Do wine scores matter?
I got Gold on my Cantadora “The Protector” from the California State Fair, but Bronze from Sunset Magazine International Wine Competition. I got Double Gold and 95pts for Cantadora “The Sage” form Sunset Magazine but bronze from California State Fair. I hardly got any scores on my Russian River Pinot Noir but it is loved by sommeliers and is the most purchased wine list wine. Regardless of this whiplash effect by scoring committees Wine Enthusiast gave almost all the wines 92 pts. Ken’s Wine Guide gave everything over 90 points. Do scores matter? I’m confused, are wine buyers confused? Who do we trust? Why do we do this?
I genuinely don’t know.
When we bought our current home in Napa it needed a lot of work. I was pregnant with my second and didn’t have a ton of time so we needed to subvert the slow and arduous permitting process. To butter up my neighbors so they wouldn’t call the city on us while we re-organized our kitchen design I dropped off bottles of wine and introduced myself. My husband told me I should drop off wine to this guy, Jim, across the street. He said “I think he’s a wine writer”. I walked over to Jim’s house to present him with a bottle of my 2016 Olivia Brion Tempranillo (30 cases of the 2019 left, wink wink) in hopes that he would be less inclined to tattle and he opened the door and I thought, oh.
Oh, as in, this isn’t “Jim” or “Jim the wine guy” or “jimwine.com” or whatever, I recognized him like you might a minor celebrity. His face was on the inside of every Wine Spectator magazine. This was Jim LAUBE editor-in-chief of Wine Spectator (formerly, I should say).
He graciously accepted my bottle and invited me to step inside. We chatted for a bit, I gave him my number in case he had a noise complaint and went home quite ready to curl up in a ball and hide from embarrassment. We took our contractor to dinner that night (we did a lot of greasing the wheels to get this project finished before I gave birth - it did work, to be fair) and I got a text from “Jim”. He told me he liked my Tempranillo. He said, and I quote “if all Tempranillos were as good as yours the world would be a better place.” I died.
To be clear, he’s never scored my wines. I’ve tried to force the issue periodically but he just sends me cryptic emojis like a unicorn. I’ve given up. He’ll never score my wine and that will be the only tasting note I’ll ever get. But in my very nervous and nascent state of starting my wine business full time (I quit my big wine job that year, in 2019, to focus on my little company) that was the best possible review I could have ever received. It made me feel like less of a hack. No, I can do this. Someone likes it. HE likes it.
After attempting to get his feedback, unsuccessfully, a few different times, Jim finally said, “you need to submit”. I thought he was right. I needed feedback from folks that didn’t care about me, that didn’t live across the street and weren’t looking at my face or invested in my story. That was the only way to get an unbiased review and to keep improving.
So I started to try to find a reviewer. I had submitted wines in the past for Alpha Omega so I knew the process but I also knew it wasn’t straight forward. Submitting to big reviewers (Robert Parker, Galloni ect.) required an expensive subscription and a personal introduction. Submitting to Wine Enthusiast was fine, but there was no guarantee anyone would review your wine, it may just sit there. Submitting to Wine Spectator almost guaranteed it would sit there because you had to be at a certain volume for them to look your way (usually 500+ cases of each wine). Sending wine to Food & Wine magazine just resulted in a year long email exchange with Ray Isle with nothing to show from it. Several publications or email letters basically said thank you for the wine, but we’re too busy.
However, when the pandemic struck, Jim Gordon, the reviewer for Enthusiast for greater California was accepting wine submissions at his home office. He lived very near me! When I went over to drop my wine submission I just kind of barged into his yard and started opening bottles. This is a defining aspect of my career, by the way. I have the chaotic idea that if I feel queasy and uncomfortable I’m doing something right and should push through those horrible feelings. This probably started in finance; I blame the unending discomfort of working in investment banking for this life philosophy.
Anyway, I spoke with him and poured for him in an unofficial capacity - he’s very nice. We talked about my wines, his home winemaking, lots of things. He did end up reviewing my wines, he gave them nice scores. He gave my last wines good scores too after his promotion to head of tasting for Wine Enthusiast and I see he has another reviewer working on them now. This mattered immensely to me. I felt legitimized and encouraged and like I had some kind of mainstream foothold.
So I submitted more broadly this year, to Sunset Wine Competition, to the California State Fair Wine Competition, and Press Democrat. It’s quite expensive to submit, it’s a few hundred dollars each time and you pay for shipping the wines that you submit. Therefore, I only sent in Cantadora for the most part as I am down to the last 30 cases or less of all the Olivia Brion wines released earlier.
I even got a special request to submit to Ken’s Wine Guide and share my wines with his panel – which was a lovely experience. And to be honest, I still feel bolstered, but also, some days, more confused. My scores for wines vary. The same wine that is loved by someone is ranked lower by others. I got my last scores this week, which were good (all are listed below). But I’m flummoxed, what does it all mean? Did it ever mean anything? Is it in fact the statistical “mean” that matters?
I don’t know. All I can say is if you like a wine, I know someone that agrees with you. The reverse is probably true too.
Without further ado, here are my wine scores. All were submitted this year except the Wine Enthusiast scores that were submitted last year. I’d love to know if it matters to you. Sometimes it matters to me, and that’s my only conclusion.
(I’m most proud of when I get passed a badass restaurant sommelier on to their list, which is why I put local restaurant representation below the scores)
2019 Cantadora “The Sage” GSV Blend
Sunset Magazine Competition – Double Gold, 95 points
Ken’s Wine Guide – 90.2
California State Fair Competition - Bronze
(served on the list at Morimoto Asia and Todd Humphries Kitchen Door in Napa and Ad Hoc in Yountville)
2019 Cantadora “The Healer” Mourvedre
Sunset Magazine Competition – Gold, 94 points
Wine Enthusiast – 92 pts
Ken’s Wine Guide – 92 pts
California State Fair Competition – Silver
(served on the list at Oenotri in Napa, Ad Hoc in Yountville and Solbar in Calistoga)
2019 Cantadora “The Protector” Tempranillo
California State Fair Competition – Gold
Wine Enthusiast – 92 pts
Ken’s Wine Guide – 91.5
Sunset Magazine Competition – Bronze
(served by the glass at La Toque in Napa, on the list at Ad Hoc in Yountville and Solbar in Calistoga)
Olivia Brion Wines
Ken’s Wine Guide
2021 Olivia Brion “Taquine” White Blend – 90pts
2019 Olivia Brion Russian River Pinot Noir – 91.2pts
2019 Olivia Brion “Mon Amour Interdit” Grenache – 90.5pts
2019 Olivia Brion “Les Vagabondes” Tempranillo – 92pts
Wine Enthusiast
2019 Olivia Brion Taquine White Blend (2021 not reviewed) – 92pts
2019 Olivia Brion Russian River Pinot Noir – 92pts
2019 Olivia Brion “Mon Amour Interdit” Grenache – 91pts
2019 Olivia Brion “Les Vagabondes” Tempranillo – 92pts