If you are following my Instagram and Facebook accounts, you have probably seen that I am campaigning alongside a wine competition, the Paris Wine Cup. This competition is different from many others, and that is why I wanted to pay more attention to it.
It was only the first year of the competition when I wrote this article, but I was sure we would hear more about this wine competition in the coming years. Since then, I have also had the opportunity to experience wine competitions and judging from the other side of the table. You can read more about my background and my experience with wine competitions and judging in my wine story.
What Is the Paris Wine Cup?
I would like to explain the differences and uniqueness of the Paris Wine Cup and why the wines awarded medals here are interesting to discover.
According to the Paris Wine Cup:
“The Paris Wine Cup aims to recognize, reward and promote wine brands that have successfully been created to identify with and target a specific wine drinker.”
The idea is that for a wine brand to earn its place on a retailer’s shelf or a restaurant’s wine list — and then stay there — it needs to be marketable and consumer-driven, rather than simply produced in the hope that enough people will eventually buy it.
How the Paris Wine Cup Is Different
This is what makes the Paris Wine Cup different from a traditional wine competition.
It is not only a blind tasting designed to evaluate the quality of the wine. The competition also considers value and packaging, giving judges a broader way of looking at the wine as a product.
Understanding how professional tasters assess wine starts with elements such as origin, climate, soil, and structure. I wrote more about this in my guide to understanding terroir and blind tasting.
The three elements are:
- Wine quality
- Value for money
- Packaging
And you know that I am all in for good-value wines! We cannot always afford to buy the most expensive bottle on the shelf, so considering the relationship between quality and price can be useful for wine consumers.
How the Paris Wine Cup Scoring System Works
The Paris Wine Cup scoring system combines three separate scores:
Quality Score (Q) + Value Score (V) + Package Score (P) = Paris Wine Cup Score
Each part of the judging process receives a separate weighted score, which is then added together to produce the final score from which individual medals and prizes are awarded.
Quality Score
The Quality Score is marked out of 50 points and represents the largest part of the final score.
Value Score
The Value Score is marked out of 25 points and assesses the relationship between the wine and its price.
Package Score
The Package Score is marked out of 25 points and takes the presentation of the product into account.
Medal Categories
The final score determines the medal awarded:
- Double Gold: 96 points or above
- Gold: 90–95 points
- Silver: 76–89 points
- Bronze: 65–75 points
What Does a Paris Wine Cup Medal Mean for Consumers?
As we can see, the quality of the wine is the most important part of the judging process, which makes sense to me. However, the competition also considers whether the wine offers an appropriate value for its price and whether its packaging works as part of the overall product.
For consumers, this makes the medals particularly interesting because the competition is not simply asking whether a wine is good. It also looks at what you receive for the price you pay and how the wine is presented.
So, if you see a bottle in a wine shop or restaurant carrying a Paris Wine Cup medal, the award gives you additional information about how the wine performed across quality, value, and packaging.
Personally, I know I would be interested in picking one up and trying it. And, of course, you can expect my tasting notes as well!
Paris Wine Cup Winners
Would you like to check out the winners from that year’s competition?
You can find the global results here and discover the wines that received the highest recognition.
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