pop & pour

PnP's complied Ratings Database spreadsheet: like this, but for wine.

Now that I’ve pounded out nearly 80 reviews over 9 months on this site, I thought it was about time to try and make the content on Pop & Pour a little more accessible.  The Search box at the top right of the page can help you if you’re looking for something specific, but until now there was no easy way to find out at a glance which wines have had the (mis)fortune of being featured on PnP over the course of the year.  Thankfully, my friend Microsoft Excel has helped me solve that problem; I have now compiled all of the names, vintages, scores, prices and review links for each of the wines I’ve written up and put them into a sortable spreadsheet that’s available for download by clicking on one these links (new Excel first, then older Excel):

Pop & Pour Ratings Database Nov 2011

Pop & Pour Ratings DB Nov 2011 Old Excel

My plan is to update this Ratings Archive spreadsheet once a month so that you will always have a fairly current list of PnP’s wines, and so that any particular review that interests you will only be a click away.  The spreadsheet also has one new piece of info for each reviewed wine that isn’t found anywhere on the blog:  a (very) rudimentary calculation of QPR (Quality Price Ratio) that gives you a general idea at a glance how much bang you get for your buck with every bottle.

Bang for your buck -- otherwise known as QPR.

QPR is a common industry term used to heap praise on bargain value wines, but my rendition of it has a particular meaning:  starting at a baseline score of 75 points (which is more or less the bottom of the barrel for wines scored on the 100-point system — my lowest score ever on Pop & Pour was a 77), my QPR number tells you how many PnP rating points over and above that baseline a wine gives you for every dollar you spend on it.  For example, if you look at the Tantalus Riesling I reviewed two days ago, it scored 92 points and cost around $25, so for that price it provided 17 rating points over and above 75, for a QPR score of 0.68 (17/$25 = 0.68 PnP scoring points for every dollar the wine cost).  Based on the 70-odd wines I’ve reviewed so far, the QPR rating is proving to be a solid (though not perfect) indicator of good value wine:  all wines with a QPR over 0.75 are ones I would suggest are killer values (Kung Fu Girl Riesling, Dr. L Riesling, Cover Drive Cab, etc.), whereas all wines with a QPR under 0.30 are either overpriced for what they are (Sleight of Hand Spellbinder, Cogno Barbera d’Alba, Habla No. 4 Syrah) or just plain expensive and therefore by definition not a bargain value wine (Cakebread Cab, Terralsole Brunello, etc.).  If you’re curious, the top QPR wine in PnP history based on the above formula is the 2002 Campillo Rioja Reserva, with a stunning QPR of 0.953 (89+ points, $15, almost a whole point over the baseline 75 for every dollar spent); conversely, and almost obviously, the worst QPR wine this blog has seen is the Pere Anselme Fiole du Pape CNDP, with a minuscule QPR of 0.057 (77 points, $35, 1/20th of a point over the baseline for every dollar spent).

Enjoy the spreadsheet, and please pass it on — check back in December for the next instalment!  From this point forward, the spreadsheet will always be available for download by clicking the “Ratings Archive DB” link in the top menu bar.  Next review in a couple days!