In total, the Élysée Palace agreed to donate 1,200 bottles of wine from the presidential collection. This, of course, is far from all, only a tenth of the total stock that had been gathered in the cellar since 1947. France's head sommelier, Virginie Routis, bet on perhaps the most famous wine regions of the country, offering to auction wines from Bordeaux and Burgundy. Buyers are also expected to be attracted by the fact that all these wines were once served at receptions in the Élysée Palace, so that over a glass of this drink fateful government decisions were made.
Moreover, buying wine from the collection of French presidents cannot be called exorbitant luxury. The starting price of some lots is from 15 euros, and many, as the organizers promised, can be purchased for less than 100 euros. However, more expensive wines are also presented with a starting price of 2,200 euros, like Petrus 1990.
Of course, nothing could be bought for 15 euros there. On the first evening of the auction, the cheapest bottle turned out to be 350 euros. However, on average, belonging to the Élysée Palace doubled the price of the wine. The famous Petrus, which the auction house advertised, sold for 5,800 euros. The oldest bottle sold was Château Latour 1936 – it went for 3,500 euros.
There is no doubt that the Élysée Palace will make good money from its lots. Even before the auction, they had attracted interest in China, the USA, Russia, and Japan. Part of the French collection, apparently, can later be tasted in major hotels and restaurants that have been enticed by the offer to buy excellent wine with a history.
However, the shelves of the Élysée Palace cellar will not remain empty. The main goal of the sale is to raise funds to update the wine collection and simultaneously help the state budget. The proceeds are planned to be used to buy more modest wine for government receptions, and the difference to be allocated to public spending. Overall, the auction expects to raise 250,000 euros for these wines. How much will remain for the treasury after purchasing new wines is difficult to say. In any case, for the French budget, a sum of a couple of hundred thousand euros is negligible, so it is difficult to perceive the sale as a real economy measure.
France has resorted to such a symbolic sacrifice for the people not for the first time. Quite recently, in January of this year, the authorities of the Burgundian capital Dijon auctioned off half of their wine stock to spend the proceeds on social needs. They agreed to sell even several times more than the Élysée Palace, and raised only about 150,000 euros.
In 2006, the wine cellar of the Paris municipality, which had been started by former French President Jacques Chirac when he worked at the city hall, was sold off. Chirac personally chose which wine to buy. Much was purchased at a relatively low price but significantly increased in value during storage.
Over nearly 30 years, about five thousand bottles of wine had accumulated there, intended for special receptions at the city hall. However, over time, the need for them disappeared – people began to drink much less at receptions in the city administration than in the 1970s. And maintaining a cellar and not drinking the wine from it is too expensive a pleasure that Paris in the mid-2000s could no longer afford.
Other European countries are also ready to save on noble drinks. Several years ago, British ministers decided to part with their wine stocks. Their logic was the same as that now followed by their French colleagues. Maintaining their own cellar was becoming increasingly expensive, and allocating additional funds for it was simply unthinkable. The public was already horrified to learn that ministers were cutting social benefits while sipping wine worth ten thousand pounds (12,000 euros). As a result, politicians decided to at least ensure the cellar's self-financing: they sold the most expensive part of the collection, whose total value was estimated at two million pounds sterling (2.3 million euros), and directed this money toward storing the remaining drinks.
In Sweden, they decided to save on the royal family. The governor of the Swedish province of Kalmar, Stefan Carlsson, decided that the royal couple, and therefore all other guests, could well be treated to cheaper wine and not spend state funds on expensive drinks. By his order, at a reception in March, 50 guests, including King Carl XVI Gustaf and his wife Queen Silvia, had to make do with cheap 2010 Rhine wine Ecologica Berlina. This wine can be bought at any Swedish store for 59 kronor. And even then, Swedish gastronomic magazines believe that the wine is not worth that money.
Stefan Carlsson is generally famous in Sweden for spending less on official receptions than other governors. He took office in February 2012 and since then has taken about 14,000 kronor from the treasury for such events.
Such an ability to save is truly enviable. Moreover, it is unlikely that the Swedish king can be embarrassed by simple wine. He himself is known for extreme modesty, which is especially striking to Russian journalists against the background of the passion of domestic officials for luxury.
Daria YEREMINA,
"Lenta.Ru".