Bordeaux, But Not as You Know It. September on La Place brings some of the world’s great wines to Bordeaux — and the releases have begun.

There’s something rather interesting happening in Bordeaux right now — and, unusually, much of it has nothing to do with Bordeaux wine.

It’s the September releases from La Place de Bordeaux.

So, what exactly is La Place?

La Place de Bordeaux isn’t a physical marketplace. It’s the historic network of châteaux, courtiers and négociants that has traded and distributed Bordeaux wine around the world for centuries. Its origins stretch back hundreds of years, with Bordeaux’s merchants building an extraordinary international network for getting wine from the region into markets across the globe.

For much of its history, La Place was all about Bordeaux. That began to change in 1998, when Almaviva became the first wine from outside Bordeaux to be distributed through the system. Opus One followed in 2004, and over the years an increasingly impressive collection of producers from Italy, California, Chile, Argentina, South Africa and elsewhere has joined them.

Today, September has become the time when many of these great wines of the world release their latest vintages through La Place.

And that’s happening now.

For us, it means the opportunity to secure these wines on release and direct through Bordeaux. Some are tightly allocated, and for many this is the best opportunity to secure them before they make their way into the wider market.

We’re buying throughout the campaign and have scheduled an October shipment for everything that is ready, which we expect to arrive in New Zealand in December.