The Wine Advocate is launching a new service called “Wine Benchmarking.” This new service was asked to be announced (publicly) to the Colorado wine industry. Having seen this announcement I decided to also mention it on my personal wine blog (can you call it a blog when you post once every few months??) and here. I have no idea what other wineries/regions were notified of this new service (I would hope this service would be available to all wineries!). I reached out to Lisa Perrotta-Brown via Twitter but have not heard back from her.
The details of this service are for an $800 fee 2 wines will be assessed/evaluated and wineries provided with actionable steps provided by WA reviewers to improve quality in the vineyard and winery at a Benchmarking seminar in February. I’ve been notified that the Wine Advocate is not happy that I announced this info, despite the fact that it was asked to be communicated to the CO wine community - hence why I took down the OP to confirm that it was indeed not confidential info.
I wonder if Lisa will disclose which wines (a) bought their service and (b) ended up, coincidentally, getting high scores. Not that cutting them some cheddar would have any connection whatsoever to the high score of course. Perish the thought. And you people are so mean for thinking such a thing would be possible! Shame on you!
Time to drop the ‘Robert Parker’ bit from the name I think, as despite his failings, I think he would have balked at such an obvious conflict of interest.
I’m rather amused that the professional wine critics deem themselves expert enough in winemaking to tell a winemaker what they are doing wrong in the winery and what to do to fix it. I suspect many would view that as rather presumptuous.
I am definitely with you on your second point, and I want to believe you’re right about the first. This is purely a Lisa brainchild. She is driving that once proud (over-proud?) institution into the ground.
I wonder if anyone is gagging on this on the board over there. Anyone with access care to fill us in?
It really does not matter that the critic in question has any winemaking experience or knowledge. He or she knows what the wine needs to taste like to garner a high score out of bottle. Sweeter, more tannin, more extraction (mega purple anyone?), etc. If Parker back in the day didn’t like Burgundy, he called it thin and anemic. If a vintner in Burgundy cared, they would do whatever it took on the back in to make a wine with more backbone and fruit.
Seems like a great way to generate cash from up and coming fringe wineries that need to have shelf takers.
Old thinking. Why pay for a process you think will get you higher scores when it is a much more efficient, modern strategy just to pay for the higher scores directly.
