When Naples trumps Napa
Philanthropy and extreme party planning combine to catapult a posh but decidedly unstuffy festival to the top of wine world events.
By CHRIS SHERMAN
Published January 30, 2006
NAPLES - Looking back, $85,000 for nine bottles of bubbly seems a pittance.
It wasn't ordinary champagne, of course, but Dom Perignon, six bottles of the fine 1995 vintage and three older magnums. The bubbly was posh enough to merit a custom display case designed by architectural legend Richard Meier. Plus dinner and lodging at the winery's chateau in France.
Yet $85,000 was just the first ante at the sixth annual Naples Winter Wine Festival auction Saturday. When 550 wealthy patrons and wine connoisseurs were finished bidding and partying under an outdoor circus tent at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort, nearly $14-million was raised for children's charities.
"Lord knows I could go to Italy for a lot less than $160,000," said successful bidder Retta Singer, a Tennessee transplant, who with her husband was among the event's founders. "It's all about those kids."
In just six years, the festival has become the richest wine auction in the world and is still so unstuffy that millionaires jump up and cheer to rock hits after every winning bid.
After the first lot of Dom, prices rocketed up through 70 more lots, averaging $150,000 or more each.
Some big sellers:
--An instant cellar of 75 top Bordeaux from 1970 through 1982, $160,000.
--Dinner with wine guru Robert Parker Jr., $200,000.
--A truffle menu with celebrity chefs Emeril Lagasse and Mario Batali, $300,000.
Throw in the $7,500 ticket price per couple and a raffle of a Rolls Royce (chardonnay in color and $5,000 a chance) and the spendathon bested last year's impressive $11.2-million.
Naples now tops older, more famous events in Napa and the rest of the wine world thanks to 14 couples who got together in 2000 in a rare convergence of philanthropy, top-drawer event-planning, plus wine knowledge and contacts.
Some of the founders, including publishers Clarke and Elizabeth Swanson and Sunkist president Jeff Gargiulo and his wife, Valerie Boyd, have successful wineries. Others have vineyards with labels on the way, giving them all a foot in Napa and another in Naples.
The group's goal, however, was to raise money for children who live in Naples' poorer precincts and especially nearby Immokalee, the home of struggling farmworkers and new immigrants.
Among the recipients of past auction money have been the Boys & Girls Club of Collier County and Guadalupe Center in Immokalee and other programs for foster care, literacy and mental health.
The children's needs easily outweighed the market value of rare vintages and luxury trips that accompanied almost every item offered. "What things sell for has nothing to do with the market value. These are very generous people," said Linda Malone, a founding trustee.
The trustees are also "people who have accomplished a lot in their lives, and they bring a very special skill set," Malone said.
Those skills include extreme party-planning. The trustees command private jets to ferry chefs and winemakers to Naples where they are met by brass bands. They marshal limousines to shuttle guests from the Ritz to their dinner parties.
Cooking for the outdoor party were chefs from the Ritz-Carlton's Florida properties, with a menu that included elk short ribs, squid ink paella and lobster beignets.
Still, there were big lines for gourmet hamburgers, chorizo corn dogs and roast suckling pork, followed by popcorn, hotdogs and cotton candy.
Big money isn't always stuffy. Only the Ritz staff was in black tie. Color scheme for guests, volunteers and decor ran from cruise ship pastels to Mardi Gras brights in harlequin patterns and candy stripes.
Attendees bid with full knowledge of the purpose. Before the grand dinners on Friday, two busloads of donors visited charities in Naples and Immokalee.
"I had tears in my eyes. To some people in this tent, $50,000 is nothing. To these families, $5,000 is everything," said Greg Gregory of Tampa, a wine collector and co-owner of Suncoast Roofers Supply. "When they ask for help at Christmas, it's not for toys; they need shoes and clothing."
Gregory contributed 101 bottles of cult zinfandels and petite sirah made by Helen Turley and 10 bottles of rare Bordeaux. Together they brought $200,000. He and some friends chipped in to buy a $200,000 lot of Italian wines.
Trustee Bruce Sherman, popped $520,000 for a Mediterranean cruise for five couples on a 171-foot yacht with the Gargiulos and their wines.
Vintner Dan Duckhorn who donated some of his best wines, also wound up bidding and buying dinner with Lagasse for $300,000.
Grace Evenstad, who owns Domaine Serene, a top pinot noir producer in Oregon and chair of this year's festival, was the successful bidder for a 2006 Bentley Continental Flying Spur. For just $440,000.
"We needed a new car," she said.
Naples' success now has the full attention of the wine world. "We've got some good ideas from them," said winemaker Jess Jackson of Kendall-Jackson Winery. "We're going to try to incorporate them in the Sonoma auction."
That may require injecting California wine with whatever is in Naples water.
--Chris Sherman can be reached at 727 893-8585 or sherman@sptimes.com