UK wine master Tim Atkin is on to a cushy number. He gets WOSA or Robin von Holdt to pay for his frequent trips to SA (his wife is Seffriken) and then he trousers R220 from each producer desperate for his imprimatur via an Atkin annual report on SA wine. WTF? This is cultural cringe gone mad. How many extra bottles will an Atkin OK sell?

His claim to fame is tasting 1000 SA wines a year, sighted. Producers are far better off sending us two bottles of wine for our weekly RECM best value tastings. Here are 10 advantages:

1. Wines are tasted blind;

2. There is no entry fee;

3. Tastings take place each week, not once a year;

4. Each producer is privately vouchsafed the score of her wine plus an inferred “value” compared to the competition;

5. Our verdict is passed by a panel of informed SA judges who taste wine very day, chaired by Winne Bowman, head of the Institute of Cape Wine Masters;

6. Best value wines receive 100 free bottle stickers with an option to purchase more – marketing gold;

7. Each wine entered is showcased that afternoon to consumers who buy stock when they feel the need;

8. Our activities cost WOSA and Robin nothing and many of our clients are foreign visitors;

9. Mega carbon credits are saved not flying UK winos around the planet in business class;

10. We’d never be as presumptious as classifying producers into “classes.” We got rid of Apartheid a generation ago and market to a born free generation. Tim and the Bordelais can stick with their pompous classed growth system.

Our next tasting is of MCC wines next Wednesday.  If you’re a producer, do send us two bottles. If you’re a consumer, come and taste bubblies next Wednesday between 5-7pm. If you’re Tim Atkin, good luck.