Trade Inquiries
For producers, importers, distributors and the people who work with them.
Wine Doctrine is one palate, writing about what it drinks. Samples are welcome, invitations are read, and every note published here says how the bottle arrived. What follows is how that works, so nobody has to guess.
What gets covered
Champagne above all, then Burgundy, German and Alsatian Riesling, and the better end of California white. Plenty else besides — twenty years of notes range widely — but those are where the attention naturally goes.
Small production is not a disadvantage here. Neither is being unknown. Being uninteresting is.
Samples
Samples are accepted and read about with interest. Three things worth knowing before you send one:
- A sample buys attention, not a review. Bottles are tasted when there is a reason to taste them, and written up only when there is something to say.
- A sample certainly does not buy a score. The note will say what the bottle was like, including when that is unflattering.
- Every sample is disclosed. Any note written from a submitted bottle is marked as a sample, permanently, on the review itself.
Write before sending rather than posting blind. Bottles that arrive unannounced sometimes sit in the wrong place for a week, which does neither of us any good.
Trade tastings, visits and events
Portfolio tastings, producer visits and press events are all of interest, particularly in the regions above. Notes taken at them are marked as trade tastings when published, for the same reason samples are.
Conditions at a large tasting are what they are, and a note written standing up at a portfolio event says so rather than pretending to be a considered assessment over dinner.
Sponsorship
Sponsored coverage is possible and is handled plainly.
What sponsorship can buy: attention, and a piece that would not otherwise have been written — a producer profile, a vertical, a region visited properly.
What it cannot buy: a score, a favourable note, approval before publication, or the removal of a piece once written. If a sponsored tasting produces a disappointing wine, the note will say so.
Anything sponsored carries a prominent disclosure on the piece itself, not a line in the footer. Readers pay for this site, and they are owed that.
What a note contains
Scores are on a 100-point scale and have been for twenty years, applied consistently — a 94 in 2009 means what a 94 means now. Notes describe the bottle in front of the writer on the night in question, which is why the same wine appears more than once with different scores.
If a bottle is flawed, the note says so and the score reflects the bottle, not the wine’s reputation.
Useful things to include
When you write, the details that actually help: the wine and vintage, the appellation, and for Champagne the disgorgement date and dosage. Technical sheets are read. Marketing copy is not.
Getting in touch
Email trade@winedoctrine.com. That address reaches the person who writes the notes.
Shipping details are provided on request rather than published, for reasons anyone who has received an unexpected pallet will understand.