DRC half price in Sweden’s Systembolaget

Long queues are expected outside Swedish wine stores when stocks of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti go on sale at less than half the current retail price.

Domaine de la Romanee Conti (pic courtesy Antique Wine Company)

The Swedish monopoly Systembolaget will release several DRC wines on October 19 on a first-come, first-served basis.

The top wine, Romanée Conti 2006 will cost 24,495 Swedish Kronor (£2300) while leading fine wine merchants in the UK are selling the same wine between £4000 and £5000 per bottle.

However, just 24 bottles are available.

Critics have claimed these prices will attract speculators looking to make a quick profit rather than Swedish wine lovers but Ulf Sjödin MW, head of category management at Systembolaget told decanter.com, ‘All orders will be limited to maximum one bottle per cru, so we hope that the bottles will be spread all over the country to wine lovers who intend to keep and drink the bottles themselves.’

The Systembolaget has an equal pricing structure regardless of a wine’s type or value. A fixed margin of SEK3.50 (£0.33) plus 19% of the cost price is added to every bottle of wine.

Sjödin added: ‘If the wine increases in value while kept in stock before launch, we still cannot increase the sales price, so some wines such as the Romanée-Conti will have a very attractive price tag when it reaches the shelves.’

Written by Rebecca Gibb