About me
I'm Paul Caputo, wine writer and critic
I write about travel, culture, history, geography, people, and business through the lens of wine.
Please feel free to get in touch.
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Highlights
Bio
Paul Caputo is an award winning UK wine writer, critic and media entrepreneur with 20 years of experience in the wine business. Starting his career as a specialist importer of boutique Italian wines for a high net worth private client list, he continued to develop his business online and ultimately into a city centre wine bar and retail unit. During this time Paul wrote for specialised wine and lifestyle publications, producing regular columns for print and digital. In 2008 he collaborated with an oenologist to produce his own Aglianico del Vulture red wine which was distributed in the UK.
In 2014 he co-authored a published guide to the Wines of North Macedonia. He judged in numerous OIV wine competitions in Europe, including IWSC, Mundus Vini, Concours Mondial de Bruxelles, Bucharest Wine Competition, Citadelles du Vin, Concorso de Vermentino, a number of winemaker technical panels in Bulgaria and Serbia. Paul was also a panel chairman for successive years at 5 Star Wines in Verona.
He has also been a guest speaker twice at Wine2Wine, a well known wine business marketing conference, as well as in the Balkans on subjects such as the development of wine tourism. Over time Paul developed a specialism for Italian and Balkan wines. He completed the notoriously difficult Italian wine Ambassador exam with the VinItaly International Academy. He collaborated with The Buyer to produce The Italian Job podcast with Richard Siddle. He has won a Millesima award and a Hungarian Wine Writing award for his writing. He has participated in around 150 press trips and been invited on many more.
In recent years, he has chosen to focus on Vinorandum, a large wine scale technology project that provides in depth guides and reports on wine regions, grapes and producers. This project is now venturing into wine tourism with a new (in beta) project called Wine Cities, essentially providing information and recommendations for focussed wine travel experiences. As a critic, Paul tastes and scores wines using the 100 point system and is particularly recognised and respected in Italy with producers frequently using his scores as an important part of their sales engine. In 2023 he completed an invite only ambassadorial course with Orvieto DOC. Paul is considered one of the wine trade’s next-generation writers and communicators.
Vinorandum is a wine search engine designed to be a reference tool for consumers looking to learn more about the world's wines regions, grapes and producers. Along with other international wine critics, I store my own tasting notes here.
Judging
I've had the opportunity to judge in some international competitions around Europe.
2023
- Mundus Vini, Deidesheim, Germany
- Concours Mundial (Sparkling), Naples, Italy
2022
- Mundus Vini, Deidesheim, Germany
- 5 Star Wines, Verona, Italy (Panel Chairman)
2021
- 5 Star Wines, Verona, Italy
- Mundus Vini, Deidesheim, Germany
2020
- Mundus Vini, Deidesheim, Germany
- Concorso di Vermentino, Sardinia, Italy
- 5 Star Wines, Verona, Italy (Remote judging)
2019
- Bucharest International Wine Competition, Bucharest, Romania (May)
- Citadelles du Vin, Bordeaux, France
- Mundus Vini, Deidesheim, Germany
2018
- IWSC 'Georgia / Russia' (associate), Guildford, UK
- Concours international des vins à Lyon, Lyon, France
- Vinaria, Plovdiv, Bulgaria
2017
- Citadelles du Vin, Bordeaux, France
- IWSC 'Spain' (associate), Guildford, UK
- Bucharest International Wine Competition, Bucharest, Romania
- Concours international des vins à Lyon, Lyon, France
- Vinaria, Plovdiv, Bulgaria
Awards
- Wine Writer Award - Millesima Blog Awards 2020 - https://blogawards.millesima.com/winners/
Publications
The Macedonian Wine Guide 2014/ co-authored with Ivana Simjanovska
Past projects
Caputo Wines - 2008-2018 - online wine merchants - owner
Mistral Wine Bar and Shop - 2018-2019 - wine bar in Chester specialising in fine wines from small growers - investor
Personal
Qualifications:
- WSET
- VinItaly International Academy - Italian Wine Ambassador
Education:
- BA Degree - Politics and International Relations - Lancaster University
- A Levels - Economics, History, English Literature
Languages
- English (Mother)
- Italian (Fluent)
- French (Basic)