Thieves have stolen about 30,000 bottles of wine worth an estimated €5 million from a storage facility belonging to Marchesi Antinori, one of Italy's best-known wine producers, in what the company says is the largest theft of its kind in Italy. The break-in took place on Saturday in Tuscany, the central Italian region famed for its vineyards, but was only discovered on Monday morning when staff arrived at work. No arrests have been made, and Italian police are investigating.

According to Italian media reports, at least seven masked men deactivated the alarm system and disabled the security cameras. They then parked two large trucks inside the warehouse and used the company's own forklifts to load pallets of wine that had already been packed for export to customers abroad. The bottles were mostly Tuscan reds from the Solaia, Tignanello and Guado al Tasso labels, which typically sell for between €150 and €500 each; some reports suggest a few more expensive bottles may have been included.

The company believes the thieves knew what they were doing. Albiera Antinori, chair of the board, said all the stolen wines were from the 2023 vintage, regarded as an exceptional year, particularly for Solaia, an exclusive wine of which only 60,000 to 70,000 bottles are produced annually. About 10,000 of them were taken. Chief executive Renzo Cotarella said the group was clearly highly trained and that a theft of this scale had never happened in Italy. "The people at the winery were crying," he told the Financial Times. Italian media suggest the gang may have been working on behalf of others, though no organisation has been identified.

Cotarella remains hopeful that at least some bottles can be recovered. "Two trucks full of merchandise can't just disappear into thin air," he told Corriere della Sera, noting that Tuscan roads are full of cameras. The company has begun warning customers in the 170 countries it exports to, as well as restaurateurs, to be wary of offers that seem too good to be true or come from outside official channels. According to the reports, the loss is not covered by insurance.

The case comes amid a series of wine thefts in Italy this year, including two in the northern Piedmont region, where hundreds of thousands of euros' worth of bottles were taken. Last month, about 3,000 bottles worth €300,000 to €400,000 were stolen from the Conterno Fantino winery. A Belgian wine expert told VRT that rising prices for cult wines such as Solaia, whose price has reportedly risen fivefold in twenty years, have made them more attractive targets, while security has not kept pace. Because wine is a legal product that can be shipped openly, he added, tracing stolen bottles is harder than tracing drugs or weapons.

Marchesi Antinori, founded in 1385, is among Italy's largest family-owned wineries and reported revenue of €263 million last year.