Wine Spectator

Categories	Wine magazine
Frequency	16 issues per year
Publisher	M. Shanken Communications
First issue	April 1, 1976
Country	United States,
Language	English
Website	www.winespectator.com

Wine Spectator is a magazine that focuses on wine. Founded as a San Diego-based tabloid newspaper by Bob Morrisey in 1976, it was purchased three years later by publisher Marvin R. Shanken.^[1] That year, its panel of experts blind tasted and reviewed over 12,400 wines. Each of the 16 issues per year contains a large section devoted to wine reviews and wine ratings.

The magazine's consumer orientation is reflected in stories such as family conflicts among producers, the identification of producers whose wines suffered from systematic cork taint, and alerting collectors to the proliferation of counterfeit wines. Among the critics in the magazine's tasting panel are James Suckling, James Molesworth and James Laube.

The magazine organized and sponsored the Wine Spectator Wine Tasting of 1986 on the tenth anniversary of the "Judgment of Paris".

[edit] Criticism

Having started a restaurant awards program in 1981, the accolade has since come under some criticism.^[2][3] At the August 2008 conference of the American Association of Wine Economists in Portland, Oregon, a hoax exposé submission of the fictitious restaurant Osteria L’Intrepido was revealed by the author and Fearless Critic founder Robin Goldstein: he had won an Award of Excellence for a restaurant that didn't exist and whose "reserve wine list" was full of the lowest-rated Italian wines in history. He stated the exposé to be part of research for an academic paper^[4], whose aim was to discover what it takes for a restaurant's wine list to receive an award from the magazine.^{[5][3][6][7][8]} With nearly 4,500 restaurant applications, the magazine earns over $1 million each year from submission fees.^[9][10] Editor Thomas Matthews published an official response on the magazine's forum site.^{[11][5][6][3][12]}

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Wine Spectator official site
• Wine Spectator School online wine courses
• Wine Spectator videos