Bordeaux
Optimism reigns. White grapes are in and many châteaux will start picking cabernet soon. Despite summer’s heat waves, the general consensus is for high quality and reasonable quantity.

Château Lafite Rothschild’s chief executive officer, Jean-Guillaume Prats, said jokingly in an email, “I know that you should never believe a Bordelais when he tells you this upcoming vintage is the one of the century! But, this year, you should!” 

Less mildew is the positive aspect of heat and drought. Last year, biodynamic producer Château Palmer, which doesn’t use preventative chemical sprays, lost most of its grapes in Margaux to a virulent outbreak after a warm, humid spring. No problems this year. Says CEO Thomas Duroux: “We finished picking merlot last week, and aromas are fresh and floral, with unusually good balance that pleases me a lot.”

Burgundy
“2019 is ‘the perfect storm’ of a vintage,” said Laurent Drouhin of top negociant house Drouhin, which owns vineyards in many parts of Burgundy. “We keep smiling because some wines will be great.” The mix included the hottest temperatures since the time of the Black Death 700 years ago (!), frost in April, rain in June, and no rain for nearly four months.

Drouhin’s harvest started on time on Sept. 13, and Laurent’s winemaking brother Frederic reports, “The first reds show an intense and beautiful color, good concentration, great balance and acidity and depth. The whites also show good richness with balance.” It’s a great year for reds, with slightly higher alcohol than usual.

The downside is very low yields. In just one April night, frost destroyed about 30% of the crop in Macon, though what’s left is making wines with good acidity and aromas.

Export company Le Serbet gathered reports from 65 producers in its portfolio, and head of marketing Peter Wasserman says the loss of grapes varies from vineyard to vineyard; in some places it may be as much as 50% to 60% lower than normal. Northern appellations such as Gevrey-Chambertin seem to have done best, down only 10%.

With less wine, you might predict even higher prices, but producers worry that this would drive away consumers.

Champagne
Harvest started in early September and is now finished. The year has been far more challenging than was 2018, a great vintage—and a big one.

As Sebastien Legolvet, cellar master at Champagne Henri Giraud points out, in 2019, the usually cool region had the wettest winter ever recorded, followed by an incredibly dry summer whose temperatures hit an unheard-of 43 degrees Celsius (109 degrees Fahrenheit). About 1,000 hectares were wiped out by frost, some areas suffered hail, and many domaines were hard-hit by mildew, requiring serious sorting in the vineyard. Yields are down about 17%.