In order to get to the wine collection, the thieves pretended to be hotel guests (symbolic picture)
Photo: Maja Hitij / picture alliance / dpa
In a hotel in southwest Spain, two thieves stole 45 bottles of wine from the wine collection - including an extremely rare 215-year-old bottle worth 350,000 euros.
The owner announced on Friday.
Accordingly, the theft occurred on Wednesday early in the morning.
"They were professionals, they knew exactly what they were doing," said Polo, owner of the "Atrio". The suspects were a man and a woman who spoke English and who gave the staff the impression of a sophisticated couple who had checked in at the hotel and dined in the restaurant. Then they asked a hotel receptionist to serve them more food. When he went into the kitchen, he left the monitors of the security cameras unattended, which the thief used, according to Polo, to steal the bottles from the cellar. On Wednesday morning, the couple checked out, paid with a credit card, and left the hotel with bags full of bottles.
Polo said no one noticed the loot, including the precious 1806 Château d'Yquem and at least six other 19th-century bottles from the exclusive winemaker Romanee-Conti in the French region of Burgundy.
He did not calculate the total value of the stolen bottles, but above all their symbolic value is particularly high.
Polo assumes that the thieves work for a private wine collector, as they only stole bottles that cannot be sold on the open market.
“These bottles are numbered and checked.
This 1806 Yquen is one of a kind;
everyone knows it's ours, ”he said.
Those in the know would therefore notice if they were offered for sale.
Like art, wine is also associated with pleasure and luxury and can sometimes achieve irrational prices, explains David Remartinez, a critic of the food and hospitality industry.
“These bottles cannot be sold in a public market, but there is a hidden market for them to be exchanged,” Remartinez said.
The theft at Atrio is a warning to private wine collectors.
The Atrio is a complex that includes a hotel and a two Michelin star restaurant with a wine cellar with over 40,000 bottles in the town of Caceres.
A police spokeswoman said an investigation into the wine theft has been launched.
tfb / AP
