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About 50 journalists who had been invited to a lunch
before the En Primeur week, hosted by Magrez and his friend and partner
in some ventures- the French actor Gerard Depardieu- were offered a bag
that contained a press kit and a box which contained the watch.
Many journalists discussed the situation and agreed
among themselves that keeping the watches could be misconstrued. Decanter
reports that the majority have been returned. One person told Magrez that
he had donated the watch to a French homeless charity, Restaurants du
Coeur.
'We wanted to show Mr. Magrez that his gesture would
not change our professional attitude towards him, or our way of judging
wines. We felt the most judicious response would be to give an equivalent
sum to a relevant charitable body,' wrote the reporter in an email.
Magrez was not fazed, however, by the reaction of the
journalists. 'At 72 I've been around the block a few times, and I know
what you should and shouldn't do with respect to journalists,' he said.
'I am not so stupid as to think I can buy them. This
lunch was held to commemorate over a total of 1,700 vintages at my three
greatest vineyards, and I chose to mark the occasion by engraving a watch.
If a few of the invited journalists choose not to keep the watch, that
is of course their prerogative.'
The head of Cartier is Alain Dominique Perrin, a friend
of Magrez who recently commented that Bordeaux pricing was immoral, and
that first growths could not cost more than $24 per bottle to produce.
' Like some of his wines, Bernard Magrez has simply been
more grand and obvious in the game that is played across Bordeaux, of
providing freebies (expensive wines, dinners, hotel stays, etc.) to those
who might be of use to them in pimping their goods, whether they be journalists,
bloggers, or critics,' reacts a reader of Decanter.
One company that would not find this episode amusing
is the group of Indian importers who have allegedly been buying some of
his wines through an associate company of Magrez. Apparently the importer
has some payments due to him and has even complained to the French Economic
Mission in India, who has promised the importer that he will get his payment
very soon.
The billionaire was featured recently in an article
published by delwine
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