Wine critic Max Allen raises ethical question of cash for reviews
Veteran wine writer Max Allen has raised the ethical issue of reviewers being paid by producers to write about them.
In a column in The Weekend Australian Magazine, Allen points to the creation of the association Wine Writers of New Zealand.
The new body states:
“We believe the practice of supplying wine reviews for direct payment removes… independence, is highly undesirable, and has the potential to harm the reputation of all wine writers in New Zealand.
Using wine as a means of raising the profile of a region is a nice trick. In NZ’s case however it cannot work. People will not equate a quality drop with moving there in the face of the google age and websites like expatexposed whicih expose the harsh realities. So throw money at a wine writer, anyone with a smartphone and a data plan will find out the truth within 5 minutes.
I have worked with wineries and they routinely pay $40 to have a wine reviewed in a magazine, or a $250 annual fee to quote what James Halliday has said about a wine on their website or marketing material (seems strange when they had to provide him with the wine for free in the first place). There has long been a question of ethics in the wine industry and I look forward to reading Max Allen’s article.
All paid blogs, reviews, Facebook shares and Tweets should be disclosed as paid if they are.
The US and UK have already made that law.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tech.....dorsements
Have always thought sending wine samples to a magazine with payment of up to $300 per sample is not kosha. Very seldom do you see a bad review by a magazine wine writer so by paying do you just pay for at least an average review and avoid the risk of a bad one?
Winery members of the Halliday site pay a membership fee to cover the licensing cost of the use of content in their marketing and to create their own advanced listing on the website featuring stockist info, photo galleries, video galleries, facilities info and more, with the aim of promoting winery tourism.