I am often asked why there is no independent tasting of baijiu, and there is no independent scoring agency. In contrast, there is such an organization in the red wine field, where consumers can judge the quality of a wine through data such as scores and ratings, so as to make purchase choices.
In fact, in the field of liquor, there have been professional appraisals in the past, and the degree of professionalism is no less than that of current red wines, that is, various wine appraisals, among which five national wine appraisals are the representatives. It is a pity that this kind of wine tasting was publicized in the early 90s, and then the wine tasting became a recharge meeting for the winery to pay money.
This shows how strong the public relations skills of some wineries are. After all, liquor is a local profit and tax industry, and the development of some liquor companies drives local profits and taxes, and the expert score is low, which affects local profits and taxes. What's more, consumers at that time had no awareness of the quality of liquor, and although the five wine appraisals were professional, only professionals could understand them. Detached from the masses and affecting the interests of the distillery and the local community, it is no wonder that this kind of fair activity is not publicized and dismissed.
In contrast, red wine production is all over the world, and there are a large number of enthusiasts, many of whom have a deep understanding of red wine tasting, which is the reason why red wine can be evaluated by third parties. Of course, more importantly, because red wine is produced all over the world, no winery or place can publicize the world, and compared with independent evaluation of white wine, independent evaluation of red wine faces less pressure. These are the reasons why independent wine appraisal can take shape.
When it comes to the independent evaluation of liquor, the atmosphere is not as good as that of red wine, which is related to the fact that liquor is mainly produced and sold in China, and it is a local profit and tax industry. In other words, if liquor is produced or sold all over the world, there is much less PR pressure on independent appraisal than it is now. Because no matter how strong the local power is, it cannot reach abroad.
So can't liquor be independently evaluated? Of course not, I think there will be a mature independent evaluation of baijiu in the future, but it will take a while. In fact, in the field of red wine, there can be such a mature independent evaluation, in addition to the good environment and atmosphere, there are also most channel dealers and enthusiasts who will taste wine and identify the quality of the wine. And this is also a constraint on some wineries: don't be foolish about the quality of the wine.
Therefore, if you want to push the independent evaluation of liquor, you must first start with the channel business, so that they can taste the wine, and will make money by guiding consumers to taste the wine, so that they can be motivated to guide consumers to taste and identify good wine. When this atmosphere takes shape and a strong market is formed, it is only natural that this circle will introduce some independent wine reviewers to speak on their behalf. At this time, the wine appraiser can face the public relations of the winery and the local government, because behind him are countless wine merchants who make money in this way, consumers who love baijiu, and wine companies that really make good liquor and serve this market.
Of course, the cycle of cultivating this market is relatively long, although I am only 33 years old this year, I am still very young, but after this market is really cultivated and matured, I estimate that there are fifty or sixty years, at that time, the sense of taste and smell is not sharp, and I can't taste some wine.
And this is what I once said: the real independent wine appraiser of baijiu is the person of the future, the young people of the post-00s, and what I can do is to create a suitable environment for them to learn, grow, and become independent wine appraisers who have made positive contributions to the industry.
So it's not difficult to understand that after I worked full-time in liquor, I became more and more like a businessman. In fact, life is one thing, and more importantly, the wine circle needs to be promoted by channels.
It has been said that independent wine critics can do this by sticking to themselves and keeping their original intentions. I used to believe in this idea and worked on it for several years. As I continue to learn more about the liquor industry, reality has taught me: if you want to be independent in the liquor review circle, then you don't want to have traffic. You have traffic, you will have trouble, a lot of black PR hacking your reputation is a trivial matter, of course, they can also be hacked, mainly because few consumers can taste wine, so the logic of consumers' liquor is easy to be taken away. Of course, hacking your account is not a big deal, personal safety is a big deal.
So I'm glad that I don't have much traffic now, so I can say that some wineries have increased their prices and lowered their quality. Of course, this also taught me that to really do this thing well, everyone still has to understand, if everyone doesn't know how to taste wine, they just say that they want to drink good wine, cost-effective wine, but actually don't know anything about good wine, just like Ye Gong is a good dragon. In such an environment, there is no independent wine reviewer, and a person with such a wine evaluation ability and vision will also keep his mouth shut and will not publish any remarks and information about wine reviews on public platforms.
Speaking of which, I would like to say an interesting thing. In fact, what really promotes the independent evaluation of liquor is still those brand liquor companies that increase prices and reduce quality, regardless of whether the channel is dead or alive. It's not that these brands are forcing traditional channels to have no food, and they won't consider transformation. In the past few months, there have been more and more traditional liquor merchants who have communicated with me about liquor tasting and marketing, and many of them are young and energetic. They are so active in coming to me, I really want to thank those brand wine companies that have raised prices, reduced quality, and compressed profits from traditional channels.
Speaking of which, some people will question: will you do this independent evaluation of liquor will not be too commercial, not pure at all, to be precise, you are actually selling wine under the banner of wine tasting! That's right, I do sell wine under the banner of wine tasting, but unlike the traditional way of shouting wine tasting slogans to sell wine, our terminals will take consumers to taste wine, so that consumers can complete the marketing after recognizing the quality, which is itself a process of improving consumers' ability to taste wine.
Of course, the wine I choose is also through my strict screening, in addition to the quality, ** assessment, I also have a strict assessment of the production of wine enterprise operating conditions, capital chain, marketing logic, personnel structure. After all, my previous wine reviews have also appeared in Jinsha Zhen 8, Pingba Carrying Ding's work, and Simian Sauce 8. If a wine company can't control its brand, quality, or management structure is too messy, then no matter how cost-effective his product is, I won't touch it.
Back to the topic of wine evaluation and wine sales. Maybe in the future, there will be a higher and more reasonable form of wine tasting to replace me, and I actually welcome it. But at the moment, there is no better way to promote the wine tasting circle. The traditional model of drinking friends circle requires drinking friends to have a high enthusiasm for liquor and strong consumption power, which screens out the vast majority of consumers. After tasting the liquor he was curious about, many of them withdrew from the liquor circle and began to play in other fields, which is of little significance to the expansion and promotion of the liquor circle.
In fact, in the red wine, whiskey, and craft beer circles, there are practitioners who promote wine evaluation, because they will be in this field for a long time and will not move with the situation, and they are indeed the cornerstone of promoting the development of this kind of wine tasting circle.
The road is long, and I will go up and down to seek. This is the old saying that Qu Yuan left us, the road to independent evaluation of liquor is difficult and long, but I will persist and make it step by step. I hope that in my lifetime, I can see that the independent evaluation of baijiu can be as brilliant as red wine, and I also hope that more excellent people will emerge in this track, and I will be friends with them to grow and learn together. I am also willing to be a green leaf, accompany and care for those who have the potential to develop into independent wine tasters, and the future of baijiu needs to have an independent voice, interpret the various styles and genres of baijiu, screen out good liquor, and let consumers appreciate the beauty of it.