Taste Washington

My Wine Nation Editor-in-Chief Ben Weinberg is also the author of “Weinberg’s Wine Notes,” a weekly wine column for the Rocky Mountain News in Denver Colorado, and a Contributing Editor and the author of “Unfiltered, Unfined,” a bi-monthly wine column, as well as other feature articles for Denver Magazine.  In addition, he is the author of “Weinberg’s Wine Tech,” a column focused on wine-related technology, and various features for Sommelier Journal, as well as “Weinberg’s Wine Lists,” a column featuring interviews with successful restaurateurs about their wine lists and the philosophies that built them, for Nation’s Restaurant News.

While employed as the Wine Manager at Heritage Wine and Liquors in Centennial, Colorado, from May 2004 through February 2008, Benjamin Weinberg tasted, purchased and sold wines valued in excess of ten million dollars.  He also worked extensively with distributors, supplier representatives, and high-level management and ownership, while overseeing a twenty-person staff of stockers and cashiers.  Mr. Weinberg implemented a staff wine tasting and training program early in his tenure, and led many staff and customer wine tastings and classes.  Prior to working at Heritage, Mr. Weinberg was the sales manager for and a representative of Rocky Mountain Vinifera, a Colorado distributor of fine Italian wine, and before that he was a wine consultant at Davidson’s Liquors in Littleton, Colorado.

Mr. Weinberg changed careers in 2003 to the wine business (explaining his rather eclectic resume).  He still consults on a part-time basis for The Weinberg Group, Inc., where he develops analytical and presentation materials for use in estate, business continuity, and wealth transfer planning.  He also previously served as Regional Director of Insurance and Regional Director of Financial Planning for Sagemark Consulting in Denver, affiliated with Lincoln Financial, where he managed a fee-based financial planning and advanced marketing unit for an affiliated group of forty financial planners.  During his time at Sagemark, Mr. Weinberg developed a fee-based financial planning process, within which his unit analyzed financial spreadsheets, insurance illustrations, and presentation materials for use in retirement and wealth transfer planning.

In 1995, Mr. Weinberg received his J.D. with an emphasis in taxation from the University of Colorado School of Law, where he was appointed a Rothgerber, Appel, Powers & Johnson Teaching Fellow and served as the Lexis/Nexis representative on campus. From the University of Colorado at Denver, Mr. Weinberg earned a B.A. in biology (1990) and an M.B.A. in finance and marketing (1992), graduating first in his class, and in 1999 he became a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE).

Mr. Weinberg has attended the Oregon Pinot Camp, has traveled extensively to the wine regions of France, Italy, Austria, Hungary, Germany, California, Oregon, Washington and Australia, and is a contributing member of both eRobertParker.com and the Wine Spectator eForums.