- Led complete digital transformation for Wine Spectator, serving 3 million global readers with modernized CMS architecture that's operated successfully for 6+ years.
- Helped migrated and optimized 400,000+ wine profiles dating back to 1970, creating one of world's most comprehensive digital wine ratings database.
- Designed and built Restaurant Awards platform helping diners discover hundreds of award-winning establishments worldwide, extending Wine Spectator's authority beyond publishing.
I led a comprehensive redesign of Wine Spectator’s digital platform, transforming the publication’s online presence from an outdated PHP framework to a modern, scalable Bolt CMS architecture. This enterprise-level project served Wine Spectator’s global audience of wine enthusiasts, collectors, and industry professionals. Wine Spectator has been prestigious publication serving as the world’s leading authority on wine since 1976. It’s print circulation reaches approximately 3 million readers worldwide and has a reputation built on rigorous blind tastings of over thousands of wines annually, Wine Spectator represents the gold standard in wine journalism and connoisseurship.
As the lead developer and de facto project manager, I collaborated extensively with a team of stakeholders across editorial, circulation, and marketing departments to ensure the redesign would enhance both user experience and meet key business objectives. Working with our UI/UX designer, we crafted a sophisticated experience that honored Wine Spectator’s legacy while modernizing how that got delivered. The content migration required careful planning and mapping as we transitioned from Symphony PHP to Bolt CMS, preserving years of editorial content while also implementing a more flexible content structure. I led the development efforts by mapping out project requirements and technical specifications and personally implemented editorial content features and delegated legacy content updates to team members.
Beyond being a technical update it also required us to have a deep understanding of Wine Spectator’s unique editorial workflows, subscription models, and content strategy to create a digital platform that would properly showcase their authoritative wine ratings, educational content, premium products and prestigious restaurant awards program. Some examples included giving editors the ability to feature and highlight articles not just on the Homepage, but across an array of over a dozen different verticals, while also having reasonable defaults when editorial overview wasn’t an option.
The final result was a scalable, maintainable system that communicated Wine Spectator’s unparalleled expertise to casual enthusiasts and serious collectors and is still in use years later.
Features
The modernized platform featured:
- A customized CMS system tailored to editorial workflows
- Sophisticated layout capabilities with configurable fields across over a dozen different content verticals
- Modernized wine search & ratings system supporting 800,000+ wine profiles dating back to 1970
- Flexible paywall implementation with editorial control
- Advanced taxonomy management for wine regions, grape varieties, producers, and vintages
- Granular permission systems separating editorial, circulation, and marketing functions
- Responsive design principles ensuring optimal performance and display across all devices
- Accessibility features meeting WCAG guidelines for inclusive user experience
- Comprehensive SEO optimization to maintain and enhance organic search visibility
- Streamlined content publishing workflow reducing time-to-publish
For editorial teams, I created modular homepage management tools that allowed editors to modify layouts, toggle paywall restrictions, and control premium content designation without developer assistance. This editorial autonomy significantly streamlined content publishing workflows and reduced previous longstanding bottlenecks.
On the subscription side, I implemented strategy with contextual calls-to-action that responded to user behavior. This featured content-aware paywall triggers and A/B testing infrastructure that integrated directly with content, allowing marketing teams to optimize subscription messaging based on website performance data.
I additionally developed a component architecture centered around a versatile card system. This approach kept visual consistency while providing flexible display options for various content formats. The architecture’s durability has been proven through more than six years as Wine Spectator’s primary design system, accommodating numerous editorial and business initiatives without requiring additional redesigns or rebuilds.
Restaurant Awards Search Platform
As a complement to the main website, I helped developed Wine Spectator’s Restaurant Awards search platform. This tool helps diners discover award-winning restaurants around the world based on Wine Spectator’s wine program. This mini-site functions similarly to the Michelin Guide but with a specific focus on wine excellence, showcasing establishments that have earned Wine Spectator’s prestigious Grand Award, Best of Award of Excellence, or Award of Excellence designations.
The platform required geolocation capabilities to create an intuitive user experience. We paired the diners location information with radius-based filtering that could handle complex geographic scenarios. This included solving multi-state city handling (such as Kansas City spanning Missouri and Kansas) and implementing efficient search capabilities within specific state and regional boundaries.
The search functionality was further augmented with pre-built geospatial queries and curated editorial restaurant lists that provided rapid reasonable results when filtering through thousands of restaurant listings. Users could easily narrow their search based on proximity to their current location, planned travel destinations, or specific metropolitan areas.
The mobile-first interface made the platform particularly valuable for travelers seeking exceptional wine experiences while visiting unfamiliar cities. The intuitive map-based search interface provided clear visual representation of restaurant locations and concentration, while the responsive design ensured consistent functionality across devices.
The enhanced Restaurant Awards online platform strengthened Wine Spectator’s authority on wine dining experiences worldwide. It provided substantial value to subscribers while attracting new subscriptions to a growing brand. By digitally extending the functionality of Wine Spectator’s print Restaurant Guide, the platform helped maintain the relevance and prestige of the publication’s award system in an increasingly digital world.
Technical Leadership
Leading Wine Spectator’s digital transformation demanded technical expertise, strong interpersonal skills, and strategic vision. Throughout these complementary projects, I demonstrated leadership by:
- Building strong relationships across editorial, circulation, and marketing to align technical implementation with business goals
- Creating sustainable systems designed for longevity, with comprehensive documentation that enabled smooth knowledge transfer
- Delivering a holistic digital ecosystem that elevated Wine Spectator’s prestigious brand while providing practical utility to everyday users
The result reinforced Wine Spectator’s position as the world’s leading authority on wine while creating digital infrastructure capable of evolving with the publication’s needs for years to come.