On behalf of all our contributors, I’m delighted to welcome you for a first look around Wine Review Online after a comprehensive redesign of the website. Aside from a vast improvement in appearance, you’ll also experience many upgrades in functionality whether you view the site on a computer, tablet, or mobile device.
We launched WRO in August of 2005, and within four months it became one of the world’s most frequently visited online sources for reviews, detailed information, and expert commentary on wines and regions from across the globe. We’ve managed to retain that high profile ever since, thanks to the tireless work of our distinguished roster of writers.
We’ve published at least two new articles and 30 reviews for 52 weeks over each of those 19 years, and if you do the multiplication with those numbers, you’ll get a clear idea of how we’ve built such a loyal viewership. Hopefully you’ll also understand why it has been difficult for the site’s leadership team to fully redesign the site while keeping our noses fixed on that endless publication grindstone. But better late than never—as the saying goes—and we’ve devoted more than two years of work with terrific designers to assure that there’s a whole lot of “better” built into the new site.
Among the improvements are an “Articles” page that will keep 9 recent pieces up for one-click viewing rather than just two on the former site. You’ll also find a new “Wine & Dine & More” page that will help broaden our coverage of wine-related travel, dining, entertaining, serving, buying, and storage advice, along with a whole slew of other topics onto which wine provides an opening.
A free subscription option has also been created, enabling you to receive notice of each week’s fresh content without needing to “bookmark” the site or rely on your multi-tasked memory to avoid missing a new issue.
We are still at work on two search mechanisms that will greatly strengthen your ability to focus on WRO’s wine reviews or, on the other hand, articles and the topics addressed within them. We had hoped to have these fully fleshed out before launching, but of course search engines are complicated “pieces” of computer engineering, and we’ve got a bit more work to do. Pardon yet another cliché, but we can’t “let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” and the keyword search options you’ll find at your disposal now work well enough for us to raise the curtain on the new website.
One last feature of note is that wine reviews are now more prominently featured, beginning with a “Featured Wine of the Day” and three new reviews atop the “Home” page. The word Review holds a central position in our name for a reason. It is true, of course, that wine lovers are invariably curious individuals, and our weekly articles and searchable archives will help viewers take as many deep dives into detailed information as they wish. However, publishing reviews that help readers find great wines and great values is the heart of our mission.
I’d add that the concept of “value” is as important in that last sentence as the notion of “greatness,” which is a distinguishing attribute of WRO by comparison to other magazines and websites. We review lots of high-end wines, but this is hardly a site geared solely toward “wine collectors.”
Most of us who write here enjoy wine frequently, and most of us want to enjoy wine with food on Tuesdays—not just Saturdays or anniversaries, so reasonable spending as an avenue to regular enjoyment is a high priority. To be blunt about the matter, any idiot with $150 to spend on a bottle can get an excellent wine. Helping you get one for $15 is an even more satisfying challenge for us, and hopefully a service appreciated by you as well.
A few words in closing.
This site would never have been launched in the first place without the vision of Robert Whitley, whose idea for WRO led me to leave my gig with The Washington Post in 2005 to join in partnership with him and Michael Apstein, former columnist for The Boston Globe and a James Beard Award winner. We lost Robert in February of 2021, then losing another founding contributor, Paul Lukacs (also a Beard Award winner), just four months later. A happy occasion such as this re-launch is the right time for remembering the friends who helped us get here, and those include the insightful and prolific Ed McCarthy, who we lost in May of this year. Many of their best articles can still be found in their archives at the bottom of our “Contributors” page, and even if you don’t know any Latin, just a bit of reading will explain the adjective in their forever titles as “Emeritus Contributors.”
We have been fortunate to recruit very strong writers to our lineup in recent years, including eight during the current decade of the 2020s alone. These include a couple of veterans as well as six already-accomplished writers and reviewers on the rise. Please look over our “Contributors” page to assess the depth of our talent pool, and to familiarize yourself with the credentials and experience that our authors bring to their work.
This re-launch would never have been accomplished without the resolute efforts and creative flair of Diane Salisbury, Robert’s beloved wife and our Publisher, who took the baton and has kept us in stride all along. Special thanks are owed to our design partners, Chanel Collis of Potion Web Studio and Gina Williams of Websites that Elevate. They are impressively talented and exceedingly patient, earning our most enthusiastic recommendation along with our appreciation.
Cheers!
