French wines vintages

The word Vintage designates the year during which the grapes have been harvested to produce a wine. Although the wines made with the grapes harvested in 2009 will only be bottled in 2010 or 2011 or even later, the vintage for all these wines will be 2009. 

In France most quality wines are vintaged wines, and 100% of the wine must be from the same vintage mentioned on the label. On the other end, in California for instance, if 80%  of a wine are from a vintage, and if these 80% are blended with a wine from a different vintage,  the wine can still be vintaged. 

The vintage effect plays a critical role in the quality and the aging potential of a wine. Since, every year has different climatic characteristics, every year the grapes and the wines are different. Only very few years per century manage to have the specific requirements to produce exceptional wines: 

• These requirements vary from one type of wine to the other:  the weather conditions that may be good for a red wine might be damaging for a sweet white wine. 
• The weather in France varies greatly from one region to the other, so a good vintage in the Loire region might have been a very poor one in Alsace. 

A mythical vintage:  1982 in Bordeaux

In champagne, it is traditional to blend vintages together in order to maintain consistency in the the production over the years. The champagne made with several blends are called "Non Vintage Champagne". They represent 80 to 90%of the champagne production. On the other hand, in the good years, Vintage Champagne is produced:  100% of the wine is made with grapes harvested during the year specified on the label of the bottle. 

Another exceptional vintage in Champagne:  Bollinger 1996

Wine critics keep records of the different vintages: 

Bordeaux vintage chart by Robert Parker

More vintage charts here