Robert Joseph founded and was until 2005 publishing editor of Wine International Magazine. Until May 2001, he was also, for 16 years wine correspondent of the Sunday Telegraph, a newspaper to which he now provides specialist features. He is a contributor to Food & Wine Magazine in the US and is author of over 27 books on wine, including The Wine Lists, The Art of the Wine Label, The White Wines of France, The Wines of the Americas, The Essential Guide to Wine, The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Wine, the K.I.S.S. Guide to Wine, and the annual Robert Joseph Good Wine Guide which was named "the Best Wine Guide in the World" in the 2002 Cointreau Gourmand Book awards. His recent best-selling French Wines has been translated into French, Italian, Dutch, German, Chinese and Japanese and is to be published in Russian. Among the awards he has won for wine writing are the Glenfiddich (twice), The Wine Guild of the United Kingdom Premier Award and the Marques de Caceres. He is a Chevalier de Tastevin; and in June 2001 he joined the select band of members of the Commanderie du Bontemps du Médoc et des Graves in Bordeaux. His book Bordeaux and its Wines was published in English, French, German and Danish in 2003. He is currently writing a book covering the history and future of wine and a general introduction to wine, special editions of which will be published in Chinese, Russian and Japanese in 2007. He is also writing the Wine Travel Guide to the World book and website which will give wine enthusiasts and casual wine drinkers information on wineries and vineyard to visit and great restaurants and wine bars across the globe.

 

As a wine taster, Robert Joseph has visited wine regions across the globe from Austria and Australia to Uruguay and Zimbabwe. He is one of the select group of members to be invited to join le Grand Jury Européen, and has been asked to judge and/or chair wines at competitions in France, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the USA. He also founded the International Wine Challenge in London, the event Jancis Robinson described as "the Oscars of the Wine World". Since 1984, this has become the world’s largest competition, with over 9,400 entries. The rapidly-growing International Wine Challenge competitions in Asia, launched in Hong Kong by Robert Joseph in 1997, are also the leading events of their kind in the region and have also taken place in Singapore, Bangkok, Shanghai, Beijing and Tokyo and Vietnam.

 

Decanter magazine, a competitor of Wine International, generously named Robert Joseph as one of the 50 people who were most likely to influence the way people would be drinking in the 21st century, and the Independent Newspaper named him as "one of the 10 leading people in the wine trade chosen by their peers". In October 2001, he was handed the inaugural Jacob's Creek "Golden Vine" by the Premier of South Australia at the World Food Media Awards for his efforts in increasing the appreciation of wine throughout the world.

 

Robert Joseph is creator of lecole-du-vin.com, the first online source of free vinous education and is currently establishing an informative site called vintage-intelligence.com. Both of these will be translated into French, Russian, Japanese and Chinese in 2006. His corkwatch.com site has also been widely praised for the influence it has had among wine producers and drinkers.

 

Robert Joseph regularly appears on television and radio in the UK and overseas. As a public speaker, he has given informative and irreverent presentations to a wide range of audiences ranging from consumers attending events like the House & Garden, Vive la France and BBC Good Food shows, to the guests and/or staff of companies such as Starbucks, Shepherd Neame, Towry Law, Credit Suisse, Macquarie Equities, Royal Bank of Scotland and Deutsche Bank.

 

In recognition of his understanding of the way in which the wine business operates globally, he has also been invited to address members of the industry in the US, Canada, South Africa, Australia New Zealand, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain. In particular, he was keynote speaker at the Australian Wine Industry 2000 Global Marketing Conference and the first Viognier and Shiraz Symposiums and has addressed meetings organised in the US by the Wine Institute of California France by INAO and ONIVINS. In January 2006, he was one of the major speakers at the Wine Evolution conference in Paris.