Chapter 6 – Wine Competitions & Wine Judging
The aim of this unit is to teach you how to communicate effectively on a judging panel of a wine competition or for a wine magazine, so that you can confidently describe both negative and more importantly, positive aspects of the wine under assessment, give your opinion and share in the debating process that leads to the final overall assessment. In Australia, many of the most important wine competitions are called ‘Wine Shows’, which are part of a much larger, Agricultural Show. In this book, we use the words competition and show interchangeably to mean the same thing. As a producer, it is vital to be able to take the positive wine show results and use them in the marketing and promotion of your wines to your sales partners and to the final consumer.
This section will focus on interviews with wine judges, a wine show organizer, a wine magazine editor and a successful wine show exhibitor. These interviews have been designed to teach the necessary vocabulary and skills for this unit and to give an overall picture of this important aspect of the wine industry.