It wasn’t that long ago, in a place not so far away, that we expressed concern about what would happen to the wine world as the media continued to expand. This was pretty much back when James Suckling left the Wine Spectator to set up his own shop, and our fear at the time was that there might be a certain rise in ‘numbers’ as this new entity tried to garner a readership. After all, it is axiomatic that consumers do not concern themselves with wines that get a B+ (89 point scores), so one of the ways to get your name in front of a new audience was to become more quotable. How does one achieve that? One way is to issue ‘enthusiastic’ scores on certain wines that would surely be quoted by those of us trying to sell said wine.
Selling by third party endorsement became a growing industry tool back in the late 1980s as certain wine media sources, mainly the Wine Advocate and Wine Spectator, made inroads into consumer wine awareness by virtue of their easy to digest 100 point scales. Yes there were words, too. But there was good familiarity with the general populace when it comes to number grading because most experienced it in school, and the quick evaluation a consumer could make just by looking up a number embedded the system into the collective wine psyche.
It didn’t help that most merchants were lazy and quick to adapt to someone else providing sales avenues via published reviews. Using third-party press relieved them of the responsibility of actually doing their own work and removed their liability in actually giving their customers their own opinions. This indemnification made the retail trade the writers’ biggest fans and the constant attention that the majority of retailers gave to third party reviews gave the media tremendous power.
Remembering back however, what was different then was that the scores themselves seemed to have honest intention on the part of the media to give the consumer the appropriate perspective. Back in the day, a 93 point score was a pretty enthusiastic endorsement, a 95 was a ‘must have’, and ‘88’ and ‘89’ were still viewed as positive prose for wines that were value priced. There were shock-waves in the industry when Robert Parker issues his first ‘100-point’ score for a domestic wine, the 1985 Groth Cabernet Reserve. Such scores were quite rare and special then.
Fast forward a couple of decades, and the value of individual scores gradually depreciated. Sadly after the turn of the century, no matter how glowing the prose, a 90 point score barely elicited a response from buyers and ‘92’ became the new ‘90’ for value wines. Giving a wine ‘89’ these days is like putting it in a witness protection program…no one will find the it because they won’t look. All kidding aside, this is what we have observed behaviorally for a while now. But the worst, it seems, is not over.
Part of it has been predictable given the way the James Suckling site established itself. Purveyors and retailers aren’t out there quoting the guys who give ’89’ to sell wine. It also seems, as we sit across the table from a steady stream of suppliers presenting us with wine and information, the ‘number’ itself is more important than the source who issued it and often becomes disassociated with the actual source of the review.
Suddenly, however, there are a lot more ‘players’ competing for consumer attention. Antonio Galloni once worked for Wine Advocate, then left to set up shop on his own, subsequently purchasing Stephan Tanzer’s International Wine Cellar and incorporating that writing team into the fold. Most recently he hired away the Advocate Bordeaux specialist Neal Martin.
Jeb Dunnuck was brought on to Wine Advocate to focus on Rhones and then got other responsibilities on the domestic front. Jeb, too, recently left to set up his own service (or more correctly re-setup as he had his own service before), knowing full well that the new enterprise would benefit from his exposure with Wine Advocate. He just recently kicked off this program. Given the ‘defections’ and the fact that Robert Parker himself has greatly scaled back on his post-sale involvement, Advocate editor Lisa Perotti-Brown, MW expanded her role in the Wine Advocate review writing.
So where are we now? Well it is fair to say that previously there were two main review services being widely followed, 2.5 if you count the respected but not always ‘quotable’ Tanzer publication. Now there are five that directly resulted from the initial two and a number of others that are at varied stages of ‘market penetration’ but arguably have lesser clout. There are likely some ‘startups’ we haven’t even run across yet that are U.S. based. All of them have plans to become, or in some cases retain a powerful voice with wine consumers. Sadly, it appears that another dangerous score escalation may be in the offing. It has been coming for a while and it appears to be heating up.
A few years back, after the sale of the Advocate, Robert Parker did a ‘second look piece’ on 2002s from Napa Valley. Now here was one of the most powerful critics of any kind, someone who had been generally judicious in handing out triple digit reviews (with the possible exception of elite Bordeaux and Guigal and Chapoutier specialty items). But in this particular issue in June, 2012, in one section, ‘The Bob’ handed out nineteen 100 point scores! Now granted, one could argue that this was the beginning of Parker’s ‘farewell tour’ after a storied career and he was making friends. One could also point to the lineup (Abreu, Harlan, Sloan, Schrader) as the Cabernet version of the ’27 Yankees so what’s a few ‘100s’ among friends. That was unprecedented at the time and we saw it as a departure from the conscientiousness of Advocate’s prior history.
But it is what has been happening recently, with reviewers operating in new positions or trying to establish new services, really has us concerned. Lisa Perotti-Brown’s first significant foray into the Napa Valley generated fifteen 100-point final scores and 32 that were either 99 or a range score that touched perfection (98-100). Perhaps a little surprising to some is that there were three Chardonnays that were awarded triple digits. Pretty rarified stuff.
Not to be outdone, there was plenty of firepower to Jeb Dunnuck’s opening report of the Napa Valley. Now one of Robert Parker’s strengths was his enthusiasm which he could convey through the written word. Jeb showed plenty of excitement in his inaugural work, handing out no less than 31 ‘100s’ and a good slug of ‘99s’ (21 actually). Thirty one ‘perfect’ wines? In a single category? Really? Someone used the term ‘jumping the shark’ for this opening salvo/love fest. More important, if the perfect score becomes commonplace, it also will seem less special and have less impact, not to mention how it undermines all of those poor souls that only got ‘96’ which, back in the day, was a very good review.
We could make a few, albeit less sensational examples to illustrate what we are talking about with respect to the current round of ‘score wars’, but it’s the overall impact that is the problem. With more publications slinging around more ‘100s’ and other lofty marks, perspective goes out the window. The consumer will start getting confused or numbed (a number of the trade already have), and sensationalism will rule the day. With so many more items pushed up against that finite ceiling (since you can’t have more than 100 points) separation becomes much less clear and it all starts to lose meaning.
In the end, if this proliferation of over-the-moon scoring continues, where does it end? People thinking the only way to get a decent bottle of wine is to pay $300-500 on somebody’s mailing list? Does ‘95’ become the new ‘89’? Is there really that much perfection in the world or are all these writers trying to win friends and influence the marketplace for their own agenda? It’s hard to say but it is clear we are entering dangerous territory.
These publications are supposedly designed to help consumers sort through the myriad of wine choices out there. Passing out big scores like Halloween candy might get the writer ‘in big’ with the wine elite. It might help Andy Beckstoffer charge even more for his grapes. But we fail to see how it helps the consumer very much, and they, my dear writers, are the ones that pay your bills. If your audience stops listening, it’s nearly impossible to get them back. Cuidado.