Buying a vineyard in France: costs, the steps, and your first year of selling the wine

Buying a vineyard in France goes through a notaire, gives the local SAFER two months to use its right of pre-emption, and ends with registering the estate with French customs before the first harvest. In 2025, appellation vineyards sold for an average of €171,400 a hectare and vineyards outside an appellation for €12,800, according to the French land agencies. The part most buyers plan last is the one that pays for everything else: who will buy the wine. The best time to plan it is before you sign.

I grew up in France, spent eleven years marketing wine in California and now work from England, so I see this from all three sides. Here is what the purchase involves, and how to get the wine selling in France, the UK and the US from the first vintage.

What vineyard land costs in 2025

Prices vary more by appellation than by anything else. A hectare in the Côte-d’Or averages around €1 million, while vines outside an appellation sell for a little over 1% of that.

Vineyard	Average price per hectare, 2025	Change on 2024
Champagne	€1.13 million	+1%
Burgundy, Beaujolais, Savoie and Jura	€307,500	+3.9%
All appellation (AOP) vineyards	€171,400	-2.9%
AOP vineyards outside Champagne	€87,400	-6.8%
Provence	€58,100	-1%
Vineyards outside an appellation	€12,800	-7.7%

Sources: FNSafer figures for 2025, published in May 2026 and reported by Réussir Vigne and wein.plus.

Bordeaux fell 23.8% in 2025, its second steep fall in a row, and the Sud-Ouest fell 28.1%. Lower prices make it easier to buy there, and they make your own route to customers the most valuable thing you can build, since the wine’s value depends on who buys it.

From offer to first harvest

1. The offer and the compromis de vente. Your notaire drafts the preliminary contract, with conditions such as finance and the SAFER’s decision
2. The SAFER’s two months. The seller’s notaire notifies the SAFER, the regional land agency, at least two months before the sale. It can let the sale go ahead, buy the land itself at the agreed price, or propose a different price. Silence after two months counts as letting the sale go ahead
3. Buying a company rather than land. Many domaines sit inside a farming company. Buying control of one can need the prefect’s approval when your total land holding passes a regional threshold, under the 2021 Sempastous law. Your notaire will check whether it applies
4. The acte de vente. The sale completes at the notaire’s office, and the vines are yours
5. Registering with French customs. The estate is registered on the casier viticole informatisé (CVI), the national vineyard register, and you become an entrepositaire agréé, the bonded status that lets you hold and ship wine before excise is paid. Customs lists each step on its page for creating or taking over a wine business
6. Joining the appellation. If the vines are in an AOP, you join its ODG, the growers’ body that runs the appellation, so the wine can carry the name

Customs also expects a monthly return and a harvest declaration each year. French excise itself is small, about 3 cents a bottle of still wine. The paperwork is the bigger job, and a good local accountant who works with growers will set it up with you.

Buy the customers along with the vines

When a domaine changes hands, the vines and the cellar are in the price. The customers often are too, and they are worth asking about by name, because they decide how quickly the estate earns.

Ask the seller for	Why it matters
Stock by vintage, with bottled and bulk volumes	Your first year of sales comes from wine already made
Rights to the brand name, labels and domain name	Returning customers search for the name they know
The website, shop and social accounts, with logins	Their history with search engines and followers comes with them
The mailing list, and the consent behind it	Customers who agreed to hear from the estate can keep hearing from you
Trade customers and importers, with recent orders	Each account is a buyer you can visit in your first month
Contracts with négociants or a cooperative	They can set what you are free to sell and to whom
The Google Business Profile and its reviews	Cellar door visitors find you there first

A domaine that sells half its wine direct, with an active mailing list and a working shop, is a very different business from one selling everything in bulk, even at the same price per hectare.

Where the wine can go in year one

Route	What it takes	Speed
Négoce or bulk	A broker and the market price	Fast, at the lowest margin
Cellar door and French customers	Opening hours, a shop on your website, French online selling rules	Steady, at the best margin
UK customers	A UK business to import the wine and pay UK duty and VAT	Steady once set up
US customers	A US importer, label approval and a distributor in each state	Slowest to set up, largest market

Selling to the UK

Wine shipped from France to British customers is imported, so a business in the UK clears it, pays UK duty and VAT, and for wine sold in England, puts its name and address on the label as the business responsible for it (gov.uk guidance). That business can be an importer who buys from you, or a UK fulfilment partner who imports and ships your orders.

Duty is the number to plan around. A 75cl bottle at 13% pays £2.99 of UK duty, before VAT. I break down the rates in UK wine duty explained, and the UK side of selling online in how to sell wine online in the UK.

Selling to the US

US buyers reach French wine through the three-tier system: an importer, a distributor in each state, and a retailer or restaurant. Your importer holds the federal permit, applies for each label’s approval (the COLA), and files notice with the FDA before every shipment. Your estate registers with the FDA as a food facility. TTB, the federal regulator, sets out the full list on its page on importing bottled alcohol.

Tariffs on EU wine have changed several times since 2025, including after a Supreme Court ruling in February 2026. Ask your importer for the current rate on the day you set your export prices.

The American buyers who matter most early on are often people you already know. Friends, former colleagues and visitors who loved the estate can order through your importer’s retail partners once you tell them where to find the wine.

A website in two languages from the first vintage

Your website does three jobs for a foreign owner: it sells to French customers and cellar door visitors, it gives importers and trade buyers the tech sheets they need, and it keeps your network back home close to the estate.

• French and English pages for every wine, written for each market rather than translated word for word
• A shop on your own website, so each wine page can rank and sell. My guide to winery website design covers what that shop needs
• A trade page with tech sheets, awards, bottle shots and contact details for importers
• A mailing list sign-up on every page, so each visitor and each order adds a customer you can write to

This is the work I do for domaines, and I set it up in French and English from the start. See winery websites and online shops.

Your first-year checklist

1. Before you sign, list what the sale includes beyond vines and buildings: stock, brand, website, customers
2. Register the estate with customs and the appellation before the first harvest
3. Decide what share of the first vintage goes to bulk, direct sales, the UK and the US
4. Write to the seller’s customers in your first month to introduce yourself
5. Launch the website in French and English, with a shop and a mailing list
6. Choose a UK importer or fulfilment partner, and a US importer, before the wine is bottled

If you have bought, or are about to buy, I can review what the estate already has and plan how it sells. Start with a marketing audit.