About the Wine PocketList
The Wine PocketList is a short list of good wines under $30: bottles that wine judges and everyday drinkers both rate highly, each with one letter grade from A+ to B+. It comes out once a year, it’s updated as vintages change, and it prints on one sheet that folds to fit your pocket.
See the 2027 List (25 wines) · How the grades work
Why letters
A 100-point score suggests a precision nobody has. A letter says what you need to know: this one’s very good, this one’s excellent. Anything below B+ doesn’t make the list. As the original put it: anything lower, and why bother?
What we don’t do
- No money from wineries for a place on the list.
- No tasting notes. Your taste is yours.
- No 100-point scores, and no republishing anyone else’s.
The story
Before 1994, John Vankat, PhD, a college professor in Ohio, had a habit. He read the wine magazines, noted every wine that more than one critic liked, and kept a list of the ones he could actually afford. Friends kept asking for copies.
In 1994 he started printing it: the Quarterly PocketList of Wine, a list small enough for a shirt pocket. Each wine got one letter grade, the way a professor grades a paper: A+, A, A− or B+. Anything lower, and why bother? The press took to it. “How would you expect a college professor to grade wines?” asked The Detroit News.
In 2002 the list moved online, with John’s Straight Talk columns and the Vin Connections newsletter alongside it. The last list of that era came out in 2006, with 5,962 graded wines.
Today’s Wine PocketList keeps the idea and the letters. What’s changed is who does the grading: instead of magazine critics, each wine is graded by wine judges at competitions and by everyday drinkers who rate what they buy, and it makes the list only when both rate it highly. The price line is under $30 (it was $35 then), and every list still prints on one sheet that folds to fit your pocket.
The original lists and John’s writing are kept as they were, in the archive.
The story in the PocketList’s own words, 1994–2007 · John Vankat · Press about the original