Recency weighting update to wine scores

We have updated our scoring algorithm to remove the impact of very old vintages on wine-level attributes and scores.  Our wine-level score is an overall score for a wine computed from both wine attributes such as search frequency for a cru (regardless of vintage), and its individual vintage data, e.g. critic ratings or price performance.

For data that exists by vintage, the equivalent wine-level attribute is calculated by taking an average across vintages, which is then used to compute a score at wine level.

Prior to the update, data from all vintages of a wine would be incorporated into the wine level average and, although vintages were weighted such that more recent vintages had a greater influence (recency weighting), we still found that very old vintages were disproportionately impacting our results.

Château d’Yquem serves as an extreme illustration of this phenomenon:

Prior to the update, Château d’Yquem’s average price (incorporating all vintages) was £712 per bottle, which was heavily skewed by very old vintages with very high prices. These vintages are rarely traded or tasted, and as such should not influence the wine-level average and corresponding wine scores.

As of today, we have updated our recency weighting across all criteria to exclude vintages over 30 years old from the wine-level average. Following the update, our average price for Château d’Yquem is £170 per bottle – a considerable reduction, and a much fairer representation of actual trade price expectations.