"Five producers are conspicuously absent from this report. Chateaus Mouton, Lafite Rothschild, Latour, Margaux, and Haut Brion-declined to submit samples for our blind tasting.
The five extended an invitation to Molesworth to taste the wines at their estates. However, due to our insistence on blind tasting, this was not an option for us.
I hope these wineries will reconsider participating in our process, as they have for many decades. When wineries opt out of an ethical review process, everybody loses."
I think it’s cowardly–you can learn a lot from tasting bilnd, and, though my palate does not align with theirs, I respect WS for doing that. Interesting that Cheval Blanc did not hold back–or did the tasting not include the Right Bank?
This is one of the silliest posts I have seen in ages. Numerous Bordeaux do not submit samples to the Wine Spectator for tastings.
If they wanted to taste the wines, they would need to go to the property. It has been that way for years. Though more and more of the top estates do not send samples to the Wine Spectator.
I know most critics have to go trotting round a number of states, not just First Growths. Seems that WS since the time of Suckling had a different set of rules.
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I hope these wineries will reconsider participating in our process, as they have for many decades.
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WS makes a ton of money. They can easily afford to purchase the wines. And like Southwold or Bordeaux Index, they can conduct a blind tasting. They just need to pony up a few, tax deductible dollars.
No reward for Chateaus and all risk. In retrospect they would not have agreed to the 1976 Napa competition…nothing to gain. Not like they need the exposure.
Does an estate that is seemingly permenantly endowed with “first growth” status really need another 100 point score from a single American publication to sell an ocean of wine at $700/btl? Easier to set up a planned tasting at the chateau where they can treat the wine however they like (decant, temperature, etc) AND taste it themselves to ensure they’ve selected a good bottle. Oh yeah … and wine and dine the reviewer because human nature is human nature.
If WS really wanted to be a consumer advocate, they’d buy one of the bottles available to … consumers. If that’s too expensive, then perhaps it’s not possible to be an unbiased publication that reviews an entire world’s worth of wine ethically. They’d provide more value reviewing a single region accurately than the entire world inaccurately.
Exactly. I respect their effort to taste blind, but “send us a couple thousand dollars worth of wine for free or we’ll criticize you in print” isn’t exactly the most “ethical” look.
Literally no incentive for first growths to submit - if they do great, it’s business as usual. If they do poorly, everyone points fingers and asks what’s wrong.
The Wine Spectator is basically saying that well established wineries should risk their businesses on a blind tasting that the Wine Spectator will profit from regardless of the outcome.
Blind tasting at any level can be educational, but with the number of wines reviewers wade through these days I have opted to host and critic that wants to come and visit and only submit samples to Josh Reynolds and John Gilman. Who do not taste blind.
There are a thousand things that can create a failure to assess a wine correctly in a mass tasting environment. If a business begins publishing reviews of my wines without my consent, I would sue them.
When you buy the bottle, you own the bottle. Not the right to profit financially by writing about it at my expense.
When I submit a sample, I’m tacitly expressing my willingness to have the publication publish their opinions of my product. Off a shelf, the bottle does not come with that right.
If a consumer or critic wants to post a TN on the Berserker board or on CT of my wine, without compensation, they’re welcome to do so. Publishing a review and score to create content for a magazine charging thousands of dollars for ad space without consent of the producer is ethically wrong.