London, the global capital of the drinks culture, plays host to the annual London Spirits, Wine and Beer Competitions, which are becoming an unmissable event where world’s top on-trade and off-trade professionals gather to judge thousands of spirits, wines and beers by quality, value and package.
The judging panel encompasses head bartenders, mixologists and bar managers who work at prestigious hotels and restaurants, including Soho House, Claridge’s, The Connaught, The Savoy, Harbour Hotels, The Ritz, Stafford Hotel, Shangri-La The Shard and The Savoy.
Key to the success of the London Competitions is that the judging panel comprises real trade buyers who rate products by price and packaging giving the winning brands an enormous marketing advantage.
Now in its sixth year, the London Spirits, Wine and Beer Competitions have added more strength to the judging panel. Over the last few years the organisers have worked hard to to build up the pedigree of its judges, who all have direct buying responsibilities and who understand exactly what their customers are looking for, which determines the brands that are included on drinks menus.
The London Competitions recognise, reward and help promote drinks brands that have successfully been created to identify with a specific target audience. For any brand to earn its place on a retailer’s shelf or a restaurant’s drinks list they need to be marketable and consumer-driven, and not just produced in the hope that they can find enough people willing to buy it.
Based on three core element, the score a drink achieves is based on the following judging formula making it a more relevant global competition: Quality plus Value and Package generates an overall score that goes forward to be compared against the scores that every other product achieves.
A separate weighted score is given for each of the three elements of the judging process (quality gets twice the weight) and the scores are calculated with other judges for the same product on the team to give a final score from which individual prizes are awarded.
The 2023 competitions are open for drinks producers to submit their spirits, wines and beers, with the award ceremony taking place in March 2023.
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