A single bottle of Penfolds Grange Hermitage has sold for A$51,750, one of the highest prices ever paid for an Australian wine, amid an industry drive to shed the country’s reputation as a producer of cheap plonk.
The 1951 bottle comes from the first vintage of Grange, which was made and signed by Max Schubert, Penfolds’ first winemaker. It was sold to a private collector at a wine auction in Melbourne this week by MW Wines, which generated record sales of more than A$1m (US$790,000).
“Australia is producing a lot of top-end, world-class wines and we are seeing a lot more interest and greater awareness of that, particularly with the Asian market opening up,” said Nick Stamford, managing director of MW Wines.