Comments on: Joe Roberts is right about bullsh*t unreliable wine judge studies http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/ A blog about the world of wine Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:14:27 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.3 By: GM "Pooch" Pucilowski http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/comment-page-1/#comment-21652 GM "Pooch" Pucilowski Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:52:58 +0000 http://www.steveheimoff.com/?p=4469#comment-21652 My name is G.M. “Pooch” Pucilowski. It’s my fault. I’ll take the blame! I let the cat out of the bag — the dirty little secret is out. The awful truth has now emerged — wine judges (and wine writers, winemakers, winery owners, wine drinkers, wine retailers, wine critics and you and me) are human! And tasting wine is subjective. And each of us should taste wines, make our own decisions and not pay so much attention to wine reviews. And on one day we may enjoy a beautiful little wine with our significant other, and on the very next day, after a squabble, find the very same wine tasting terrible. And sometimes we may try a wine because someone recommended it or because of the shiny sticker on the label. But now its out! Everyone can breathe easier, relax, calm down and even sip a little wine. I have been the Chief Judge for the California State Fair for the past 25 years. I hired Bob Hodgson, at least 7-8 years ago, to help me find the best and most competent wine judges’ possible. I was looking to create a judging system that would test the consistency of judges. The first couple of years were used to establish the experimental design. The testing needed to run in the background of our competition and not interfere. The initial results were intriguing, but limited to a few panels and judges. Since 2005, we have uses the same testing program for all our judges. (Judges rotate every year, so some judges may have been tested 4 times and some as little as once.) I have been reading many of the consumer/trade responses from the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Vino and Steve Heimoff’s blogs. There are many misconceptions about wine competitions in general and how they are conducted. I would like to share how the California State Fair Competition is run, how we test our judges and answer some questions that have been asked in the discussion process. By the way, the California State Fair has been judging wines since 1854 which might make this the oldest wine competition in America. I would first like to state a few observations and food for thought: 1) Wine Judges are not perfect (and dare I say, neither are any other humans I know). 2) Wine Judges are honest, decent, and hard working individuals that come from many walks of life (sort of like you and me), although the majority are connected to the wine industry in some way. I frankly don’t know why they judge wines? They certainly don’t do this for the money. At the California State Fair, we pay judges a whooping $75 a day for 3 days. Yes, we may fly a few out-of-towners in (but anyone within 300 miles or so pay their own expenses, no reimbursements) and we put them in a hotel for 3-4 days. We feed them 3 lunches and 1 dinner. Tough way to make a living! 3) I hired Bob Hodgson to help me find the best and most competent wine judges available. I’m sure its my fault, try as I might, I have not developed the technique to look at a person (or even talk and laugh with them) and decide that they are in fact a good judge or a bad judge. In fact, I also judge wines at other competitions (not the State Fair) and I’ve sat on many panels with other judges and still cannot state who is a good judge or not — even if they totally disagree with everything I taste (what makes my medals any better than theirs?). 4) Most judges (yes, there are a few prima donnas) realize they don’t know everything about wine and understand that there are different styles of Chardonnay or Zinfandel. They are also willing to change their mind (sort of like you and me) if other judges politely suggest they may want to reconsider this particular style. And if the 4 judges choose not to change their minds, we have a scoring matrix that can convert a Gold, Silver, Bronze and No medal to Bronze score (or any other combination the judges may dream up). And that is the final score the wine will get unless one of the judges decides to change their own score. 5) Judges look at tasting wine differently than consumers. They have different motivations. Judges judge wines to find faults and defects. They come to the table to evaluate and critique wines. Consumers drink wine to just drink, enjoy and/or sometimes share. In sharing with you how the State Fair Wine Competition is conducted, I hope I can also address some of the many comments in response to the article and blogs, including the remark about the smell of corn dogs and horse manure. We don’t judge wines during the actual State Fair and we go to great strides to ensure our tasting environment has plenty of light, fresh air and free of as many distractions as possible. When preparing a blind tasting, it’s important to note that we go to extreme lengths to make sure it’s truly blind. Judges do not know the winery, the appellation, the region, or even see the bottle shape. I also believe that wine judges should not know the price of the wines. They may know the vintage date for the larger categories, but basically they only know the variety of the grape. All the glasses are the same size and have a 4-digit random number on the stem that matches the paperwork. We are also one of the few competitions that only judge California wines. Since we started testing our judges, I have consistently lowered the amount of wines that judge’s taste in one day. There are competitions that have judges tasting 130 to 150 wines in one day. I don’t know if that is too much, that is the decision of each competition, but I’ve held our daily max at 100 and continually lower that number. Last year the total was between 80 and 85 wines per day per judge. This amount is usually finished by a majority of judges by 2 pm. We start around 9 am with a 45-minute lunch included. We use the Peterson method of wine tasting that is unique in competition circles and has judges tasting wines like a winemaker might do with barrel samples. Dr. Richard Peterson developed it for us. We bring 20 to 40 wines to the judge’s table and have each judge smell the wine only, placing them into 1 of 3 groups. Then starting with the group that the judge liked the most, smell each wine again and put them in rank order (this wine smells better than this one, etc.) At the finish, all 20 to 40 wines will be in 3 or 4 groups, ranked from his favorite to his least favorite, and then the judge begins to again smell and now taste the wines, rearranging the order again if he feels he needs to. This time he is looking to place wines in categories of Gold, Silver, Bronze, or no medal. For Professor Hodgson’s study, in each of these flights we may triplicate two or three different wines. Judges get a total of 4 wines per day that will be tasted 3 times. We attempt to avoid testing judges during the first or last flight of the day. After every judge on a panel has tasted and scored their wines, they form a group to discuss and record their final score. By the way, Bob Hodgson takes the judge’s first scores to evaluate, before discussion. These are the basics of our competition. Dr. Hodgson’s study has been kept confidential according to our agreement. All of my Wine Judges (nearly 150), to this day, do not know the results of their individual results. The study actually shows there is a bell shaped curve with most of the judges falling in the middle. There are 10 to 20% of the judges in any one year that score exceeding well, not perfect, but pretty darn good. On the other side of the bell shape, the right side, there are another 10 to 20% that score pretty badly — consistently. The majority of the judges are in that 60 to 80% of the middle of the bell shape (probably where you and I would fare). Here are a few points to consider: There are no “super judges”. No judges show up every year in that top 10 to 20%, they just slide back into that middle portion and some other judges in the next year are in that “high” range. On the other hand, the low 10 to 20% of judges almost always show up the right side of the bell and they frankly have proven to NOT be consistent—ever. These are the judges that I can now weed out and this is one of the results that I hoped to achieve by doing this study. After reviewing the judge’s results for the past 7-8 years, I’ve recently begun to seriously realize how difficult wine judging can actually be. I wonder how good any of us can be? We know it not humanly possible to be perfect, but how close can we get? The challenge I offer any one of you readers (and/or critics) is to find and score 3 of the same wines out of the same bottle in a pile of 20 to 40 Pinot Noirs, Sauvignon Blancs or name your favorite. Can you pick out the wines and score them the same? Now, up until I hired Professor Hodgson to conduct this consistency exam, I might have felt like you — what’s the problem? Seems easy enough. Anyone that’s any good should be able to do this! But now, after testing these very sincere judges — I’m not so sure any more. I will continue with the study to test the judging system and find the right combination of wines, judges and scores to give consumer the greatest confidence possible. There was a number of comments to the Wall Street Journal article by a consumer, Morton Leslie, that suggested that wine competitions “would chose their judges on the basis of tested and proven wine tasting ability and consistency.” He went on, “They would monitor judge performance during the competition and eliminate judges who fail to be consistent. They would provide quality and flavor standards and definitions for each wine … Why not measure whether a judge is consistent or whether they have the sensory skills necessary to judge a particular wine? Why not prohibit table talk? Why not reduce the number of wines tasted to help prevent palate fatigue? Why not establish standards by which wines are judged? Why not ask that a judge have training in sensory analysis? Why not ask that the results be more than chance?” I totally agree. These are logical steps to take and quite similar to the practices I’ve put in place for the California State Fair Wine Competition. We are the only competition that requires judges to take an evaluation exam, currently conducted at UC Davis, before they are able to judge for us. We are one of the few competitions that ask judges to rank their favorite wines so they won’t be stuck tasting a variety they dislike. Instead of testing our judges every year, which could be cumbersome, I bring in Professors and/or experts to conduct seminars that educate the judges on one aspect of wine. I started a Mentorship program that basically trains newer judges on how we judge wines and bring them up to speed. I’d like to point out that no other competition or wine critic that I’m aware of has tested their judges or themselves. It is only because of the courage and faith of the California State Fair and our Advisory Members that we continue to test our judges. What would we be talking about now if the study never happen? At least I know now, where we stand. I now have a base that allows me to make changes and evaluate whether it helps or hinders. I stand by the fact that we did do the study, that we continue to do the study and that it was published. I am looking for ways to improve the process at the California State Fair that will give judges the best opportunity to be as consistent as humanly possible. This is an important discussion that has begun as a result of the testing and I look forward to seeing it continue. And we will continue to share the results. My name is G.M. “Pooch” Pucilowski. It’s my fault. I’ll take the blame! I let the cat out of the bag — the dirty little secret is out.
The awful truth has now emerged — wine judges (and wine writers, winemakers, winery owners, wine drinkers, wine retailers, wine critics and you and me) are human! And tasting wine is subjective. And each of us should taste wines, make our own decisions and not pay so much attention to wine reviews. And on one day we may enjoy a beautiful little wine with our significant other, and on the very next day, after a squabble, find the very same wine tasting terrible. And sometimes we may try a wine because someone recommended it or because of the shiny sticker on the label. But now its out! Everyone can breathe easier, relax, calm down and even sip a little wine.
I have been the Chief Judge for the California State Fair for the past 25 years. I hired Bob Hodgson, at least 7-8 years ago, to help me find the best and most competent wine judges’ possible. I was looking to create a judging system that would test the consistency of judges. The first couple of years were used to establish the experimental design. The testing needed to run in the background of our competition and not interfere. The initial results were intriguing, but limited to a few panels and judges. Since 2005, we have uses the same testing program for all our judges. (Judges rotate every year, so some judges may have been tested 4 times and some as little as once.)
I have been reading many of the consumer/trade responses from the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Vino and Steve Heimoff’s blogs. There are many misconceptions about wine competitions in general and how they are conducted. I would like to share how the California State Fair Competition is run, how we test our judges and answer some questions that have been asked in the discussion process. By the way, the California State Fair has been judging wines since 1854 which might make this the oldest wine competition in America.
I would first like to state a few observations and food for thought:
1) Wine Judges are not perfect (and dare I say, neither are any other humans I know).
2) Wine Judges are honest, decent, and hard working individuals that come from many walks of life (sort of like you and me), although the majority are connected to the wine industry in some way. I frankly don’t know why they judge wines? They certainly don’t do this for the money. At the California State Fair, we pay judges a whooping $75 a day for 3 days. Yes, we may fly a few out-of-towners in (but anyone within 300 miles or so pay their own expenses, no reimbursements) and we put them in a hotel for 3-4 days. We feed them 3 lunches and 1 dinner. Tough way to make a living!
3) I hired Bob Hodgson to help me find the best and most competent wine judges available. I’m sure its my fault, try as I might, I have not developed the technique to look at a person (or even talk and laugh with them) and decide that they are in fact a good judge or a bad judge. In fact, I also judge wines at other competitions (not the State Fair) and I’ve sat on many panels with other judges and still cannot state who is a good judge or not — even if they totally disagree with everything I taste (what makes my medals any better than theirs?).
4) Most judges (yes, there are a few prima donnas) realize they don’t know everything about wine and understand that there are different styles of Chardonnay or Zinfandel. They are also willing to change their mind (sort of like you and me) if other judges politely suggest they may want to reconsider this particular style. And if the 4 judges choose not to change their minds, we have a scoring matrix that can convert a Gold, Silver, Bronze and No medal to Bronze score (or any other combination the judges may dream up). And that is the final score the wine will get unless one of the judges decides to change their own score.
5) Judges look at tasting wine differently than consumers. They have different motivations. Judges judge wines to find faults and defects. They come to the table to evaluate and critique wines. Consumers drink wine to just drink, enjoy and/or sometimes share.
In sharing with you how the State Fair Wine Competition is conducted, I hope I can also address some of the many comments in response to the article and blogs, including the remark about the smell of corn dogs and horse manure. We don’t judge wines during the actual State Fair and we go to great strides to ensure our tasting environment has plenty of light, fresh air and free of as many distractions as possible.
When preparing a blind tasting, it’s important to note that we go to extreme lengths to make sure it’s truly blind. Judges do not know the winery, the appellation, the region, or even see the bottle shape. I also believe that wine judges should not know the price of the wines. They may know the vintage date for the larger categories, but basically they only know the variety of the grape. All the glasses are the same size and have a 4-digit random number on the stem that matches the paperwork. We are also one of the few competitions that only judge California wines.
Since we started testing our judges, I have consistently lowered the amount of wines that judge’s taste in one day. There are competitions that have judges tasting 130 to 150 wines in one day. I don’t know if that is too much, that is the decision of each competition, but I’ve held our daily max at 100 and continually lower that number. Last year the total was between 80 and 85 wines per day per judge. This amount is usually finished by a majority of judges by 2 pm. We start around 9 am with a 45-minute lunch included.
We use the Peterson method of wine tasting that is unique in competition circles and has judges tasting wines like a winemaker might do with barrel samples. Dr. Richard Peterson developed it for us. We bring 20 to 40 wines to the judge’s table and have each judge smell the wine only, placing them into 1 of 3 groups. Then starting with the group that the judge liked the most, smell each wine again and put them in rank order (this wine smells better than this one, etc.) At the finish, all 20 to 40 wines will be in 3 or 4 groups, ranked from his favorite to his least favorite, and then the judge begins to again smell and now taste the wines, rearranging the order again if he feels he needs to. This time he is looking to place wines in categories of Gold, Silver, Bronze, or no medal.
For Professor Hodgson’s study, in each of these flights we may triplicate two or three different wines. Judges get a total of 4 wines per day that will be tasted 3 times. We attempt to avoid testing judges during the first or last flight of the day.
After every judge on a panel has tasted and scored their wines, they form a group to discuss and record their final score. By the way, Bob Hodgson takes the judge’s first scores to evaluate, before discussion. These are the basics of our competition.
Dr. Hodgson’s study has been kept confidential according to our agreement. All of my Wine Judges (nearly 150), to this day, do not know the results of their individual results.
The study actually shows there is a bell shaped curve with most of the judges falling in the middle. There are 10 to 20% of the judges in any one year that score exceeding well, not perfect, but pretty darn good. On the other side of the bell shape, the right side, there are another 10 to 20% that score pretty badly — consistently. The majority of the judges are in that 60 to 80% of the middle of the bell shape (probably where you and I would fare). Here are a few points to consider:
There are no “super judges”. No judges show up every year in that top 10 to 20%, they just slide back into that middle portion and some other judges in the next year are in that “high” range. On the other hand, the low 10 to 20% of judges almost always show up the right side of the bell and they frankly have proven to NOT be consistent—ever. These are the judges that I can now weed out and this is one of the results that I hoped to achieve by doing this study.
After reviewing the judge’s results for the past 7-8 years, I’ve recently begun to seriously realize how difficult wine judging can actually be. I wonder how good any of us can be? We know it not humanly possible to be perfect, but how close can we get? The challenge I offer any one of you readers (and/or critics) is to find and score 3 of the same wines out of the same bottle in a pile of 20 to 40 Pinot Noirs, Sauvignon Blancs or name your favorite. Can you pick out the wines and score them the same? Now, up until I hired Professor Hodgson to conduct this consistency exam, I might have felt like you — what’s the problem? Seems easy enough. Anyone that’s any good should be able to do this! But now, after testing these very sincere judges — I’m not so sure any more. I will continue with the study to test the judging system and find the right combination of wines, judges and scores to give consumer the greatest confidence possible.
There was a number of comments to the Wall Street Journal article by a consumer, Morton Leslie, that suggested that wine competitions “would chose their judges on the basis of tested and proven wine tasting ability and consistency.” He went on, “They would monitor judge performance during the competition and eliminate judges who fail to be consistent. They would provide quality and flavor standards and definitions for each wine … Why not measure whether a judge is consistent or whether they have the sensory skills necessary to judge a particular wine? Why not prohibit table talk? Why not reduce the number of wines tasted to help prevent palate fatigue? Why not establish standards by which wines are judged? Why not ask that a judge have training in sensory analysis? Why not ask that the results be more than chance?”
I totally agree. These are logical steps to take and quite similar to the practices I’ve put in place for the California State Fair Wine Competition. We are the only competition that requires judges to take an evaluation exam, currently conducted at UC Davis, before they are able to judge for us. We are one of the few competitions that ask judges to rank their favorite wines so they won’t be stuck tasting a variety they dislike. Instead of testing our judges every year, which could be cumbersome, I bring in Professors and/or experts to conduct seminars that educate the judges on one aspect of wine. I started a Mentorship program that basically trains newer judges on how we judge wines and bring them up to speed.
I’d like to point out that no other competition or wine critic that I’m aware of has tested their judges or themselves. It is only because of the courage and faith of the California State Fair and our Advisory Members that we continue to test our judges. What would we be talking about now if the study never happen? At least I know now, where we stand. I now have a base that allows me to make changes and evaluate whether it helps or hinders. I stand by the fact that we did do the study, that we continue to do the study and that it was published. I am looking for ways to improve the process at the California State Fair that will give judges the best opportunity to be as consistent as humanly possible. This is an important discussion that has begun as a result of the testing and I look forward to seeing it continue. And we will continue to share the results.

]]> By: Elisa http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/comment-page-1/#comment-21304 Elisa Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:23:23 +0000 http://www.steveheimoff.com/?p=4469#comment-21304 Steve- Thank you for your honest and frank opinion. I hope I have not mislead you into thinking that we are fooling average consumers by tricking them into buying wines that may not deserve a medal. We hope to offer some guidance to consumers that may not read wine reviews or that are just starting to drink wine. We know that medals sell wine to all levels of consumers and we feel that our judging method within our competitions are legitimate and consistent. My 'so what 'comment was address at the fact that different competitions through out the country may have inconsistencies at awarding wines medals. I stick by that comment base on the fact that we know wine will taste differently throughout its life and wine judges all have different palates. This makes it virtually impossible to consistently award medals to wines that are entered into several different competitions. Finally, my stating that we require all judges to taste the wines before awarding medals, I was simply trying to shine a light on tasting at a wine competition is conducted. Steve- Thank you for your honest and frank opinion. I hope I have not mislead you into thinking that we are fooling average consumers by tricking them into buying wines that may not deserve a medal. We hope to offer some guidance to consumers that may not read wine reviews or that are just starting to drink wine. We know that medals sell wine to all levels of consumers and we feel that our judging method within our competitions are legitimate and consistent.

My ‘so what ‘comment was address at the fact that different competitions through out the country may have inconsistencies at awarding wines medals. I stick by that comment base on the fact that we know wine will taste differently throughout its life and wine judges all have different palates. This makes it virtually impossible to consistently award medals to wines that are entered into several different competitions.

Finally, my stating that we require all judges to taste the wines before awarding medals, I was simply trying to shine a light on tasting at a wine competition is conducted.

]]> By: Mark http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/comment-page-1/#comment-21302 Mark Fri, 20 Nov 2009 18:15:30 +0000 http://www.steveheimoff.com/?p=4469#comment-21302 In the FWIW category I work for an East Coast winery. In 2009 we entered 7 wine competitons. Of the two wines that received the most medals the results seem to have some consistency 2006 Syrah tallied 2 golds, 2 silvers and one bronze 2006 Merlot tallied 4 silvers and one bronze Here are the competitions we entered some local and some national. 2009 Dallas Morning News Wine Competition 2009 San Diego International Wine Competition 2009 Tasters Guild International Wine Competition 2009 Pacific Rim International Wine Competition 2009 Riverside International Wine Competition 2009 PWA Pennsylvania Wine Competition 2009 Pennsylvania Farm Show You can draw your own conclusions. I think wineries enter these because they are there and you do want to be compaered to your peers and see how you come out, As well as the the fact that we don't get reviewed by the national media/critics. Did these medals help sell these wines probably not, but it can't hurt. I don't hear our customers standing in the retail area of our tasting room looking at wines making any comments whatsoever about a wine winning a medal before they make a purchase. We don't stand at the tasting bar spouting off this wine won this and that wine won that, but there are a number of wineries I have visited that this is a major part of their spiel. When I hear this I am usaully turned off immediately feeling the wines must stand on their own merits to my palate. BTW I read Gerry Dawes In the FWIW category
I work for an East Coast winery. In 2009 we entered 7 wine competitons. Of the two wines that received the most medals the results seem to have some consistency
2006 Syrah tallied 2 golds, 2 silvers and one bronze
2006 Merlot tallied 4 silvers and one bronze
Here are the competitions we entered some local and some national.
2009 Dallas Morning News Wine Competition
2009 San Diego International Wine Competition
2009 Tasters Guild International Wine Competition
2009 Pacific Rim International Wine Competition
2009 Riverside International Wine Competition
2009 PWA Pennsylvania Wine Competition
2009 Pennsylvania Farm Show
You can draw your own conclusions.

I think wineries enter these because they are there and you do want to be compaered to your peers and see how you come out, As well as the the fact that we don’t get reviewed by the national media/critics. Did these medals help sell these wines probably not, but it can’t hurt.

I don’t hear our customers standing in the retail area of our tasting room looking at wines making any comments whatsoever about a wine winning a medal before they make a purchase.

We don’t stand at the tasting bar spouting off this wine won this and that wine won that, but there are a number of wineries I have visited that this is a major part of their spiel. When I hear this I am usaully turned off immediately feeling the wines must stand on their own merits to my palate.

BTW I read Gerry Dawes

]]> By: Tim Hanni, Moron of Wine http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/comment-page-1/#comment-21299 Tim Hanni, Moron of Wine Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:55:38 +0000 http://www.steveheimoff.com/?p=4469#comment-21299 Mike Dunne - would love to connect soon and take you through our next iteration! We are reversing the process now and selecting consumers by their declared wine preferences, have them assess wines consitent with their preferences, THEN have a team from Davis assess their taste sensitivity, taste buds, etc. I will give you a holler. Mike Dunne – would love to connect soon and take you through our next iteration! We are reversing the process now and selecting consumers by their declared wine preferences, have them assess wines consitent with their preferences, THEN have a team from Davis assess their taste sensitivity, taste buds, etc. I will give you a holler.

]]> By: Tim Hanni, Moron of Wine http://www.steveheimoff.com/index.php/2009/11/18/joe-roberts-is-right-about-bullsht-unreliable-wine-judge-studies/comment-page-1/#comment-21294 Tim Hanni, Moron of Wine Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:22:59 +0000 http://www.steveheimoff.com/?p=4469#comment-21294 Given all the brouhaha (sp?) over wine competitions and judging inconsistencies here is a fun thing to take a look at: www.consumerwineawards.com We are getting ready to launch an amazing wine tasting and awards program using consumers as judges. Our intentions are: -Raise money for local charities (primarily a playground renovation project and wheelchair initiative) with the Lodi Tokay Rotary. -Continue our paradigm-shifting research on : o why consumers like the products they do. o how to segment consumers to create vibrant communities based on shared sensory and aesthetic values. o See how open the consumers are (or not) to exploring new and different styles and flavors and develop new means for our industry to embrace and cultivate the entire market. With gusto. o Provide feedback to producers to gauge how the hardest to reach consumers respond to their products. o Develop the means to have everyday consumers themselves become confident that they can assess wines, share the information and connect other consumers to the products they will love the most in stores, restaurants and online. o Capture data with several formal studies with our team of mentors and researchers to determine the validity of our various hypotheses and tasting methodology. We anticipate over 1,000 wines and a judging body of over 100 consumers. What makes this even more fascinating is that we are seeking consumers who are NOT necessarily be members or affiliated with wine organizations, take wine education classes, read Robert Parker or the Wine Spectator. Both Jancis Robinson MW, OBE and Gary Vaynerchuk (yay for extremes) are on our Board of Directors demonstrating the interest we are brewing in the wine community. Given all the brouhaha (sp?) over wine competitions and judging inconsistencies here is a fun thing to take a look at: http://www.consumerwineawards.com

We are getting ready to launch an amazing wine tasting and awards program using consumers as judges. Our intentions are:

-Raise money for local charities (primarily a playground renovation project and wheelchair initiative) with the Lodi Tokay Rotary.

-Continue our paradigm-shifting research on :

o why consumers like the products they do.
o how to segment consumers to create vibrant communities based on shared sensory and aesthetic values.
o See how open the consumers are (or not) to exploring new and different styles and flavors and develop new means for our industry to embrace and cultivate the entire market. With gusto.

o Provide feedback to producers to gauge how the hardest to reach consumers respond to their products.

o Develop the means to have everyday consumers themselves become confident that they can assess wines, share the information and connect other consumers to the products they will love the most in stores, restaurants and online.

o Capture data with several formal studies with our team of mentors and researchers to determine the validity of our various hypotheses and tasting methodology.

We anticipate over 1,000 wines and a judging body of over 100 consumers. What makes this even more fascinating is that we are seeking consumers who are NOT necessarily be members or affiliated with wine organizations, take wine education classes, read Robert Parker or the Wine Spectator. Both Jancis Robinson MW, OBE and Gary Vaynerchuk (yay for extremes) are on our Board of Directors demonstrating the interest we are brewing in the wine community.

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