Why is Priorat so expensive?

I mean, it's Spain. It's "good value." Right?

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Looking back at the previous Priorat Report as I prepare for this year’s edition, it’s worth taking a look at one of the most-asked questions about the wines of DOQ Priorat which is, “Why are they so expensive?”

There are many aspects at play in this, but it’s important to look at their cost relative to other fine wine regions in the world as Priorat is not actually that expensive in the global view of things. For example, the average price per bottle for wines from Napa Valley in California is currently ~$100. Champagne is up there too, usually running about half that price in the US for the most basic non-vintage blends and of course there are others which are a great deal more such as Burgundy, Barolo, Bordeaux, and undoubtedly other regions starting with a ‘B’. As per a comparison, the official average price of Priorat wine, according to the Catalan Wine Institute (INCAVI), is 9.85€, which, hmmm…

It would be amazing if this was an actual figure, but it doesn’t fully compute and is ridiculously low unless there’s some winery producing one million bottles of wine at around 7€ retail to offset the more typical price of around 25€ locally for the bulk of production. I’ve reached out to INCAVI for further clarification. Needless to say, whether it’s 9.85€ or 25€ this is still a vastly different amount than $100 and yet Priorat continues to have a reputation of producing very expensive wines.

This perception is most likely based upon a few anchor wines which form the pinnacle of several producer’s portfolios. Perfect examples are: Álvaro Palacios’s l’Ermita at 1,200€, Mas Doix’s Tossal d’en Bou (1902) at roughly 500€ and Coma de Cases (1903) at 425€, Clos Erasmus at 350€, Vall Llach’s Mas de la Rosa at 290€, and Terroir al Límit’s Les Manyes and Les Tosses at 250€. There are few others that break the 100€ mark but the numbers rapidly fade away after these and you arrive to much more modest prices (with much larger production) such as Palacios’s Camins del Priorat, Vall Llach’s Embruix, Mas Alta’s Artigas, and Scala Dei’s Prior that are all at around 22-25€, locally.

This may be news to those who thought that Priorat wines were out of reach in terms of price. Thus, for those interested, please have a look at this selection of Priorat under 30€ where there are nearly 40 very nice wines at very digestible prices.