Someone still has money in this economy - Wine auctions up 45%

This wine is NOT coming out of boxes.

Hart Davis Hart, a Chicago-based wine auction house, just released it's half-year financial information. We knew wine buyers had money - what we didn't know is that their finances apparently are unaffected by bad economic times. This year, since January, HDH has sold 23 MILLION dollars worth of wine - up 45% from that period last year. Whoa.

In their most recent lot, a case of a 1996 La Tache went for $23,900 and nine bottles of 1991 Chambertin went for $17,925. We realize that fine wine is very expensive, and by all accounts HDH is a very very good auction house - nothing whatsoever against them. Here we were ranting about $20 cocktails, thinking that was expensive in a recession. Clearly, we've set our foodie sights far, far too low.