The Buyer | Final entries call to London Wine, Beer and Spirits Comps 2024

For all the details about the individual awards click on the links here and find out why to enter and who is judging the awards below. The final day for entries is February 22.

Now into their seventh year the London Competitions continue to set the pace for leading brands across the wine, beer and spirits sectors. Particularly those focused on competing on quality, value for money and the look, feel, design and packaging of their products. The key criteria on which these competitions are based.

For the London Wine, Beer, and Spirits Competitions were set up with one aim. To reward wines, beers and spirits in the same way the average consumer decides to buy them in a busy supermarket, or packed bar.

Every drinks brand and product entered into the London Wine, London Beer and London Spirits Competitions is judged in these three ways:

Blind Tasting

Each product entered is first blind tasted by our professional team of judges made of leading wine buyers, importers, merchants, sommeliers and Masters of Wine. Only those wines, beers and spirits that pass the blind tasting are then put forward to the next two rounds of judging..

Pricing and value for money

The judges are then told the recommended retail price and cost price of the wine, beer or spirit in question and asked to assess how that equates to the quality they have just tasted. Does it offer value for money at that price point? Will a retailer, wine merchant, bar or restaurant be able to sell it at that price to their customers?

Design

The judges are then asked to look at the actual bottles and packaging of all the products entered, to pick them up, to analyse their front and back labels and their overall brand design. Do they live up to the taste and quality credentials? Does it match the price being asked for it? Would the judges be proud to have that on their retail shelf or back bar?

Scoring

Some of the judging panel for the London Competition awards

Scores are awarded per product in each of these three key criteria in order to determine which medal they will receive.

To win a medal in each of the competitions a product needs to get the following scores:

Gold: 90 points or over.

Silver: a score between 76-89.

Bronze: a score between 65-75.

Promotion

All products that receive medals in either the London, Wine, Beer or Spirits Competitions will then be promoted through the various business and trade websites, social media and YouTube channels that the shows organiser, Beverage Trade Network, runs around the world. This includes the London Drinks Guide and two new dedicated sites for the UK – The On-Trade and Drinks Merchants.

You can also use the specially created media and press templates to personalise press releases and publicise any medal winning products to key trade and consumer titles

The Judges

The London Competitions are only judged by drinks professionals ideally in a direct buying position with the majority of judges working in bars, restaurants, importers, merchants or major retailers. It means the very people who are tasked in deciding with products go onto the shelves or the drinks lists of the most prominent and respected venues in the UK are the ones deciding which medals are handed out in the London Competitions.

Here are some of the judges taking part.