Marchesi Antinori's €5 million theft: 30 bottles of fine wine stolen

Cortona – A multi-million dollar robbery was carried out between Saturday and Sunday at the Marchesi Antinori winery in Cortona, in the province of Arezzo. Thieves stole thirty thousand bottles of fine wine, with an estimated total value of five million euros.

Five criminals loaded bottles onto two trucks: the Arezzo prosecutor's office is investigating.

Some of the company's most prestigious labels, including Solaia, Tignanello, and Guado al Tasso, were targeted. According to initial reports, the robbery was organized by at least five people, who disabled the alarm system and disabled the surveillance cameras.

The thieves then reportedly entered the facility and used company forklifts to load the bottles onto two large trucks that have not yet been found, so it has not yet been determined whether they were stolen. The Carabinieri and the police are investigating the incident. It has not been ruled out that the thieves may have had an inside mole.

The Arezzo prosecutor's office is awaiting a detailed report on the incident to reconstruct the circumstances and responsibilities behind the robbery. The area where the company is located is relatively isolated and does not appear to be equipped with public video surveillance cameras. However, the area is near a road junction that also leads to the Perugia-Bettolle ring road, a connection that could prove crucial in reconstructing the thieves' movements.

The hunt is on for thieves and any moles within the logistics of the winery

Investigators do not rule out the possibility that the group may have had an accomplice who, for some time, had been studying the logistics of the facility and the methods to enter the premises and steal the precious labels.

"It's certainly a highly trained gang, perhaps the same one that has targeted other wineries in Italy in recent months," said Renzo Cotarella, CEO of Marchesi Antinori. "A theft of this scale and value has certainly never occurred in Italy."

Fine wines, CEO Cotarella: "Our employees are crying, we hope for a recovery."

The stolen wines include approximately 10,000 bottles of Solaia from the 2023 vintage, compared to an annual production of 60,000-70,000 bottles. The stolen wines also include Tignanello, the flagship Super Tuscan wine created in the 1970s by winemaker Giacomo Tachis, and Guado al Tasso, produced on the Antinori estate in Bolgheri. The company, founded in 1385 and now in business for 26 generations, has initiated communication with international customers to warn them of potentially suspicious offers.

"At the winery, our employees are crying. It's not just the value of the wine: it's something more. We can survive, but what deeply saddens me is that something like this could happen to us." Renzo Cotarella, CEO of the Marchesi Antinori winery, commented on the theft and is unconvinced. He hopes the wine will be recovered: "All that wine, two trucks, can't just disappear." The robbery, carried out inside one of the company's warehouses and logistics facilities, has been described by industry experts as one of the largest wine thefts ever to occur in Italy.

"These wines," Cotarella said, "are highly valuable, and I don't understand how they can sell all these bottles around the world unnoticed." The company will therefore warn potential buyers about the risk that attractive prices and unusual sources could be of illicit origin. Last year, Marchesi Antinori posted revenues of approximately €263 million and exports to 170 countries.