Tim Hanni’s Awards for Wines Consumers Like
During February 2012, Midwest Wine Press wrote a story about Tim Hanni’s presentation at the Illinois Grape Growers and Vintners Association Conference: Midwest Wines Should Embrace Sweetness .
Hanni is a leading international authority on wine taste preferences and vinotyping. His well constructed message is spot-on for the Midwest Wine Industry: Be proud of making quality sweet wines and allow people to drink the wines they love.
Hanni recently spoke by email to Midwest Wine Press from the 2015 Iowa Wine Growers Conference in Cedar Rapids.”I’m at the Iowa Wine Growers Conference in Cedar Rapids and I love participating in events in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and other Midwestern states,” Hanni said. “But as I write this message, I am struck by the many challenges Midwest wineries face. The greatest challenge of all is the ignorance the wine ‘gatekeepers” that prevent the wines that consumers clearly love from being placed on wine lists and retail shelves.”
Hanni says this ‘tyranny of the minority” is the work of wine critics and experts that have a narrow and limiting view of what wine should be — oblivious to history and consumer preferences. “Our solution to this problem is to give consumers a stronger voice,” Hanni said.
“The Consumer Wine Awards provides the opportunity to have your wines evaluated, and awards given, by panels of consumers who love the style and varieties of wine they are asked to evaluate. We also use the Consumer Wine Awards to collect and disseminate new consumer insights that help the industry better understand what consumers really want, and why. We encourage the submission of wine that the wine critics love to hate! Join us in celebrating the diversity of wines made throughout the world and also celebrating the diversity of consumer preferences.”
For more information and to submit wines for awards please see: Submit Wines for Consumer Wine Awards
