Three years on from its merger, Goedhuis Waddesdon’s commercial director Helen Miller sat down with db to talk about negotiating the downturn post-merger, consolidation within the industry and reasons to be cheerful. Arabella Mileham reports.
The news that fine wine merchant Goedhuis & Co and Rothschild distributor Waddesdon Wine were merging came somewhat out of left-field back in November 2023, but the deal brought together two “very successful, very profitable businesses that were both in growth”, only for the market to change. This, commercial director Helen Miller admits was “a big shock” and one that needed to be carefully navigated.
“When we merged, we were merging into a very different marketplace than the marketplace we [subsequently] found ourselves in,” she explained. The private client team in particular had a tougher time because of the fine wine market, although the commercial team faced a market that wasn’t struggling as much.
The results for the year to 31 March 2025 reflected this (as well as the financial cost of the merger itself) with the company reporting a loss before tax of £1.8million, up from £938k in 2024. Gross profit margin fell from 23% in 2024 to 18% while the “continued fall in fine wine values and unrealistic release prices from producers severely impacted sales,” the director’s report noted”. Stock provision more than doubled, from £100k to £250k and the general economic situation caused a bad debt expense of £81k. Turnover however rose to £37.1m.
However, more than a year on, the future is much brighter. Turnover is expected to rise to £42m this year, Miller says, and much of the loss in 2025 came from “an awful lot of write-downs from the cost of the merger”.
“The two businesses coming together without the cost of the merger wouldn’t have resulted in a loss,” she explained. “What we’ve demonstrated is a fantastic example of how two very different businesses can come together, complement each other, and make a success of what is effectively a very blue chip Bordeaux and Burgundy wine merchant and a B2B business coming together, without undue reliance on the Rothschild wines, but respecting the Rothschild ownership all the way through.”
“We’re excited for the future, we are hitting budget and we are in growth as a business. We have been in growth as a business for the whole of the first quarter.”
Combined forces
From a commercial perspective, the merger has given the combined business “the infrastructure behind us to succeed rather than changing the way we work,” Miller explains. “We still do what we do, but we do it with more support behind us.”
From a portfolio point of view, there were some wines on the private on the Goedhuis side that were pulled into the commercial side. One example is Burgundy’s Maison Roche de Bellene, which has gone into Ocado very successfully. “We created a Burgundy category in Ocado that didn’t exist before, just with Roche de Bellene and now we dominate that category for Ocado,” she explained. “We’ve been very fortunate that we’ve been able to find new avenues for the wines for our partner wines.”
As a result, Goedhuis Waddesdon is in almost 50% growth in commercial, much of which has come through specialist Majestic,,“which has seen huge growth for us”. Its wines are also now in Tesco for the first time, including Roseblood, a Pauillac, Saint-Émilion and Aruma from Bodegas Caro – which Miller credits to the foresight of buyer Beth Kelly, who herself moved from Majestic to Tesco.
“We’ve got Rothschild on the shelves of Tesco for the first time with a Pauillac from DBR Lafite and a satellite Saint-Émilion from Edmond Rothschild, and they’re doing really well,” she said.
Careful navigation
This is something that has has had to be gently navigated “to ensure that it doesn’t impact on the very premium and luxury business,” however. There are advantages – “when you have rosé brand on a list or on a shelf of a small retailer, it helps that people have seen it in bigger retailers at those levels,” she explains, but in other cases bespoke labels were created to offer a point of difference.
“We’re lucky that we have very long-term relationships with our partners, so DB Lafitte were able to create a bespoke label for their Pauillac, so it doesn’t influence anything else in the marketplace,” she said.
Partner Content
There has also been growth in several key areas of commercial. “We are going from strength-to-strength in five-star deluxe Mayfair,” she says, with restaurant chains, white tablecloth and wholesale into the on-trade also in growth.
Celene Crémant is doing well in the likes of Marriott, however one of the biggest successes has been the Waddesdon Rothschild collection, “effectively a good house wine”, Miller explained, that offers a full portfolio and the ability to have “category conversation with all of our customers”.
“We can’t get enough juice – we’re struggling to source enough Piquepoul and Viognier,” she adds.
Fine wine uptick
Meanwhile Miller is optimistic that in terms of fine wine. “We are seeing an uptick. I feel like we’re at the bottom of the lull.”
En primeur was “more successful than we could have dreamt it would be”, she said, with the private client team embracing whole barrel selling that the Bordelaise were able to offer. “So all of a sudden we’re selling 300 bottles instead of six,” she explains. “We had some really stand out successes, and we weren’t necessarily expecting it,” she says, pointing to Lafite and Monrose in particular. “It was tough last year, but most of the customers who bought 2024 bought into 2025 this year, so we’re really pleased with that performance.”
Merchants seeing limited allocations was also quite helpful, for as Miller points out “because of our unique relationship, we were able to supply Lafitte into some of the other merchants. So although very low margin, for Saskia de Rothschild, it’s about ensuring everybody’s got the Lafitte they need, and so every customer can buy the case they want.”
Meanwhile David Roberts MW and his team were more selective about what they offered, offering around half the wines they might have done in the past “but the ones that we do offer really count”.
“What that’s done is removed noise from the period,” she explained. “Where the wines truly stood out for quality and were released at the right price point, we’ve really got behind them.”
“As every other merchant has, we haven’t just been offering en primeur during that month period. There have been other offers going on, so it’s not just been about Bordeaux EP.”
“I remember hearing Maxwell Lalondrelle saying he won’t be leaving his team fully on Bordeaux EP for two months anymore, and I completely agree with him. It’s just not possible.”
For now, Miller remains proud of the way that the Goedhuis and Waddesdon teams have pulled together, as the recent tasting showed. “We are genuinely really excited about the future, and I don’t think there are many wine businesses that could sit here and say that right now.”
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