2021 Northern Rhône - En Primeur Offer

A vintage of contrasting fortunes and a vintage where it pays to know your producer well; the whites are generally very good to excellent whilst the reds are medium bodied, bright and mostly ready from the get-go. This is a drinker’s vintage, one that will provide immediate pleasure and you can rest assured that we have been thorough as ever in our tasting and selection process.

In this Offer

This is primarily an offer of 2021s, but while the majority of wines are from 2021, not all our producers release their wines uniformly and so some whites are from 2022. The Duclaux brothers like to release their wines when they are in bottle and are a vintage behind with their 2020s.

Use the left side bar to browse the offer by Appellation, or the table below to browse by Producer.


Reviews

'Looking at 2021, this is the most challenging vintage for the Northern Rhône in decades, and vignerons had the proverbial kitchen sink thrown at them, battling devastating frost, hail, abundant precipitation, and a lack of sunshine. However, after five sunny, at times scorching, vintages, 2021 was a welcome break for the vines and is reminiscent of vintages from the 1980s and 1990s, with much lower alcohol levels and chaptalization being common throughout the Northern Rhône.'
Jeb Dunnuck

2021 Vintage Report

2021 will forever be known as the frost vintage. It hit the Rhône hard but it hit hardest in the North. The nights of 7th and 8th April will not be forgotten quickly by the vignerons and domaines of the whole region, Cote-Rôtie and Condrieu in particular being hit by a brutal frost.

I spoke with Graeme Bott of Domaine Bott on the morning of the 9th as news filtered through of a once-in-a-generation frost that had swept through France. 'I'm lost for words, we won't know the full outcome for some time, but fingers crossed we will have some fruit'.

In the end Graeme was one of the fortunate ones and he has fashioned some lovely wines from a very difficult year. Compare this with Isabelle & Henry Guiller at Clos de la Bonnette who lost everything in 2021 and you have an idea as to quite how bad the frost was (they have some brilliant wines coming through in 2022). It seems so unfair that those who can least afford it get dealt the worse hand.

It wasn't just the frost that caused sleepless nights for the hardest working vignerons. Mother nature threw everything at them in 2021; odium, mildew, hailstorms and an a fairly average summer all added to the woes. This should be seen as a vintage that doesn’t work, but remarkably it does.

The whites are good to excellent – lively and and fresh wines are key here, and the reds are more in line with Burgundy, offering bright pure Syrah with firm but generous tannin – all are quite low in alcohol but with refreshing acidity.

You can safely purchase and consume these wines, confident in the knowledge that these incredibly hard-working men and women in the Northern Rhône have faced down adversity & brought all their winemaking skills to the fore. It has been quite some run of vintages and all good things come to an end, but this is a vintage for now, leave the 20’s 19’s 18’s 17’s in the cellar and tuck into some very generous reds and some extremely good whites from 21.
Derek Robertson, Lea & Sandeman Rhône Buyer

Arrival in the UK

The wines will arrive in the UK by this Autumn (2023). This is an opportunity to secure the wines at the lowest possible price before they reach the general market. We guarantee you will find some exciting options for your cellar.

Prices: This is a primeur offer - all prices are quoted IN BOND per case (case sizes as stated).

Terms of the Offer

ORDERING VIA OUR WEBSITE:

  • Click on the 'ORDER' button to add cases to your Wishlist order form. The Wishlist appears in both the sidebar and header (separately from the main basket).
  • You can view and edit your Wishlist at any time before submitting the order form.
  • Submit your Wishlist order form with your details and please indicate any special requirements in the notes, including whether you would like the wines duty paid.
  • We will respond as quickly as possible with confirmation of your order and your invoice.

Please note that certain wines are on very tight allocations and will first be offered to customers who buy across the range. If you have any queries, please email our primeurs team or speak to your usual L&S contact.

ORDERING VIA EMAIL:

Please feel free to email us your Wishlist at any time. This list can include wines listed as available on the website, as well as those marked 'To Be Advised'. We will reply as soon as possible with confirmation of what we can offer.

STORAGE OPTIONS:

Wines bought en primeur are scheduled to arrive in the UK over the course of the next eighteen months. If you do not wish to take home delivery, you may wish to consider where you would like the wines shipped on arrival in the UK. Lea & Sandeman offers duty paid and in bond storage through a dedicated storage company called Elephant Storage. For more details on the terms and fees associated with storage please go to our Storage Homepage or contact our primeurs team for more information.

While helpful, we do not require a firm commitment on delivery destination to process your primeur order at this stage. Our team will be in contact with you when your wines arrive in the UK to confirm the necessary delivery details.

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RHÔNE PRIMEUR FAQ

OFFER: All wines are offered subject to availability and final confirmation.

PRICING: All prices are quoted IN BOND ex-VAT, by the case size stated. Please double check that the desired case size does match what is being offered as wines are variously listed in threes, sixes, dozens, halves and larger formats.

DELIVERY - TIMING: This is a primeur offer so the wines are not yet physically available for delivery. They will be shipped to the UK over the next eighteen months. Generally wines are shipped to your nominated location once the whole order has landed in our London City Bond account. If you require wines to be delivered by a certain date, please advise us at the time of ordering.

DELIVERY - FEES: In bond delivery to an Elephant Storage account (for more information see 'Storage Options' opposite) is free of charge. Transfer of wines to any third party bond (i.e. not Elephant Storage) will incur an administration charge of £16.50 + VAT for all orders under £500. If you require wines duty paid, please indicate this in your Wishlist order form. A duty & VAT invoice will be raised once all the wines on your order are available for shipment. Once the relevant duty & VAT has been settled, we will ship the wines to your nominated address as per our normal duty paid Delivery Terms.

PAYMENT: All orders will be invoiced for immediate payment by cheque, cash, debit card or cleared funds to our account. We regret that we cannot accept credit cards for primeur orders. We reserve the right to apply a dunning charge of 2% per month on invoices unpaid after 30 days.

Browse the Offer

For more information and pre-shipment pricing on these wines, click on the tabs below or in the sidebar:

CondrieuCôte RôtieSaint JosephHermitageCrozes HermitageCôtes du Rhône & IGP