Episode #49 - Jean-Michel Cazes

There’s meeting great people, and there’s meeting people who embody an entire generation of wine. For this 49th episode of the Wine Makers Show, your wine podcast, I went to meet Jean-Michel Cazes. Owner of Lynch-Bages, he has been one of the most iconic figures in Bordeaux wine for years. Meeting him was a real testament that I have no doubt you’ll enjoy. Happy listening.

Could you start by introducing yourself?

Jean-Michel: Yes, well, my name is Jean-Michel Cazes. I was born in Bordeaux, too long ago. I think you want to know a bit more. Antoine: I think so, yes. But we’ll dig in.

Could you tell me how you came to wine?

Jean-Michel: Of course. I was born into a family that had interests in wine, at the time of the Great Depression of the 1930s. It was a period when the Médoc vineyard was in extremely poor condition. My family is not originally from Médoc, but from Ariège. My great-grandfather came around 1870-1875 to the Médoc as a seasonal worker. With his comrades, they would let go of their goats during the winter. He came to work the winter in the vineyards of the Médoc. They were planting specialists. The Ariégeois, who were called montagnoles here in the region, were known for their skill with the pickaxe. They were used, at a time when the vineyard was in full expansion, to prepare the soils, the plantings, the deep tilling. An operation done today with big machines, sub-soilers. Back then it was done with a pickaxe. There were 40, 50 of them. They were lined up and they pickaxed to prepare the plantings. They continued after phylloxera. And they were also called upon for the replantings. One year, my great-grandfather decided not to return one summer to tend his goats in the mountain. He settled in Saint-Lambert near here, opposite Château Latour. There he became a market gardener, and he sold his vegetables at the market. He had several children, including my grandfather. It seems he was brilliant. But he left school at 11 and did several things. He was a banking apprentice for a while, and then he was a baker’s assistant. He married the daughter of the baker, himself from Ariège, and he became a baker in Pauillac during the war of 14. After the war, he returned with the rank of captain. That wasn’t bad, except that at the time advancement was rapid. There were so many losses. Then, he continued at the bakery until an event decided the family’s fate. In 1924 the bakery burned down. They found themselves without a bakery, without a baker. So he had to work. He was a bit of a peasant on the side and he knew the vine. It was the start of the Great Depression. He went to see vineyard owners who were absent and having difficulties. So he offered to help them manage their vineyards. He started managing properties on behalf of absent owners, who were in Paris, Bordeaux or elsewhere.

He looked after Château Lieujean next door, he looked after the vineyards of L’île de Patiras, Château Valrose, another at île Vincent in Margaux, in short a number of vineyards. That’s how he met General de Vial who was the owner of Lynch-Bages at the time.

He didn’t actually live in Pauillac, he lived in Paris and Saint-Jean de Luz. He had inherited Lynch-Bages through his wife but it was bankrupt. Things were going very badly, all the properties were in difficulty at that time. To give you an idea of the extent of the disaster, between 1929 and 1939, 15 classed growths out of 18 changed hands in Pauillac, generally because they were going bankrupt.

Was it impossible to make wine at that time?

Jean-Michel: It was difficult, yes. And Lynch-Bages was in this case. In 1933 he was approached by the general who proposed taking over the property as a tenant farmer, telling him: “You take a tenancy, I’m not asking you for rent but you don’t ask me for money and you’ll keep the vine in production.” That was the deal. My grandfather didn’t want to do it alone, it was a big risk for him, so he partnered with the Peugeot dealer in Pauillac. Fortunately the first year, he managed to find a négociant who bought the entire harvest. It was the maison Cruse. They saved his bacon because in fact it’s thanks to maison Cruse that he was able to continue in 34, in 35, etc. Then the garage owner wasn’t interested anymore and he left. He found himself alone. The general, seeing he was getting by reasonably well, wanted to sell, he was discouraged. He wanted to sell from 1936-1937 onwards and for several years he found no buyer. It was for sale on the Bordeaux market, like all properties were for sale. And you have no idea what state the vineyard was in at that time. Finally he found no one. He ended up accepting the proposal that my grandfather made to buy the property but for not much. It was really little but he wasn’t making money either at that time. The deal was done, they reached an agreement in 1939, just before the war.

So my grandfather got Lynch-Bages back in 1939. The general had sold all the furniture, there was nothing left inside the house. My grandfather wanted to furnish it because he was afraid the Germans would move in there in 1940.

At that time, there was in Pauillac the former Château Croizet-Bages whose vineyard is next to Lynch-Bages. At the time of the economic crisis, the owner had sold the château to get rid of it because it was a source of expenses and not income. This château had remained furnished since the nineteenth-century owner, who had furnished it very well at the time. This owner named Julien Calvé, around 1880, was a fairly well-known painter in the region, had his paintings at the modern art museum in Bordeaux and there were paintings by this Julien Calvé that interested no one in 1940. My grandfather bought the former Château Croizet-Bages, the building and what was inside to furnish Lynch-Bages. He transported all the 1880 furniture to Lynch-Bages. I lived all my childhood among the paintings of Julien Calvé, the former owner of Croizet-Bages. By the way, we just got them back to put in the new building we just built, just to show there’s continuity. He found himself here at the start of the war in 1940. At the same time he bought, under more or less the same conditions, the Hauts de Pez at Saint-Estèphe. He tried to make a living from it, which was very difficult during the war. My grandfather had four sons. The eldest, who was a strong-headed fellow, had enlisted in the French army at the time of the Rif War, in Morocco. When he came back he had to do something, and he became an insurance agent in Dax. The second and third had had quite brilliant studies at the college of Blaye, where they went by the ferry. With the boat that crossed the Gironde for him, when he was a baker. They both ended up at the École Polytechnique and they had brilliant careers in banking. They cut contact with the Médoc. It must be said that in the 30s it wasn’t encouraging. My father had the example of his two older brothers and he was the last, he was the fourth. His two brothers just before him had had fine studies and he wanted to do the same. He wasn’t doing badly. So he went without difficulty up to the special preparation class at Louis Le Grand in Paris, where he was a boarder at the lycée. There, he was struck by pleurisy. He became tuberculous and was repatriated just before taking the entrance exams. He stayed bedridden more than a year. Then he had to start up slowly. He earned a law degree. At 33 he had never worked. Then he started developing a small insurance portfolio that my grandfather had created and he too became an insurance agent. He developed this insurance firm which became important; he succeeded very well.

I went to school in Bordeaux. I lived at first with my grandparents. When the time came for me to choose a path, wine was not an option.

My father was an insurance agent, my grandfather lived at Lynch-Bages in conditions that didn’t really appeal to me. Going to feed the horses with oats at 5 in the morning and distributing the cows’ milk as I saw being done all my youth, that wasn’t really my thing. I wanted to be a doctor because I had read a novel at the time which was very famous, called “Citadelle”, you wouldn’t know that. Antoine: No. Jean-Michel: Or “The Citadel”, I don’t know what, by Cronin, he’s an English author who tells the story of a doctor. It was thrilling. I wanted to be a doctor. And my father, medicine didn’t really appeal to him. He had after all a great disappointment from his own youth, he pushed me towards scientific studies. And then finally, he got me by saying: “Medical school starts on November 15.” On the other hand, the lycée, where there were preparatory classes for the grandes écoles, started on October 1st. And he told me: “Listen, go into math-sup, if you don’t like it you’ll change and on November 15 you’ll do your medicine.” I said: “Why not.” And so, the holidays were long. I went off to the lycée in math-sup and I liked it. So I stayed and I went to Louis Le Grand afterwards. I forgot medicine and so I did a scientific school. I failed to get into the École Polytechnique unfortunately to my grandmother’s great dismay who already saw herself with a third Polytechnician in the family. I didn’t have that honor and I went to the École des Mines in Paris which was good enough for me. And then I specialized in geology, I really loved geology.

What drove you in geology?

Jean-Michel: I found that it was a fascinating science. Then on the professional level, it was right in the middle of the 50s, the future was oil. At the time we only talked about oil, the Saharan deposits, Hassi Messaoud, Hassi R’mel, all that appealed to me, it was adventure. Not for a second had I thought of a career in wine. Besides, my father not only didn’t push me, but he would have done anything to keep me away from it. You don’t realize but for a young person at that time, it was a failure. It wasn’t working at all. I just didn’t think about it. I had left at 18. In 1953 I left Pauillac with the idea that I would never set foot in this rotten country again, it was literally miserable. On leaving the École des Mines I wanted to improve my training a little. I went to the United States. I went to the University of Texas. I did a degree in oil research. Then I came back to France at the time of the Algerian War. I had to do my military service. I had been able to choose aviation. I won’t tell you in detail but I was very lucky. Instead of going to Algeria like most of my comrades, I had the chance to be selected to go to the air ministry, in the service called operational research. I didn’t know what operational research was. It turned out that it was about being part of the teams that were going to install the first computers that the air force had ordered from IBM. I prepared the arrival of these computers with a small group. We installed them, we made them work, we programmed them. I started up the first computers of the air force.

Were they gigantic machines?

Jean-Michel: They were quite gigantic machines, yes. Less powerful than the one I have in front of me, but it took up a 100 square meter room. But it was still miraculous, for us it was wonderful. I had never seen anything like it, it was absolutely fascinating. I did two years of military service. During those two years, I learned to use computing at a time when it was literally a fledgling activity. When I was discharged, in 1962, I immediately looked for work in my field, which was oil research. I went to see several companies, BRGM, Total… At that time, since the Algerian War had just ended, the Saharan deposits were losing momentum. We could feel that they were slipping away from us. Not only were they no longer hiring, but geologists like me were arriving by the boatload from Africa. They took all the good positions. I didn’t find a job. I had kept very good relations with the people I had been in contact with at IBM. I said to myself after all why not and I went to see them. They were delighted because they didn’t need to train me, since I had been trained by the army. So they employed me right away. I joined IBM at the end of 1962 I think.

Was it for IBM in the United States?

Jean-Michel: No, in Paris, IBM France. I was what was called a sales engineer at the time. IBM had the reputation of being a company where if you wanted to succeed you had to be in sales, which had a technical part of course. But they first sent me to the development laboratory at La Gaude near Nice. I had the chance to work on the first data transmission systems which were something very new at the time. We put the data at one end of a wire and we got it back at the other end, it was like a miracle with the first modulators. It was very interesting. I didn’t stay very long. I quickly asked for my transfer to the Paris sales department. But as I was better trained than most of my comrades, I immediately had the chance to be assigned to large accounts SNCF, EDF, things like that. It lasted about ten years. I had under my responsibility EDF, Gaz de France, INSEE, all of social security, hospitals… Antoine: That was a big portfolio. Jean-Michel: It was a big portfolio. And it was fascinating, plus it changed all the time. It was a company that was extremely dynamic at the time, that was very young. The average age was 32. There was an extraordinary state of mind. I really loved it and I planned to make a career in this profession. What changed my way of seeing things a bit, is first that there was May 68. Well I didn’t make the revolution, but despite everything it was a new wind that was blowing. I was young, I met my wife by the way at that time, we did the barricades together. We visited the Sorbonne, and the theater, I don’t remember what it’s called. I saw my father regularly. I went to Pauillac from time to time, he worked a lot. He had become mayor of Pauillac, he was overflowing with work. One day when I was having lunch with him in Paris in a restaurant called “Le Beaujolais”, rue d’Hautefeuille, a predestined name, he came to see his insurance company which was near where I was, chatting I asked him how things were going. He told me he wasn’t managing, that he had too much work. The agency in Pauillac was running well. On top of that his brother had died, he had to take care of the one in Dax too. He had the mayoralty of Pauillac where he was a general councillor, he told me “I’m overwhelmed, I can’t do what I have to do.” That was in 1971. “Your grandfather is too old, he can’t take care of Lynch-Bages. I’m also obliged to take care of the property while making him believe he’s the one deciding.”, in short he was a bit depressed. Antoine: It was a little burnout. Jean-Michel: And he tells me: “Business is a tiny bit better in 1971. I wonder if this might not be the right time for us to get rid of the vines.” I tell him: “Dad, wait, why?” He tells me: “Because I can’t manage, I can’t do everything.” And that’s when I told him: “And what if I came to settle in Pauillac, your insurance agency is big enough for two, I’ll have enough to live on. I’ll learn to do insurance, that’s a security and then between the two of us we’ll be able to keep everything.” So the first reaction was, he looked at me and said: “She’ll never come live in Pauillac.” I had been gone for twenty years and I tell him: “Well listen, why not, we can discuss it, we’ll see, I need to talk about it with my wife, etc.” She, she thought she had married an engineer in Paris a year earlier. Finally we discussed it and after two years I took the leap. I first went to take courses to learn how to do insurance. I know very well how to write a fire insurance policy! I spent three months learning to do insurance and I came to settle in Pauillac. My grandfather died in the meantime, in 1972. Arriving in Pauillac the problem was that business which wasn’t great became catastrophic. We arrived in July. In September, there was the 1973 oil shock which had the consequence of increasing interest rates, from around 4 percent before to 20, even 25 percent, in other words there was no more money. We could no longer borrow to finance stocks, it was impossible. The profession collapsed. Six months after my arrival here, I was doing insurance but everything that was wine was slipping through our fingers, and that lasted several years. It really only started up a bit at the end of the 1970s. Between 1974 and 1979 practically, we were on the edge of the precipice, it was complicated. On top of that, it was a time when oenological technique made considerable progress. We had to modernize installations that hadn’t changed an iota since the nineteenth century. There hadn’t been a tile changed at Lynch-Bages since 1880. And it was the same everywhere in the region. Because of the progress in oenology, we couldn’t use the old materials. As business was difficult, buyers in general had become much more demanding on product quality. We discovered that malolactic fermentation absolutely had to be done. Until 1974, no one in the region worried about it. If it happened, all was well; if it didn’t happen, we figured it would happen later. When business became difficult, the négociants said: “Me, a wine that hasn’t done its malolactic fermentation, I don’t buy it, or I won’t pay for it.” That led people to practice methods they didn’t know. The cellar master I had at Lynch-Bages in 1973 didn’t know what malolactic fermentation was. He was a very good cellar master, but he was like most of the others. Old Gaston Moreau who had the cellar here behind, in 1974 or 1975 came to tell me: “The négociant, I sold my wine to him, it’s in barrels and he doesn’t want to take it.” I told him: “But why?” “Because it hasn’t done its malolactic. What is this thing? My wine is good.” The négociant had seen a way to get rid of a wine he no longer wanted. We were all in the same boat. We had to be sure that the basic things like the malolactic were done. Most installations were not equipped to be able to do it in good conditions. We had never worried about it before. Our cellar, the vat room, dated from 1866, hadn’t been touched at all so we had to modernize all that. Little by little we managed to get through the somewhat difficult period, that is to say the 1974-1980 period which was the hardest. On top of that, the wines were not of extraordinary quality. What saved us, it must be said, is that at the same time as technique was evolving a lot, and brutally, the markets evolved too. The Bordeaux wine markets, before the 1970s, were essentially England, the countries of northern Europe, a little France. Paris for example, just after the war, was a market for Burgundy. I remember my father saying: “Eight bottles of Burgundy are sold in Paris for one of Bordeaux.”, in 1950. We had a way to go. The market was quite narrow, the English market was good, the market of northern Germany, Holland, the Hanseatic cities. That was the Bordeaux market. Then, from the 1970s, the American market opened up under the influence of people like Alexis Lichine in particular who was very important for us. Then the Japanese market which started to function from 1978, end of the 1970s. And then, I remember doing a lot of promotion in Paris which was a missionary land at the time for us. Switzerland, Germany, which were Burgundy markets. The market, which was very centered on the British Isles and northern countries spread out in the ten years following 1975. It changed, it greatly improved the situation.

Were these the first times you were also traveling?

Jean-Michel: That I was traveling? No, I had been to the United States before. Antoine: Oh yes that’s true, you had been to Texas too. Jean-Michel: Thanks to the experience I had of traveling, I spoke English rather well. That helped me a lot. When I started traveling to the United States in 1979, I was friends with the director at the time of Mouton-Rothschild, named Philippe Cottin. For the premier crus in 1975-1976, they had set up a promotion program of dinners in several cities in the United States with distributors. There were the 5 premier crus, there wasn’t Pétrus but there was Haut-Brion, Lafitte, Latour, Bouton, Margaux, yes that’s it. There was one of the owners who accompanied this annual trip. One day, Philippe Cottin calls me, explains to me what they do in the United States, and tells me: “Jean-Michel, the person who was supposed to go next year can’t go. It was a Rothschild who was supposed to go. So we got together among ourselves and they agree if you want to do it, you speak English. You’ll represent the premier crus of Bordeaux and of course we’ll add Lynch-Bages.” No problem. I said yes. In 1979 I landed in Los Angeles with my wife for the first time. The next day we had a dinner at Ma Maison, which was the trendy restaurant in Los Angeles, the place where there were all the movie actors and everything. We were landing on another planet and it was funny. The chef was Wolfgang Puck, I don’t know if that name means anything to you, a celebrity in the United States. Today, he must have 50 restaurants. But at the time, he was very young, he’s an Austrian. We did Los Angeles, and we toured the United States for two or three years. The year after, since it had gone well, and they were getting tired of it, they told me: “Don’t you want to do it again?” I did it for them adding Lynch-Bages. For me it was remarkable. After 3 years, they decided to stop, they didn’t want to do it anymore. An extraordinary Hungarian who was their representative in the United States and with whom I had become friends tells me: “But you’re not going to stop.” I tell him: “Yes.” and he told me: “Find me 3 or 4 good winemakers in Bordeaux and we don’t need the premier crus, we’ll do it without them.” I didn’t really believe in it at first. But I went to see Bruno Prats who was at Cos d’Estournel, Claude Ricard who was at Domaine de Chevalier, Thierry Manoncourt at Figeac, and Michel Delon at Léoville Las Cases, and we left again with a group of five. We did that for years, we still do it. It’s not quite the same thing anymore. It allowed us to crisscross the United States. We went to small towns and we got to know enormous numbers of people that way, at a time when the American market was developing a lot. It was very beneficial for us. Plus it was fascinating, we met loads of interesting people. It’s no longer the same group as before and it’s my son who takes care of it. In 1985, I had the chance to be designated by Wine Spectator as number 1 in its top 100 of the year, that helped too. Antoine: Of course. We’re still only in 1985, we still have about forty years left.

You spoke about your wife. There were two years between the moment you had this discussion with your father at the restaurant and the moment you left for Pauillac. What was your wife’s reaction at that time?

Jean-Michel: No reaction. Antoine: Ok. Jean-Michel: First, she wasn’t French. She’s Portuguese, originally from Mozambique. She lived all her life in Mozambique. Between Paris and Pauillac, she didn’t see much difference; no, I’m saying that, it’s not true, plus we had 4 children.

Yes, in fact it was rather opportune, in the end. It was a nice operation to get away from the capital, to have more space?

Jean-Michel: For her yes, I think she was above all a mother. She was happy in Paris, in Pauillac she adapted very well. She followed me everywhere I went. Since she spoke English fluently she was extremely useful to me. When we traveled with her, it was often more an asset than anything else. She was very important, very useful. She had made many friends in the trade. Just the fact of speaking English was very practical. She had been to school in Rhodesia, with the English. Am I too talkative? Antoine: No not at all, we have time, it’s very good.

We’re arriving in 1985, the United States is opening up, Château Lynch-Bages is developing. You have a new roof, you have a new life.

Jean-Michel: During all that time, we built new vat rooms, we developed everything we had. We transformed buildings. For example, we transformed the barn where the cows were into a vat room, the stable too, all that. It was an upheaval. But we were doing it continuously with the means at hand because we didn’t have many means. We adapted. On the technical level we were, from the start of 1973, followed by Émile Peynaud. He was our consultant, and he taught me a lot. I went to take courses at the faculty to learn a bit of oenology anyway, and Peynaud was wonderful. My first harvest in 1973 we almost lost everything because of all this damn lactic fermentation. It was panic on board. Because we had to do it, it had become mandatory to do it for commercial reasons. But we didn’t know how to do it. We had equipment that wasn’t suitable. We waited for it to happen on its own in rotten wooden vats, it wasn’t possible. It was turning to vinegar. We were a hair’s breadth from losing the harvest to vinegar. That’s why we called on Peynaud to come bail us out. He was wonderful. He had a great quality since he had seen all the cases, he was extremely reassuring. And we had several times periods where I couldn’t sleep over it.

To that extent?

Jean-Michel: Yes. At the 1981 harvest, we had a fermentation stop on two thirds of the harvest, I couldn’t sleep over it. Especially since we were, from the financial point of view, on the razor’s edge. If we had lost two thirds of the harvest, we no longer existed. And we never knew what happened. But Peynaud reassured us and we were able to restore the situation. But there were very mysterious things, we were never able to explain that 1981 harvest story. And we weren’t the only ones by the way, in 1981 and 1982. In 1982 we had no problems; but I know that there are other properties that had problems in 1982 similar to those we had in 1981. Yeasts are living beings. We didn’t master things like today. The equipment wasn’t suitable, so deviations were easy.

Since then everything has accelerated for Lynch-Bages?

Jean-Michel: From what point of view? Antoine: All of them, I have the impression. From the technical point of view? Jean-Michel: We haven’t stopped making progress. Even today, it doesn’t stop. I’m amazed to see everything we discover, what we learn. In vinification, there isn’t much left today. The essential was done in the 70s-80s. Antoine: Yes, there are always tests, always new containers… Jean-Michel: Yes, you can always invent things, yes. But I’m speaking scientifically, so tests yes… I saw that they’re testing glass vats now, but well why not. We’re making progress in understanding the phenomena, but the bulk has been acquired for a long time. On the other hand, where there’s enormous progress for about twenty years, is in agriculture. And we continue to make some, it continues to progress in the knowledge of the plant, the conditions. I’m not talking about all the debate on organic or non-organic, that’s still something else. On the way to treat the plant and all that, it takes a very long time to acquire. There has been enormous progress made in the last 25 years. The progress in oenology is mainly in the 80s-90s.

You were a witness, then, and an actor, in the opening of the United States to wine. But you were also one for another, huge market.

Jean-Michel: Then there was Asia. Antoine: Exactly! Jean-Michel: Yes, for me it started in 1989. Antoine: That’s early, on the scale of Asia. Jean-Michel: I got a phone call from one of my friends who was president of a Champagne zone who tells me: “I have a customer in Hong Kong who is looking for a fairly large volume of Bordeaux wines but they need to have some age. They’re only being offered young wines and he would like wines a bit older. I thought you might be interested.” I tell him: “Who is it?” “He’s a Swiss German, who works for the Cathay Pacific company.” I told him: “What’s that?” He tells me: “An airline.” I had never heard of it. I got in touch with this gentleman who tells me that indeed he’s looking for wine. Why? Because his big competitor, Singapore Airlines, is starting to serve Bordeaux on its first-class flights. He wants to one-up him because Singapore Airlines was serving young wine, one or two years old. He wanted a grand cru but with 8 or 10 years of age, but he couldn’t find any. I had quite a lot of wine from previous harvests. Finally, we started discussing. I didn’t know them, I was a bit suspicious anyway. Especially since he wanted to pay right away, but in yen. For me, it was a slightly weird currency. Finally, to go straight to the end of the story, we sold them, hold on, 23,000 cases of wine, all at once, paid cash, in yen! Antoine: That must have made millions of yen! Jean-Michel: That was a lot of yen, yes. It was a deal, we’d never seen anything like it! It’s the biggest deal I’ve made in my life. We went through a Bordeaux négociant by the way to manage the thing. I had inquired beforehand at the Banque Française du commerce extérieur and from Claude Bébéar who was the president of Axa, who was a friend. I had asked him to look at the contract. I said: “You have financial specialists in your thing, let them take a look at this thing so I’m not getting taken for a ride.” We signed and we were installed therefore from 1989 in first class on all Cathay Pacific flights, in particular all those serving Asia, London, etc. That was an extraordinary boost. They asked me to go to Hong Kong, where I had never been, to train the flight attendants. They had to be taught to uncork bottles, talk about wine, etc. They were kids, the average age was 22. There were 11 nationalities, all more ravishing than the next. And we uncorked bottles. Antoine: There’s worse, after all. Jean-Michel: Yes. but I met quite a few people in Hong Kong on that occasion, including a Chinese man who had a bistro there and who absolutely wanted me to go to Beijing with him. I didn’t really feel like going, especially since we weren’t selling a drop of wine in mainland China. Finally, in 1991 he convinced me to go to Beijing and he got me a stand at a food fair. It was a kind of exhibition, of trade show in Beijing. I left with a friend, a Bordeaux man, with a few wines with the idea of having people taste them. There was no buyer, we wanted to see people’s reaction. We had asked for red and Sauternes. In Beijing, the Chinese man got us a black limousine. On the windshield, it had “state guests”. We went everywhere with that, it was wonderful. At the show, we sold nothing. The people who passed in the aisles, and we said to them: “Come taste some wine.”, we had a Chinese interpreter. It was red, they tasted it and they spat it out, it was disgusting for them. They couldn’t stand the taste of tannin. It’s very far from Chinese tastes. On the other hand, the Sauternes they drank like I drink water. On leaving, I was talking with the friend I had left with and I told him: “We may sell Sauternes one day in this country, but red, no point.” We were wildly wrong. Everything changed in China in 1993. There had been that program on American television “60 Minutes”, on the French paradox. The report showed that wine was good for the heart. The Chinese, who are very preoccupied with their health, started buying wine as medicine. The first deals I did in China, in 1995, was 80,000 bottles of a small Bordeaux that we sold to a pharmaceutical products company that sold them to pharmacies. Antoine: Incredible! Jean-Michel: Yes, in Chinese pharmacies, they sold wine. It was called “Les Amoureuses”. They had made a special label with two women with flowered hats. That was our first deal there. They started buying wine, but it’s Hong Kong that was the entry point. There was a lot of contraband, it was complicated.

Have you been a victim of counterfeits or things like that?

Jean-Michel: Yes, a lot. There was a guy who made Lynch-Bages. It was the same label. Instead of Château Lynch-Bages, it was written Pauillac-Lynch-Bages. Below, it was written “vin du Languedoc”, but no matter what’s written on the label, the Chinese person doesn’t read it. There was Lafitte where it was written “Vin du Midi”. We tried to put a stop to that thing, it’s a bit irritating. We took on a law firm in Shanghai and they managed to find the origin in Shenzhen, near Hong Kong. They found the office. They asked if they could buy fake Lynch-Bages. He said there was none. He was suspicious. Then he called them back a short time later. He said he could get some but they had to order at least 25 cases. We didn’t do it. There’s still some, I even saw a counterfeit wine catalog. Real counterfeiting is the one who makes fake Lafitte or fake Mouton-Rothschild and copies everything down to the detail and sells it as real. That’s what the forger who was arrested in America did. But most fakes in China aren’t that. They’re things that look similar but aren’t identical. For example, the Lynch-Bages, the label was similar, but it wasn’t written Château Lynch-Bages. It was written Pauillac Lynch-Bages. I remember seeing a Château Lafitte, it was written Chatreal Lafitte. They’re the same drawings and characters but not the same words. The basic Chinese person doesn’t look if it’s the same thing. They’re counterfeits but it’s a bit more complicated than that. Jean-Michel: During my first trip to China, I saw a bottling workshop where they were labeled Bordeaux. It was a fake. Antoine: That’s incredible. Jean-Michel: I remember one day visiting a casino in Macao where they had an extraordinary cellar, there were Pétrus… Coming back to Bordeaux, I had lunch with Christian Moueix, who took care of Pétrus at the time, and I told him about it and he told me: “They’re all fake.” Antoine: Since then the Chinese market has greatly evolved regarding consumer education on grand crus. Jean-Michel: Yes it evolved but it’s big the Chinese market. Antoine: Yes and there’s still a lot to do.

There’s an element in your career that’s also very interesting, it’s the moment when you worked with Axa Millésimes. You accompanied them in their acquisitions of various Châteaux. Could you tell us how it went and what your role was?

Jean-Michel: It happened because I was at school with Claude Bébéar, who was the president of Axa. We had remained friends, we saw each other regularly. He’s an enthusiast of fine things. When he came on holiday at Cap Ferret where he had a house and we did too, we would leave together for Gers to taste foies gras. One day in 1985, he called me to tell me he was about to buy a property for Axa next door to me. The team in charge knew nothing about wine. He asked me if I could give them an opinion. It was about Cantenac Brown. I met his team, it was actually Bernard Robin who was the director of acquisitions for the Axa group. Like all insurance companies, they buy real assets which are counterparties to the commitments they have made to their clients. They are guarantees to later pay pensions, life insurance, claims, etc. They have legal rules to observe. He had had this idea. So I participated in the discussion with the owner at the time who deceived us, he signed behind our backs with someone else. When I say behind our backs, it’s because I was with the team. It didn’t concern me much. Some time later, in 1986, Claude calls me back and tells me they’re on another deal, which is Château Pichon-Longueville in Pauillac. But it was about to fall through. They wanted my help. I knew the Bouteiller family well, the sellers. I was able to patch up the discussion. They bought Pichon. Claude Bébéar told me: “Now that we’ve bought this, we have to make it work, are you interested?” I found myself responsible for the operation of Pichon. It was in an impossible state. The whole cellar had to be rebuilt and that interested me a lot. After Pichon there were others, in the end I made an agreement with Claude Bébéar. I created a management company and we bought together seven properties: Suduiraut, Quinta do Noval, Disznókö in Hungary… We built a group that held its own and that was that. It was fascinating. At Pichon we rebuilt everything, I wanted to do it with Chien Chung Pei, who is the son of Ieoh Ming Pei, the architect who did the Louvre. I had met him when he was building the Louvre.

How did you meet him?

Jean-Michel: I met him because I had dinner with him one evening, by chance. I was next to him and we hit it off. He’s American and he speaks French very well, his Vietnamese and French wife. He had invited me to visit the Louvre construction site. By the way, he had just discovered the foundations of Philippe-Auguste’s castle, underneath. It was astonishing. So I had stayed in contact with him, he was in New York. He participated in wine clubs, he was a great wine enthusiast. When it came to building Pichon, I asked him if it interested him and he said yes. We had more or less agreed. Unfortunately, at that time he had a project underway with a Californian client. The client wanted exclusivity so he couldn’t do it. We stayed in contact and when it came to building Lynch-Bages, he was still active. I went to see him with Jean-Charles and we ended up working with him. We’re very happy. Antoine: We can’t wait to discover all that! Jean-Michel: It was a choice. Either we did fake old or we went towards something more contemporary. The future will tell us if we were right. In any case, I like it. You’ll see, it’s good. Axa happened like that. After Pichon we got Cantenac Brown back. The Compagnie du Midi which had bought Cantenac Brown was bought by Axa. So we got Cantenac Brown back without having to buy it. After, there was Petit Village, I bought it from my buddy Bruno Prats who wanted to settle these family affairs. Then, Quinta do Noval, my wife being Portuguese it was easier. It was an incredible adventure. Portuguese accounting is artistic. It wasn’t simple. But it’s a magnificent property, I was dreaming of it. I had been there once by chance, and it had dazzled me. The place is magical. When I learned that the Van Zeller family was selling, I rushed in. The most fascinating adventure of all was Hungary. The restart of the Tokay vineyard, which was practically abandoned, after 50 years of communist regime. Suduiraut was more difficult. But Sauternes is more difficult. Antoine: Yes that’s true, and still today. Jean-Michel: And I still hear my grandfather at Sunday meals complaining that business was going badly in the 40s-50s. He said: “I would have done better to buy vines in Sauternes.” Just to show how you can be wrong. Antoine: Yes, in the end not necessarily.

You spoke a bit about Jean-Charles, your son. He’s the one who now takes care of Lynch-Bages. How did it go with him? Did he always want to do this?

Jean-Michel: No. He did his studies in France. Then he did internships in management, in banks. He did a degree in economics. After he went to Brazil. We sometimes considered that he take over. Among my children he was the one who seemed most willing. I always told him: “You have to do something else first.” First I wasn’t very old at the time. I think professional experience in a different sector is always good. I told him: “Do your career and if one day you want to come, we’ll discuss it.”, I didn’t push him at all to come, on the contrary. It was very useful for him to go see what was happening elsewhere. He went to Brazil where he was a controller at Valeo, the auto parts factory. His V.I.E. contract ended. He really liked Brazil. He had found a job at Crédit Lyonnais Brazil. Except that he needed a permanent immigrant passport which he didn’t have. It lasted a long time and meanwhile he was here, he wasn’t doing anything. Brazilians are very tough about that, they protect their candidates. They grant permanent work permits for jobs for which there aren’t too many Brazilian candidates. We took on a lawyer in Brazil to try to move the file forward. Finally after several months, I told him “Meanwhile, I have a sales position in a négociant company we had. He said okay. And then, finally he got hooked and after a few years, he traveled around the world. I fell ill. I had seen too many examples of people who didn’t know how to stop. He replaced me from 2007, he had the title of general director. At the start it was a bit difficult. I fell ill again in 2011 and that’s when I understood that it was the moment. Being two is complicated, we don’t agree on everything. I had also made an important mistake. I had given him the title but not the attributes of the title. That is to say I had kept the nice office, and that’s not good. People when they arrived, they came to me directly. So I would say: “He’s the boss.” It went very well, he’s solid. We went through difficult moments. By the way, all that we just did, that requires a lot of preparation in terms of management and financing. He pulled it off very well.

I would be delighted to do an episode with him, I think it would be interesting to have his point of view on this. If you had the chance to say something to Jean-Michel Cazes when he was still very young and having lunch with his father at the Beaujolais, what would you tell him?

Jean-Michel: Don’t get discouraged. What’s certain is that I was a thousand miles from imagining that things would turn out as they did. Today the wine landscape of 2021 has not much to do with what it was in 1970. We’re in a different environment. I never believed in career planning. If I had had to make plans, they would all have been wrong. On the other hand, I believe that life puts you in front of decisions, turns that you take or don’t take, that you take from the right side or not. We don’t really know why at the moment it happens. Chance does things well, it can do them badly too. I have the impression of always having been a bit tossed around by events that occurred, but that there are opportunities that present themselves and you have to take them at the moment they present themselves.

I have three end-of-podcast questions left that are quite traditional. Do you have a favorite tasting?

Jean-Michel: I have plenty. For different reasons, it’s the wines of the 50s that my grandfather made. It’s 50, 52, 59, 62 also. It was a period during which my grandfather with weak means managed to make exceptional wines and which were the basis of Lynch-Bages’ reputation. I told you about Alexis Lichine, he was the first négociant who imagined doing what was called blind tasting. It didn’t exist before. He was American, he had other methods and he organized regular tastings. He would put premier crus and then wines he liked like Lynch-Bages, like Pichon… He’s the one who got Lynch-Bages out of anonymity in the 50s thanks to those vintages my grandfather made, which are extraordinary. How he made them at the time, I don’t know because he didn’t have many means. But I think he was a good winemaker at a time when very few people were. He made wines that were a bit different from classic Médoc. His wines were riper. He had a principle, he harvested eight days after Latour. It wasn’t very scientific. In the end, that meant he was looking for complete maturity at a time when most people weren’t looking for it. The others were looking for safety. He had problems, in 64 he harvested later but it started to rain and it rotted impossibly. But for me, those wines are very good and loaded with emotion. A wine isn’t just organoleptic perception, it’s the genie in the bottle as they say.

Do you have a wine book to recommend to me?

Jean-Michel: Yes, the latest book on Bordeaux, it’s in my opinion the best ever made on the subject, it’s the one by Jane Anson. Antoine: Yes, an absolutely magnificent book. Jean-Michel: And then on wine in general, there’s Bertall. He’s a 19th-century author who described the Médoc, and it’s extraordinary. On life in the Médoc in 1880. And on wine there’s one that’s the basis, it’s “Le goût du Vin”, by Émile Peynaud. Antoine: It’s a great classic.

Who should be the next person I should interview on this podcast?

Jean-Michel: Éric Boissenot, an oenologist, and a really nice guy. He’s the son of Jacques Boissenot who was an oenologist too, and a student of Émile Peynaud. He’s the one who took over from Émile Peynaud in his consulting contracts that he had here and there. I worked a lot with Jacques Boissenot after Peynaud. He passed away and it’s his son Éric who consults all the premier crus, Lafitte, Latour, and us by the way. Antoine: I can’t wait to meet him. Jean-Michel: And among the négociants, would that interest you? Antoine: Yes, of course. Jean-Michel: Alain Mosesse, who was a wine broker. He had married the daughter of Balavesse who was a big Bordeaux wine broker. He set up as a broker with the father-in-law. Very quickly he took the lead. In the 70s and 80s, he was the one who accompanied the resurrection of the Bordeaux trade. He’s remarkable. Alain became a négociant with his sons. Among the winemakers, there’s Philippe Courrian. He’s the owner of Château Tour Haut-Caussan in Blaignan in the Médoc and he was the pioneer of Languedoc. Today he’s settled in the Corbières, Château Cascadais, it’s a very beautiful place, paradise on earth. And Philippe is very interesting. Antoine: Wonderful! We’ll go meet these three people in the coming weeks and months. Jean-Michel: And then, they’re not people we talk about much in the papers. Antoine: And yet, they deserve it! Thank you very much Jean-Michel for the time you spent with me. Jean-Michel: I talked a lot. Antoine: That’s what it’s for! I learned a lot of things and I had a wonderful time. Jean-Michel: Thank you.