The 36th Nederburg Auction was held over September 3 and 4 at the Distell-owned property in Paarl. Overall, income went from four million rand to R5.68m.
A new record price for a South African wine was achieved when a Nigerian business and importer paid R62,000 for a case of 6 x 75cl bottles of Nederburg ‘Port’ 1964.
This is the only fortified wine ever made at Nederburg by its famous wine maker Günter Brözel, who retired in 1989. The previous highest price was the 6 x 37.5cl bottles of 1959 Chateau Libertas that sold for R23 000 last year.
The organisers said the increase in overall prices is a “correction” in the market place after prices dropped over the past two years.
Four South African supermarket groups have dominated the portfolio of buyers across the top 10 category, taking 36% of the sales directly to the consumers. The combined purchases of the Spar group place them into the overall first position, like last year, with total purchases of R830,940, followed by Checkers with R556, 210, Makro with R511,880 and Pick n Pay with R160,500. They were joined by Tesco from the UK this year that ended as the third biggest buyer with R522,000.
The other buyers under the Top Ten were: Flemingo International from India; Al’s Grill and Butcher from Cape Town; Morukuru Lodge from North-West Province; Hotel Pension Palmquell from Namibia and Sun International.
Foreign buyers from 17 countries were responsible for 30% of total sales. Top purchases came from the UK, India, Denmark, and Nigeria.
