Spent this morning judging at Laithwaites Experts’ Choice tasting, held at the Worx in Parsons Green. The concept? Laithwaites staff do a pre-screening of their range and then present around 200 wines to be tasted blind by a mix of their staff and journos like me, working in panels of four. We rate all the wines, and the highest-rated of these make it into the offer (see last year’s offer, to get an idea of the results).
Why is this a good idea, and why should I spend my time doing this? Well, very few wine merchants have found a way to sell wine to customers that doesn’t involve reducing the price. This Experts’ Choice selection was a great success last year with Laithwaites’ customers, because it gave them reassurance that the wines would be good.
The Laithwaites creative team were out in force, with a camera crew led by Red Johnson (he’s the son of Hugh, who was also tasting) and a photographer (whose life was probably made quite difficult by the bizarre mix of normal and orange-tinted sodium lighting in the room). Pictured above: Tony Laithwaite being interviewed. Pictured below: the team were keen to see which wines had made the grade, when the bottles were revealed.
This is the blog of wine journalist Jamie Goode, online since 2001. Feel free to nose around; your comments are welcomed.
Where’s Hugh?
What did you make of them Jamie?
Last years case had some decent wines. See my reviews at http://wineblogforthefrugal.blogspot.com/search/label/Laithwaites