The American Association of Wine Economists met for their 2nd annual conference in Portland, Oregon on August 14-16, 2008.  For the full article in Wine and Vines, the industry news Web site, please visit their Article about the conference. A quick summary of why this read is worth your time!

• Wine Spectator sting!  Two economists set up a fake restaurant in Italy, only a Web site, no actual restaurant, and submitted their wine list to the Wine Spectator for an award of excellence.  The list included wines that WS has rated poorly in the past.  For their $250 application fee they got their award of excellence along with 21 other Italian restaurants.  So would you trust WS???
• The same wine is judged differently at different competitions. If there are actually some kind of standardized criteria for wine taste, which would be the only way to actually compete on taste, then why a gold at one competition and no rating at another?
• Winemaker’s reputations elevate the perceived value of wines even if the winemaker had nothing to do with the wine.

At Wine Questers we feel that the intrinsic value of wine, not the price necessarily, has much more to do with the consumer’s value of the tasting experience than what judges decide or how wineries price their products.

We believe that when wineries compete on the total experience it is less expensive marketing for the winery and brings greater consumer satisfaction.  The existing system of magazine ratings and competition is mostly a fraud and offers little value to consumers.

- jim

Over many decades of wine tasting I’ve carefully observed that the tasting room experience is far more valued than the taste of the wine.  The right tasting room staff can turn a sweet white wine taster into a cab sav taster in less than a hour.

During my ethnographic research of tasters in tasting rooms I tried to bring some science to my observations.  I am no longer a believer in focus groups and surveys.  The best understanding of people can come from careful observation of the subjects in their environment.

My hypothesis is supported by my observations:

The overwhelming value of the tasting room visit, and the value of the wine that tasters purchase, is created by the taster’s experience in the tasting room and what that means to them.  The wine is just something to talk about.

So how do you create meaning in a winery experience?  This will be covered in the future but please add your thoughts in the forum for wine tasting experiences and ambiance.

- jim