styles across estates.

The very best wines show precise tannins, excellent fruit structure, and beautiful balance.

On the purchasing side, it will be more crucial than ever to be selective this year, to avoid wines that may become tired at a young age.

An intense week overall—over 50 properties visited and 270 wines tasted from the 2024 vintage, including individual visits and major tastings such as Union des Grands Crus and CVBG.

Vintage Summary
2024 was a challenging year in Bordeaux, primarily due to excessive rainfall up to May. The drier summer helped recover quality across the appellations. Key vineyard issues included uneven tannin ripeness, mildew pressure, and reduced photosynthesis.

This vintage required intense human effort—vineyard work, strong disease control, and significant grape sorting. Yields dropped in some estates to as low as 18hl/ha.

Tastings revealed clear quality gaps, even between neighbouring estates. Wine styles range from fruit-forward and loosely structured to the very best—offering complexity and freshness with great ageing potential too.

Appellations in Brief
Saint-Estèphe - Superb wines from the top names. Montrose and Cos d’Estournel made excellent 2024s with a fresher profile. Calon Ségur showed very well with elegant tannins and a fuller structure.

Pauillac - Possibly the most varied in precision across estates. Lafite 2024 was in top 3 of Yohann’s wine of the week alongside La Conseillante & Vieux Chateau Certan.

Saint-Julien - Many good wines here, but results were inconsistent. Château Beychevelle was one of the standouts with remarkable tannin precision.

Margaux - Overall lighter styles with simpler, easy-drinking wines. Highlights included Château Margaux, Château d’Issan and a very impressive Alter Ego 2024 too.

Pessac-Léognan - A tough vintage here, lots of variations between structure, precision and balance. Pape Clément Grand Vin in both colours was outstanding. Haut-Brion showed precision, while La Chapelle 2024 was superb

Pomerol - One of the most consistent appellations. Excellent wines from La Conseillante, VCC, Le Pin, Petrus, and Lafleur. La Conseillante 2024 was a personal highlight, Pomerol was the most impressive appellation on this trip

Saint-Émilion - After the impressive tastings in Pomerol, Saint-Émilion felt a little less consistent. Highlights included Cheval Blanc 2024, Canon 2024, and Belair Monange 2024.

Highlight Wines of the Vintage – Yohann’s Selection
Reds
Lafite, La Conseillante, Haut-Brion, Vieux Château Certan, Cheval Blanc, Margaux, Petrus, Le Pin, Latour à Pomerol, Lafleur-Petrus, Lynch-Bages, Lafleur, Beychevelle, Canon, Montrose, Branaire-Ducru, Laroque, Duhart-Milon, Calon Ségur, Langoa Barton, Gruaud-Larose, Les Carmes Haut-Brion, Lafleur-Gazin, Pichon-Baron, Cantemerle, Chapelle de la Mission Haut-Brion.

Whites
Duhart Milon Blanc, Cos d’Estournel Blanc, Pavillon Blanc, Pape Clément Blanc, Domaine de Chevalier Blanc, La Garde Blanc, Château de Suduiraut Vieilles Vignes Sémillon.

Click here to view the Château Lafleur 2024

Our Fine Wine team would be happy to bring you the most up-to-date news & prices*!
* Opening Price are for Reference Only.

Terms & Conditions

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How it works

If En Primeur is new to you, let me explain how it all works. Around Easter time Bordeaux comes alive with merchants from all corners of the Earth making a beeline to taste the new vintage. Once the wines are tasted, notes and scores are made public and the Chateaux start to release their prices. The theory behind this practice is that the Chateau recuperates money that has been spent on the vintage and the end consumer can get the wines at a cheaper price, before they become physically available.

If you are buying En Primeur, the wines still need another 18 months in the barrel. Once they go into bottle, the Chateau will sell them onto the open market and the price is normally 10-20% higher. In 2011 and 2012, the chateaux over-priced their En Primeur offers and prices traded poorly in the after-market. In 2013, the chateaux lowered En Primeur offer prices, but unfortunately the vintage was a disaster due to the weather. 2014 potentially will be the first year for a long time where we will see reasonable pricing with a good quality vintage so we are optimistic this will be a good year for En Primeur.

Depending on the crop size of the vintage and the quality of the wine, the Chateau will decide how much to release as En Primeur, therefore, the initial release is usually in very small quantities.

Once the wines are physically available, you have a few options. You can arrange storage with us under bond Bordeaux, at $ 120 HKD per case per year, arrange shipment back to Hong Kong, which is currently $ 250 HKD per case or if the price has increased considerably, we can assist in selling your wines for you, with a 10% broking fee. For further, please refer to below:

		Hong Kong Storage	France Storage	Shipping
Unit (Size)	Pack Size (Bottles)	Per annum (HKD)	Per annum (HKD)	Per case (HKD)
0.375	12	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
0.375	24	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
0.75	1	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
0.75	3	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
0.75	6	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
0.75	12	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
1.5	1	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
1.5	3	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
1.5	6	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
3	1	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
3	3	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
4.5	1	$180.00	$60.00	$130.00
6	1	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
9 (Or Duclot collection)	1	$360.00	$120.00	$250.00
Balthazar (12 litres)	1	$720.00	$240.00	$500.00
Nebuchadnezzar (15 litre)	1	$720.00	$240.00	$500.00

Very important

Emails We have no idea on what day or time a particular Chateau will release, so there might be a flurry of emails over the campaign. If you are not interested in buying wines En Primeur please let me know immediately and I will make sure you don’t receive updates as they become available.

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The Insight

As for tasting notes, these will follow in due course. Influential wine critic, Robert Parker, will no longer taste En Primeur and has elected his protégé, Neal Martin, to fill his rather large shoes. At present James Suckling has released some scores and if he is anything to go by, this is really an outstanding vintage.

Groups

Highlight Wines of the Vintage – Yohann’s Selection - Reds
Highlight Wines of the Vintage – Yohann’s Selection - Whites
1st Growths
2nd Growths
3rd Growths
4th Growths
5th Growths
Bordeaux Collection
Left Bank Others
Pessac-Léognan
Pomerol
Right Bank Others
Sauternes & Barsac
Second Wines
St. Émilion
St. Émilion 1er GCC A
White Wines

Wine List

Highlight Wines of the Vintage – Yohann’s Selection - Reds