vintage Port 161than not there is a natural consensus but there are a number of examples of so-called
‘split declarations’ where some of the principal shippers have opted for one year and
others have plumped for another. Recent examples include 2009 (when Taylor, Fonseca
and Croft surprised the trade with their declaration) and 1991–1992. There is no law of
averages about the regularity of vintage declarations but, as a rule of thumb, three or four
years are declared in a decade. Expectation mounts when there are long gaps between
declarations as happened, for example, between 1985 and 1991.
The size of a declaration will depend upon the year and the market. Some shippers used
to be very cagey about revealing the information but expect a major shipper to declare
between 8,000 and 15,000 cases of vintage Port. However Noval, whose wines have been
on top form since the 1994 vintage, sometimes declare 1,000 cases or less. Warre declared
just 500 cases of the 2009 vintage. To put vintage Port into context, it is worth pointing
out that whereas the top twenty chateaux in Bordeaux make about 600,000 cases a year
between them, the top ten Port shippers declare perhaps 90,000 cases every three years.
Vintage Port is often thought of as a time-honoured tradition and the shippers can
be quite affronted when they are accused of changing the wine to suit the market. But
with the benefit of hindsight and repeated tasting, it is fair to say that vintage Port went
through a fundamental stylistic change after 1970 and up to 1994. This should not be
too much of a surprise for the interim vintages (1975, 1977, 1980, 1983, 1985, 1991 and
1992) coincided with a period of profound socio-economic change in Portugal. Over-
production in the vineyard, a shortage of labour and changes in methods of vinification
all had an impact on vintage Port. Handling was not given top priority and the problems
began to manifest themselves in the 1985 vintage (see below). Some shippers deliberately
ceased to prioritise vintage Port during this period, preferring to build up bigger brands
for the mass market. From 1975 to 1992 inclusive, there was an overall dip in quality;
although some outstanding wines were still produced, there are many wines from leading
shippers that do not have the same longevity as in earlier vintages.
Against this, with the steady investment in vinification that has taken place since the
early 1980s, the production of high quality Port is much less hit and miss than it was.
Unless the harvest happens to be a washout (as in 1993 and 2002), wines of potential
vintage quality can now be made every year. The shippers have consequently been faced
with a dilemma of how to market wines from good interim years without undermining
or diluting the reputation of a fully declared vintage. In the past, a certain amount of
wine that was good but not quite up to vintage standard was bottled as crusted Port,
usually accompanied by both the date of harvest and bottling. Since the late 1960s, the
collective solution to this problem has either been to declare wines under a second label
(Fonseca Guimaraens, for example) or, more commonly, to bottle a single-quinta vintage
Port (SQVP).
The Port and Douro Wine Institute (IVDP) treats second label and SQVPs in
exactly the same way as fully declared vintage Ports. In order to obtain approval for the
description ‘vintage’, a sample of the wine must be submitted to the Institute between
1 January and 30 September in the second year after the harvest. The quantity must be