Judges Dozen is an exciting new wine-retailing concept empowering wine drinkers to taste, rate and ultimately select the wines that are made available for sale. The aims are simple – to make buying wine a more dynamic experience, and to take it beyond a retail transaction.

• Visit the Judges Dozen website here

Steve Doherty, Judges Dozen founder, said he developed the idea after becoming disenchanted with the lack of innovation in wine selling. He said he was tired of the industry doing its best to make the average drinker confused and intimidated when purchasing wine.

Blind tasting: from the choices, 12 bottles will be selected by the judges.

Pouring over it: will this anonymous bottle making it onto your winners’ list?

“Wine is meant to be fun, enjoyable and ideally adventurous, but for many it’s filled with in trepidation. In many ways the industry does a great job at making consumers feel inadequate,” said Steve.

“Let’s face it. We’ve all had the know-all, pompous sommelier or bottle shop attendant gives us the sale spiel only to be more confused than when we first started looking. Add a rating system where most wine has a 90 points plus rating and there becomes a sea of confusion. It puts us off our guard and ultimately we revert back to the safety of the known … boring!”

Judges Dozen crowd finds wine drinkers for a themed event where they sip in judgment – blind tasting, critiquing and rating wines via their mobile phones.

The rating system provides a live view on how wines are performing and ultimately the top 12 wines judged to be the best are the ‘Judges Dozen’ and sold online.

At their most recent event, The Tassie Top Drop Show, over 30 wineries were represented with more than 80 wines from isle tasted by 120 people.

“It was a great day. We flew in a chef from Tasmania who created some brilliant tasting plates from local produce and guests sipped their way through some great cool climate wines.

“Not many Tasmanian wines make it to the mainland, let alone to a booze barn, so it was a fantastic opportunity for guests to experience some of the lesser known brands and also to extend the repertoire of what they drink. This really optimises what Judges Dozen is all about and that’s bringing new wine experiences to daily wine lovers.”

“At the end of the day it comes down to taste, what you like and this is product co-creation at its very best, providing purchasers with the confidence of knowing that many people like them have chosen the wines.”

Founder’s background

Judges Dozen founder Steve Doherty

Steve Doherty has spent most of his working life in the advertising industry. His mother comes from a family of hoteliers and his uncle, from his father’s side, was a wine journalist and judge. Steve has always had a penchant for wine. It was only a matter of time before his marketing experience and passion combined to form what is now Judges Dozen.

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