WINE AUCTION HISTORY

The auction process, selling goods and services to whoever is willing to pay the most, has been around for thousands of years. There are well-documented accounts of wine being sold at auction during the time of ancient Rome.

Michael Broadbent started modern wine auctions in 1966. As a young Master of Wine, he left Harvey's in Bristol and took up a position with Christie's in London. What inspired Michael Broadbent was the opportunity of bringing to market the huge quantities of French wines and port. He also recognised that the large estates in Scotland and England were a new kind of customer who not only bought a lot of wine for drinking enjoyment but also that the vast quantities collected could be sold or swapped.

Broadbent created a system to appraise, classify and catalogue their wines for auction. The world is changing, and so is the art of selling wine at auction.

MW auctions are leading the change by defining the brand-new world of selling wine at specialised wine auctions as well as internet based auctions. MW started with its first wine only live auction in 1996.