The Rothschilds are growing their wine empire—again. The famed banking family spent a whopping $99 million when buying Domaine William Fèvre from the Pinault clan, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. The deal was announced last year and finalized in January, but the price wasn’t divulged back then.
Now it’s been revealed in financial filings. Domaine William Fèvre is situated in the Chablis region of France, which produces highly regarded Grand Cru wines such as Bougros, Les Clos, and Vaudésir, Bloomberg noted. Before Domaines Barons de Rothschild (Lafite) took over the vineyards, they were under the control of the Pinaults’ Artémis Domaines.
While the Rothschilds have long been important in the world of Bordeaux—they own the first growth Château Lafite Rothschild —the acquisition allows them to move into Chablis, where they haven’t historically had as strong of a presence. “Chablis benefits from the renown of Burgundy while having much larger vineyards that can produce bigger volumes per estate,” Sébastien Jacquemont, a representative in the region for the real-estate agency Vinea Transaction, told Bloomberg. (Domain William Fèvre sits on 173 acres of land, for example.
) The Rothschild family has been in the winemaking biz for more than a century, with Baron James de Rothschild acquiring Château Lafite in 1868, Bloomberg wrote. Currently, former journalist Saskia de Rothschild is at the head of Domaines Barons de Rothschild, which has expanded a.
