The Rise and Fall of Robert Parker, Wine Advocate

Today I want to give you a quick overview of the story or history behind the ABSOLUTE GOAT of wine critics in the world, unequivocally THE most famous name and figure in the wine world of all times, Robert Parker. What is Robert Parker up to these days, and what has his famous publication the Wine Advocate publication become you may be wondering? Let’s dive into it…

00:00 – About Robert Parker Intro
01:20 – Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate – How it Started?
04:00 – 30 Years Shaping the World of Wine
06:02 – Gradual Retirement and Fading Influence

Hello bour and welcome to your new Bonner private wines video today I’d like to start with you a bit of a wine video series another one about the most influential wine critics in the world the most famous wine critics and introduce you to the people who have

Shaped the wine world over the past few decades so I’ll talk about Janis Robinson the wine spectator the Cano magazine and some other names but today I want to give you a quick overview of the story or shall I say the history behind the absolute goat in the wine World

Unequivocally the most famous name and figure in the world in the wine World Of All Times Robert Parker what is Robert Parker up to these days and what has his famous publication the wine Advocate publication become since have you heard about him lately you probably wondering what’s up with RP let’s dive into It let me give you a brief history of Robert Parker he was born in Baltimore Maryland in 1947 his father was a construction equipment salesman nothing to do with wine humble beginnings fast forward his youth Parker graduated from the University of Maryland School of Law at age 26 in 1973 apparently he

Discovered wine as a student visiting the famous alzas wine region of France where Patricia F now his wife was studying that’s the legend while working as a lawyer in Maryland in 1975 he started writing a wine guide book which remained very confidential for several years in 78 he published a direct mail newsletter

Called the Baltimore Washington wine Advocate which was later renamed simply the wine Advocate from this humble beginning in the wine World it took Robert nearly 10 years to break through the establishment of wine critics when around 1983 84 he predicted that the Vintage 1982 in Bordeaux would become a

Collector all other wine Publications at the time all the most influential magazines had said 82 had been too warm a vintage climatic conditions too hot that the wines were too fruity and not acidic or steering o off to age well over time they said it would just be a

Shortlived vintage decent wines while young but with no aging potential and no real long-term Glory Parker on the other hand tasted the wines and like them and for the first time in the history of wine critics he saw the potential of wines made from greater grape maturity bigger richer wines with more alcohol

And body and he told his readers of the wine Advocate to buy the Vintage on mass which they did vintage 1982 in Bordeaux you have to know turned out to be the best vintage for the region of the whole 1980s essentially as we had to wait

Until 89 and 1990s to find the next legendary years for Bordeaux Robert Parker had seen it all before anyone else and disrupted the established EST estblished critiques wine scene from the mid 1980s onward Robert Parker’s influence on the wine world just grew and grew bigger as he became

The wine taster and wine reviewer people trusted most to identify promising vintages and promising Wineries and producers as well so following his vintage 82 revelation since his publication the wine Advocate became extremely followed in the US first before the rest of the world Court went of it and of this Visionary and started

Following Robert Parker and his comments as well I would like to go back to this phenomenon that affected the wine industry from the 1980s to the end of the 2000s called the parkerization of wines in the future video because it deserves more time an entire video time

That I haven’t got here so make sure to stay tuned And subscribe to the channel so you don’t miss when we discuss this but let’s just say that over the next 30 years or so Parker’s ratings the first to be on a 100 point scale and this is

Important you can watch more about how wine scores are established in another video right here because we discussed it in the past Robert Parker scores became the gold standard for wine consumers and WI wi producers alike Winery started chasing those high scores from the wine Advocate often pushing grape maturity

Further and further into October riper richer grapes to produce bigger wines often oier wines to please not only Robert Parker’s tastes because he favored those types of wines but also what has been referred to as the American palette favoring larger sweeter wine Expressions as I said we’ll get back to This if you haven’t been living under a great Vine and haven’t followed wine news in detail over the former few years you have to know that Robert Parker’s influence has been gradually fading away for the past 15 20 years in short in 2006 Parker chose a group of Staff

Members to cover the majority of the world’s wine regions in his place they would go out to taste the wines not him anymore Robert Parker scores weren’t really RP scores anymore from then but at least they were still the wine Advocates but in December 2012 Robert stepped back from his full-time position

At the wine advocate naming Liza peroti Brown as the publication’s new editor and chief Liza and her team did a great job but from there the wine Advocate scores got a little diluted among other wine Publications since it clearly wasn’t Robert Parker at the helm anymore famously that’s an anecdote but it it’s

Telling one of Robert’s wingmen Antonio galone who had been tasting and rating wines from Italy California champagne burgundy in place of Robert Parker for the wine Advocate from 2006 one of his tasters abandoned the ship in 2013 to start his own competing wine publication called Venice a move some

Have called a betrayal several years later Parker retired formerly in 2019 business-wise in 2017 Michelin the famous culinary guide acquired a 40% stake in Robert Parker wine Advocate and in 2019 Michelin became sole owner of the company writing wise in 2021 perody Brown stepped down as the editorinchief

And former managing editor Joe chinski became the new Editor in Chief so everything has moved and evolved let’s say Robert Parker wine Advocate currently employs nine wine review each assigned their own wine area of the world William Kelly tastes Bordeaux and burgundy shab or champagne Etc Ain

Brooks for example reviews the Oregon in certain parts of California and so on the other seven taste other regions Italy Spain and more today the wine Advocate is still a very respected wine publication many subscribers and also many wine producers producers still read and listen to what their nine local

Critiques are saying but it feels that there is a much broader wine scene of wine critics now and that the influence is more spread out between historic wine critics like Janis Robinson Antonio galone who we mentioned the wine spectator or decanter magazine that are still here and more newcomers that are

More significant now which is why I would like to make more videos for you introducing you to some of those very other alternative Publications that are significant now we’ll cover those in ongoing series for future videos so stay tuned to the channel for those but in summary Robert Parker and the wine

Advocates era of absolute domination over the world of wine reviews has come and gone and perhaps for the better the world of wine is diverse at the end of the day and wine Publications maybe should be as well but we’ll get back to this in future episodes thanks for watching and I will

See you soon in the wonderful world of wine Cheers