Armand de Brignac Brut Gold - IntoWineTV Episode 105

You're watching Into Wine TV and today we're at Encanto in San Francisco and we're tasting sparkling wine. This is a very special wine here. We've got the Armand de Brignac. It's Brut Gold. This retails for $300. This sparkling wine has gained a lot of popularity recently with some of the rap videos it's been featured in. And we'd love to hear what you guys think about it. Before even trying the wine, you mentioned $300. I really want to be blown away. Hopefully when I take a sip it's going to be something that really impresses me to the limits. For $300 I have drunk some amazing champagnes that were half the price in my life. You could join a gang and you might be blown away. Be careful what you say. This is interesting because just looking at the glass, the quality of the bubbles is extraordinary. The sign of a truly great champagne should be one small steady stream of bubbles, which this has. It actually has another couple of streams because there are imperfections in the glass here. Already, without even picking up the glass, I can see this is going to be a great champagne. On the nose it's a very, very elegant champagne for sure. The $300 price point, you might think I'm weird having previously said wines are overpriced. But when you look at this bottle, you know it's going to be expensive. And it would be really bad if it wasn't expensive. It's gold-plated. Before you mentioned the rapper stuff, I thought automatically this would be great for some rap guy to take on as a feature in one of their videos. So $300 doesn't surprise me. The people who really want to just boast how much money they've got and celebrate, this is great. Perfect. Why not? I think the winemaking is also very impressive. I don't know if you guys read through some of the background beforehand, but only eight people are involved in the winemaking of each bottle. I was going to say, a couple things for me about the wine. I mean, the price tag, the packaging, including the box and the bottle, for me, it kind of puts it right away behind the eight ball because it really has to deliver. The style of the wine for me is pretty much about purity of fruit. I think it has a nice entry. As Bartholomew said, it has a really fine bead, really nice perlage. But for me, it kind of shortens up about mid-palate and doesn't finish as long as I hoped it would for the price of the package. Let's face it, nothing of contemporary wine, unless you've aged the wine and it's got some historic value, no wine is worth $300 a bottle. But you're buying here a concept, you're not buying a wine, you're buying a marketing concept. It is really good champagne. If this was in an ordinary bottle, selling at ordinary champagne prices, I'd say, yeah, it's great. It compares really well with the best. But what we're complaining about really is the price, and that's really got nothing to do with the wine. Well, I understand that packaging is extremely important, especially in champagne. But to me, wine, after all, is about taste. And I just can't help comparing this champagne with some other champagnes I've had in my life for a fraction of the price. And I really don't think this champagne, as far as the structure, the complexity, delivers. I'm not finding a lot of classic flavors, champagne flavors. It's a little restrained, a little too shy, in my opinion. So, yeah, I'm not impressed. I just don't think that the people who are going to be buying this wine are the types of people who are buying wine just for the quality. They're buying it to either sit on their yacht, and they're not really going to be tasting wine in the best conditions, or they're buying it in a nightclub where you're not going to be tasting wine in the best conditions. And, you know, it's certainly not going to disappoint. People who are blinging down $300 aren't going to be worried about, oh, is this as good as Le Pique's La Grande Dame or Dom Perignon or anything like that. It's more of a statement. Yeah, it's a statement. To me, right now, as we have this debate, that's the interesting thing about this wine. And the topic of wine and culture is that this wine at this price is really going to appeal to some people, and there are going to be those that really enjoy it and think it's somewhat of a value, even. Yeah, maybe. Well, also, there's that perception, psychological proof that the more a wine costs or more something costs, the more the perception that it's good. You can put two identical wines in a bottle, sell one for $10, one for $20, and ask people what they think is a better wine, they're going to say the $20 one. Sure. It's just natural. Yeah, I think, I mean, people towards which this wine is marketed don't really care whether it's $300 or $500. I think that's basically the clientele that this wine is. And that has got to be expensive to produce. Even the labels of metal, even the back labels of metal. And the case, too. Did you see the case? Yeah, the case. Oh, wow. It's gorgeous. What a great presentation. Do you pay separately for the case? No, it comes with it. I'm just kidding. Another $250 for the case. It's a solid case. You can use it for all sorts of things. You can put it under your bed and keep personal items. So maybe, you know, if you're looking to save a few bucks on a sparkling wine, this would not be the best choice. But if you do want to impress and make a statement on your yacht or anywhere else amongst your friends, I highly recommend the Armand Du Brignac. It tastes great. And for the entertainment factor and the statement, definitely worth it. Thanks for joining us on Into Wine TV. We'll see you next time.