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Robert Parker (wine critic) was born on 23 July, 1947 in Baltimore, Maryland. Discover Robert Parker (wine critic)'s Biography, Age, Height, Physical Stats, Dating/Affairs, Family and career updates. Learn How rich is He in this year and how He spends money? Also learn how He earned most of networth at the age of 76 years old?

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Robert Parker (wine critic) Height, Weight & Measurements

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Robert Parker (wine critic) Net Worth

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Timeline

Parker formally retired from The Wine Advocate at the age of 71 in 2019.

Parker disclosed end of 2012, that he will sell a "substantial interest" in his newsletter and plans to step down as editor in chief. His new partners are a trio of Singapore-based hedge fund investors.

Among the books and films that have focused on the influence and effects of Parker on the global wine industry are the 2004 book The Accidental Connoisseur, by Lawrence Osborne, the 2004 documentary film Mondovino by Jonathan Nossiter, a 2005 unauthorized biography The Emperor of Wine by Elin McCoy, the 2008 book The Battle for Wine and Love: Or How I Saved the World from Parkerization by Alice Feiring, and the 2010 French language bande dessinée comic book, Robert Parker: Les Sept Pêchés capiteux.

In issue 164 of The Wine Advocate, Parker wrote a long article about Jeffrey Davies, a wine trader based in Bordeaux. As Hanna Agostini and Marie-Françoise Guichard point out in their book Robert Parker, Anatomy of a Myth, what Parker failed to mention was that he tasted wines with Davies, not by himself—yet Parker has repeatedly stated that an impartial wine critic should taste wines alone. Davies advised Parker not to publish his comments on the 2004 Bordeaux in issue 164, as Parker had planned, because they would have suffered from their comparison with the much better 2003 and 2005. Parker followed Davies' advice, and published those comments in the following issue instead.

Whatever his influence, Parker alone cannot impact the market price for a wine if he is alone against the mainstream. The famous controversy around the Château Pavie 2003 is an example of this: despite Parker's positive ratings, the wine in bottle sold 30% cheaper than en primeur.

A lengthy profile of Parker entitled "The Million Dollar Nose" ran in The Atlantic Monthly in December 2000. Among other claims, Parker told the author that he tastes 10,000 wines a year and "remembers every wine he has tasted over the past thirty-two years and, within a few points, every score he has given as well." Yet, in a public blind tasting of fifteen top wines from Bordeaux 2005—which he has called "the greatest vintage of my lifetime"—Parker could not correctly identify any of the wines, confusing left bank wines for right several times. (In general, "left bank" wines are grown in regions west of the Gironde Estuary, and "right bank" in the regions east.)

Parker's influence on Burgundy wines was lessened as the result of a libel lawsuit filed against him by Domaine Faiveley. In the third edition of his Wine Buyer's Guide, Parker reported that "the Faiveley wines tasted abroad would be less rich than those one can taste on the spot [...]". In other words, Parker accused Faiveley of cheating. Faiveley sued Parker for libel; in February 1994, Parker was requested to appear in front of the Paris superior court (tribunal de grande instance). The case was settled out of court. It was eventually discovered that the difference in taste that Parker identified was due to improper storage of the wine at the American importer's warehouse, causing the wine to be "cooked." Parker delegated coverage of the Burgundy and Alsace regions to Pierre-Antoine Rovani in April 1997.

Robert Parker's goddaughter, Marie Raynaud, is the daughter of Alain Raynaud—the co-owner of Château la Croix-de-Gay in Pomerol and former owner of Château Quinault in Saint-Émilion. Mr. Raynaud was the President of the Union des Grands Crus de Bordeaux, an advocacy group for the Grand Crus of Bordeaux, between 1994 and 2000.

Parker received worldwide attention when he called the 1982 vintage in Bordeaux superb, contrary to the opinions of many other critics, such as San Francisco critic Robert Finigan, who felt it was too low-acid and ripe. While there is still debate about the timelessness of the vintage, prices of 1982 Bordeaux remain consistently higher than other vintages.

According to Mike Steinberger, Parker has inadvertently made becoming a wine critic in the future almost impossible, since— in part because of the success of his scoring system—it is now prohibitively expensive to taste the very wines one should criticize. If it behooves a critic to understand, say, Château Lafite 1982, 2000, 2003, and 2005 before assessing the latest vintage: the critic must drink wine worth tens of thousands of dollars before beginning the review. This was not true when Steinberger became a connoisseur in the 1970s.

The second issue of The Baltimore/Washington Wine Advocate stated "Robert Parker has no interest, direct or indirect, financial or any other, in importing, distributing or selling wines." In the late 1980's, Parker invested in an Oregon vineyard with his brother-in-law, Michael G. Etzel, called The Beaux Frères Vineyard ("The Brothers-in-Law"), which would soon after become a commercial winery under the same name. He promised never to review any wines produced there in The Wine Advocate.

In 1975, Parker began writing a wine guidebook. Taking his cue from consumer advocate Ralph Nader, Parker wanted to write about wine without the conflicts of interest that might taint the opinions of other critics who also make a living selling wine. In 1978, he published a direct-mail newsletter called The Baltimore-Washington Wine Advocate, which was later renamed The Wine Advocate. The first issue was sent free to consumers from mailing lists Parker purchased from several major wine retailers. Six hundred charter subscribers paid to receive the second issue published later that year.

Parker was born in Baltimore, Maryland. His father was a construction equipment salesman. He is an honors graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park, with a major in history and a minor in art history. He continued his education at University of Maryland School of Law at the urban campus of the University of Maryland, Baltimore, graduating in 1973 with a Juris Doctor degree. He discovered wine as a student visiting Alsace, where Patricia, now his wife, was studying. For over ten years, he was assistant general counsel for the Farm Credit Banks of Baltimore; he resigned in March 1984 to focus on writing about wine.

Until the 1970s, wine criticism was usually complementary to the production or trade of wine. The conflict of interest that might ensue from this close relationship was accepted by consumers, as they consulted wine reviews to gain an introduction to the world of wine, and not necessarily for advice on getting good value for their money. Hence, before Robert Parker, wine critics almost always had some link to the production or trade of wines.

Parker's impact on the style of fine wines has generated controversy. Parker is highly critical of "those who make 'industrial wines with little flavor and no authenticity'" and he believes that there are still undiscovered regions and wines that can successfully challenge the wine establishment. Critics such as Golo Weber claim that Parker likes less-acidic, riper wines with significant amounts of oak, alcohol, and extract. This supposed "Parker taste" may be less the result of Parker's own preferences than of a trend initiated by Émile Peynaud, the French oenologist and father of the so-called "international wines". In the 1970s, winemakers avoided the late harvests, when the grapes were mature, in order to avoid the risks of end-of-season rains. Peynaud proposed that winemakers should wait to harvest until the grape was fully mature, or even over-mature. He also insisted on control of malolactic fermentation through the use of stainless steel vessels.

The globalist domination of the oenological press by Parker's ideas has led to changes in viticulture and winemaking practices, such as reducing yield by green harvesting, harvesting grapes as late as possible for maximum ripeness, not filtering the wine, and using new techniques—such as microoxygenation—to soften tannins. These widespread changes in technique have been called "Parkerization", also sometimes known as "The International Style", and have led to fear of a homogenization of wine styles around the world as Parker's "tastes are irrevocably changing the way some French wines are made", according to the BBC's Caroline Wyatt. Indeed, certain low-producing "boutique" wineries, among others, have received high scores from Parker for wines made in this style. Parker disputes the notion of growing homogeneity and argues for the opposite: "When I started tasting wines, in the 1970s, we were on a slippery slope. There was a standardization of wines, where you couldn't tell a Chianti from a cabernet. That's pretty much stopped now."

Robert McDowell Parker Jr. (born July 23, 1947) is a retired U.S. wine critic. His wine ratings on a 100-point scale and his newsletter The Wine Advocate are influential in American wine buying and are therefore a major factor in setting the prices for newly released Bordeaux wines. This made him the most widely known and influential wine critic in the world.

Parker argues that he scores wines on how much pleasure they give him. He, and others, have said that it is the obscurity, corruption, and other problems of the appellation system that made his consumer-oriented approach necessary. For example, the Bordeaux Wine Official Classification of 1855 was based entirely upon the château's reputation and trading price in 1855. However, since then many châteaux have sold much of their vineyards; others have bought additional vineyards far away. The original winemakers are long dead. Parker says that this state of affairs was responsible for creating an injustice for consumers, causing mediocre wine to be sold at too high a price, and good wine to be sold at too low a price. He says of the 1855 classifications, "At most, these classifications should be regarded by both the wine connoisseur and novice as informational items of historical significance only."