Library Release: Digging into Wine Scores

Library Release: Originally aired as Episode 5 in June of 2020.  

In one of our original episodes, Robert and Peter discuss how competitive the wine market is, how wine scores used to differentiate wines from each other, but do that less today, and the use of wine scores has evolved over time.  This episode provides another data point for the conversation around the evolution of the wine critic, as discussed in episodes 61 - 64.  

Detailed Show Notes: 

• Wine scores were the traditional method of differentiating a wine brand
• The wine landscape is getting more competitive and crowded, 
  • # of wine brands (as of 2019): 
    • >1,000 in Napa valley
    • ~4,000 in California
    • ~10,000 in the US
    • ~300,000 globally
• In Luxury Wine Marketing, Peter did an analysis of 100 point scores in Robert Parker’s The Wine Advocate: 
  • 1995 - 14 100 pointers
  • 2005 - 33
  • 2015 - 116
  • In 20 years, there were 8x more 100 point scores, making them less remarkable than in the past
  • However, the same percentage of wines (0.4%) got 100 points in 2015 as in 1995, as 8x more wines were reviewed by The Wine Advocate
• How wineries use critic scores
  • In the past - wineries leveraged the followers of wine critics, gaining new customers
    • 20+ years ago, thousands of buyers would flock to wineries with a 100 point score; today, that number is in the hundreds
  • Today - wineries use scores to promote and market their wines - they are used as a validation of quality, not necessarily dependant on a specific wine critic
• Spinouts of wine critics
  • Many critics have gone independent - Jeb Dunnuck (guest of Episode 64), Antonio Galloni (Vinous), James Suckling, Jeannie Cho Lee, Jancis Robinson - making the field more crowded than ever
  • It has become harder to follow a single critic than in the past
• Wineries need to build their brands
  • E.g., Philippe Guigal once said, “we don’t do marketing” - and is able to do that because Guigal has already built their brand in the trade with over 20 Robert Parker 100 point scores -> this type of marketing may not be as effective today
  • Brands need to have wine quality as a baseline and more than scores to sell effectively
• Critics leveraging scores to promote themselves - some critics may give higher scores to be the top score that is used to promote the wine by retailers and wineries, increasing consumers awareness of their own brand and media channel
• Crowdsourced scores (e.g., CellarTracker, Delectable, Vivino)
  • Scores are a snapshot in time and will change over time
  • It gives the ability to follow individuals and learn their palate
  • Not yet influencing the wine trade (as of early 2020)
  • It helps bring another touchpoint of brand awareness to wineries
  • Wine Berserkers - has had an impact on wine sales, at least a few dozen signups for mailing lists of wineries Peter has worked at
• Lessons for wine brands: 
  • Need to build the brand, having high wine quality and high scores are the baseline
  • Figure out the marketing channels that work for your brand and double down on them
  • The cost of customer acquisition is going up with the fracturing of wine criticism and the rise of crowdsourced wine scores

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