Wine Rating System

About our wine rating system

Our wine ratings (and selection) are provided by some of the most internationally recognised experts in this field. You will no doubt know some (if not all of them).  Please find information below pertaining to these specialists.

• Robert M. Parker, Jr

• Wine Spectator Magazine

• Decanter Magazine

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Robert M.Parker, Jr

Robert M. Parker, Jr. (born July 23, 1947) is a leading influential wine critic. His 100 point ratings and florid tasting notes define modern American wine criticism, and are a major contributor to the prices for newly-released Bordeaux wine.


Biography

Mr. Parker was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He is an honors graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park, with a major in History, and a minor in Art History. He continued his education at University of Maryland, Baltimore, graduating in 1973 with a Juris Doctor degree. For over ten years he was an attorney for the Farm Credit Banks of Baltimore; he resigned in March 1984 to devote his full attention to writing about wine.

By 1975, he began writing a consumer's guide to wine. Parker wanted to be a consumer advocate, unencumbered by the need to sell wine.

In 1978, Parker started a mail newsletter called The Baltimore-Washington Wine Advocate, soon shortened to The Wine Advocate. The first issue was complimentary, sent to those on mailing lists acquired from a few local wine retailers. The magazine had 600 charter subscribers in August 1978.

Parker received worldwide attention when he "called" the 1982 vintage in Bordeaux as superb, contrary to the opinions of many other critics who felt it was too low-acid and ripe. The debate about whether 1982 is a vintage for the ages continues through the early 2000s, but the wine market appears to have spoken, elevating prices for 1982 Bordeaux above other vintages from the period, although price is not always a fair indicator of a wine's quality.

Now, over twenty years later, The Wine Advocate has over 40,000 subscribers, primarily in the United States, but with significant readership in over 37 other countries. Today, many knowledgeable observers agree that The Wine Advocate exerts the most significant influence on wine consumers' buying habits, particularly in America. New York Times wine critic Frank Prial asserts that "Robert M. Parker Jr. is the most influential wine critic in the world."

In addition to doing the writing and tasting for The Wine Advocate, which is published bi-monthly in Parkton, Maryland, Mr. Parker has been a contributing editor for Food and Wine Magazine. He has also written periodically for the English magazine The Field and has been the wine critic for France's L'Express magazine, the first time a non-Frenchman has held this position.

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Impact on the wine industry

The most influential, and controversial, impact of Parker's writing is his 100-point ranking system, which he devised with his friend Victor Morgenroth. The scale, since widely imitated in such other publications as the Wine Spectator, ranks wine on a scale from 50 to 100 points, on color and appearance, aroma and bouquet, flavor and finish, and overall quality level or potential. The scale was developed to counter what Parker believed to be confusing or inflated ratings by other wine writers, many of whom Parker also accused of a conflict of interest, as they often had a financial interest in the wines they rated.

Many of his competitors, however (for example Hugh Johnson and Jancis Robinson) argue that the quality of a wine is too subjective to be assigned a numerical rating with such a high degree of implied precision. While most American reviewers have adopted Parker's ranking system or similar approaches, many British reviewers still refrain from assigning numerical ratings to wines.

Now it is common for retailers in North America to mark wines with Parker's numerical scores on printed cards on the shelves. Large numbers of consumers, collectors and investors, especially in the increasingly important United States wine market, make purchasing decisions based on the numerical scores that Mr. Parker awards to wines based on his taste preferences. Many customers buy only wines he rates at 90-95 points ("outstanding" in Parker's system) or above. This has had the dual effect of driving the prices for 90+ wines very high, and also making wines rated from 75-79 ("above average") or even 80-89 ("very good") hard to sell, even though some of these may in fact be excellent bargains. The saying in the wine trade is that if Parker gives a wine a score of below 80 it can't be sold at any price, but if he gives it a score above 90 it becomes too expensive for most customers.

Parker himself cautions that they should read the tasting notes to determine the wine is made in a style they will like. As he was quoted in a February 2005 article:

"There can never be any substitute for your own palate nor any better education than tasting the wine yourself.... Any scoring system ... ultimately makes the taster more accountable to the reader. I am comfortable with my point system and I recognise its limitations: there is nothing scientific about it, and it should not be interpreted that way."

Parker argues that he scores wines on how much pleasure they give him. He and others have said that it is the obscurity, corruption, and other problems of the appellation system that made his consumer-oriented approach necessary and inevitable. For example, the Bordeaux Wine Official Classification of 1855 was based entirely on recent wine prices of that time. However, in the many decades since then, many châteaux have sold much of their vineyards, others have bought additional vineyards far away, the original winemakers are long dead, and many other changes have occurred. Parker says this has created injustice for consumers because the classification causes mediocre wine to be sold for too much, and good wine to be sold for too little for lack of a ranking. He says the 1855 classifications "should be regarded by both the wine connoisseur and the novice as informational items of historical significance only."

Even the "first growths" of Bordeaux are not immune to Parker's scoring. With great reviews for the 2000 vintage, many raised their prices to unheard of levels. When Parker declined to review the 2002 vintage in barrel, they were forced to drop their prices to previous levels. Wine critic Prial says "The Bordeaux wine establishment feels threatened by these new-style wines...and is engaged in an increasingly bitter fight against Parker and his influence."

Parker is an avid fan of Bordeaux and some critics observe that his world of wine is largely limited to France. For example, his Parker's Wine Buyer's Guide, with over 1,600 pages, devotes less than a single page (just two paragraphs) to all of South Africa's wines. This may help explain why so many of the honors he has received have come from France.

Because of his powerful influence, his experiences have ranged from having two chateau owners offer him the sexual favours of their daughters to receiving death threats. On one occasion the manager of Chateau Cheval Blanc, Jacques Hebrard, was outraged at Parker's evaluation of his 81 vintage barrel samples and asked Parker to retaste. Upon arriving, Parker was attacked by Hebrard's dog as the manager stood idly by and watched. When Parker asked for a bandage to stop the bleeding from his leg, Parker says Hebrard instead gave him a copy of the offending newsletter. Hebrard denies that Parker was bleeding. (McCoy, pages 159-160)

According to Elin McCoy, Parker is a consumer advocate who admires Ralph Nader and has been critical of most wine critics who, traditionally, have been part of the wine industry and have a vested interest. His commitment is to his readers rather than to producers. He believes that a producer’s reputation and prestige is unimportant compared to the wine in the glass.

Despite being portrayed as a consumer advocate, Parker is increasingly criticized by consumers who feel that he has become part of the wine industry. As evidence for their claims, critics point to the volume of high scores he issues which arguably inflate pricing, his apparent unwillingness to moderate the market's exuberance for rapid price escalation, and his propensity to make statements which some interpret as unnecessary hype.

Parkerization of wine

Another controversy revolves around Parker's impact on the style of fine wines. According to one Bordeaux shipper cited by McCoy, "the difference between a score of 85 and 95 [for one wine] was 6 to 7 million Euros". Thus, there is a big economic incentive for winemakers to abandon centuries of tradition and make wines in a style that Parker will like.

His critics such as Golo Weber claim that he likes less-acidic, riper wines with significant amounts of oak, alcohol, and extract. This has led to changes in viticulture and wine making practices, such as reducing yields by green harvesting, harvesting as late as possible for maximum ripeness, not filtering the wine, and the use of new techniques such as such as micro-oxygenation to soften tannins. This "Parkerization" has led to fears that his influence is leading to a homogenization of wine styles around the world. This point of view is presented in the 2004 documentary, Mondovino, he is "a man whose tastes are irrevocably changing the way some French wines are made". Indeed, certain low-producing "boutique" wineries, among many others, have received high scores from Parker for wines made in this style.

On the other hand, Parker himself is highly critical of "industrial wines with little flavor and no authenticity." He believes that there are still undiscovered regions and wines that can successfully challenge the wine establishment.

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Wine Spectator Magazine

     Wine Spectator is a lifestyle magazine that focuses on wine that was founded as a newsprint tabloid by Bob Morrisey in 1976. Three years later it was purchased by Marvin R. Shanken, who is the publisher. In 2005, paid circulation was over 382,000 and the magazine reached an estimated 2.25 million readers worldwide. That year, its panel of experts blind tasted and reviewed over 12,400 wines. Each of the 16 issues per year contains a large section devoted to wine reviews and wine ratings.

The magazine's consumer orientation is reflected in stories such as describing family conflicts among producers, the identification of producers whose wines suffered from systematic cork taint, and alerting collectors to the proliferation of counterfeit wines.

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Decanter Magazine

Decanter is an up market magazine on wine and spirits, based in the UK and published in over 90 countries on a monthly basis. The magazine content includes news from the industry, vintage guides and wine recommendations. Some of its' editors include the esteemed Jancis Robinson MW, Michael Broadbent MW, Hugh Johnson amongst others. Decanter organizes the annual Decanter World Wine Awards.

Decanter World Wine Awards was founded in 2004 and gained a reputation as one of the world’s most respected and influential wine competitions. An expert panel of tasters from around the world, chaired by the highly-respected Steven Spurrier, judge wines on a regional basis reflecting variety, style and retail price.

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