A New Hampshire wine merchant who had purchased hundreds of bottles of wine from a vineyard in California before it went under for auction reportedly bought a bunch more before selling it, according to an exclusive story published on Thursday by The New York Times.
According to the Times, Joseph Cziborai, the owner of the St. Francis Estate in New Hampshire, purchased bottles of the popular and pricey Domaine Saint-Bernard-de-Grâce from his company, Wine Merchant Group, in August of this year for $8,000 each.
The wines were to be auctioned at a public auction, but it was never done.
Instead, Czibi bought dozens of bottles from a private collection that includes his brother, Peter Czaborai.
The auction was a huge success, with about 200 buyers bidding for more than 100,000 bottles, including several bottles of Domaine de Grâce that Czabi bought from the collection.
He reportedly paid more than $1,000 for the wine, which is believed to be the most expensive wine ever sold at auction.
A few weeks after the auction, Cziabi told The New Yorker that he bought more wine than he had in his inventory, and that he didn’t intend to sell it until he sold his holdings in the company, which includes a wine shop and wine processing business.
Peter Czabo has said that the couple is going through a difficult time financially and that the purchase of his company’s wine collection was the last straw for him, the New York Observer reported.
According the New Yorker, the Czabs bought the collection in 2009 for $30,000, a price that was “much too high for us.”
Peter Czaabi, who died in January of the illness that caused him to lose his hearing, reportedly took over as president and CEO of Wine Merchant in May, but the couple never found a buyer for the collection and were reportedly forced to sell their company.
The couple also sold the St Francis Estate, which they owned and operated for almost 20 years, to another company in January.
In March, Czaabis brother Peter said the company was planning to open a vineyards winery in Vermont, The New Hampshire Times reported.
Peter and his brother Peter Czaborai had a falling out when the couple began selling wine, according the paper.
Peter Cziabori has said in the past that his brother’s alcoholism was the reason they sold wine.