The time has come, the walrus said, to start seriously preparing for the Masters of Wine course. Despite the fact that I won’t be applying until July 2019, there’s a lot to consider before then, including the hefty financial burden of joining. This and future posts on the subject aim to detail my process, including a transparent breakdown of the costs and time commitments, as well as information about the studying itself. I hope over the years it’ll prove useful to other students who find themselves in a similar situation.

Ever since I decided to get involved in the wine industry a few years ago, the Masters of Wine course was always my eventual educational goal. This was true a long time before I really knew what the course entailed or what the institute was all about, so my first attraction was one purely of a good challenge. This has been a constant theme throughout my life. It’s the reason I joined basic training with The Royal Marines at the age of 20 rather than any other military unit; their “99% need not apply” advertisement campaign was custom made for young men like myself at that age, a red rag to a bull. It’s the reason I’ve tried to throw myself in at the deep end of every sport I’ve played or activity I’ve engaged in. It’s the reason I jumped straight into wine without a parachute and it’s served me well, overall.

I’ve been working in wine for over 3 years now and my feelings about the Masters of Wine course have matured. I’ve been taught by MWs during my WSET courses, I’ve judged with 6 different members of the institute so far at the IWC, I’ve had the chance to socialise, have drinks and even did a bit of impromptu blind tasting with various MWs and it’s changed my perspective, if not my ambition. Whilst the fact that the course is notoriously difficult will always remain an masochistic attraction for me, I’ve come to admire the overall knowledge, composure and tasting ability of the vast majority I’ve met who can put MW after their name. The same can be said for the dedicated students currently studying, several of whom I’ve pestered and probed for information, and I’ve come to the conclusion that whilst the course isn’t for everyone, it really does contain some of the most interesting, talented members of our industry and that’s seriously exciting. These are people I want to spend more time with, to taste with and to study with.

In short, I want to become a Masters of Wine for much the same reasons as many people I’ve met:

Education – If you’re serious about learning anything, you surround yourself with knowledgeable, interesting people who you can learn from. Despite the fact that my trips to London are inconvenient and expensive, there’s something about being surrounded by my peers that fills me with energy. I want to be part of an organisation that values the constant learning and improvement that I cherish, that organises trips and regularly meets to share information. The Institute of Masters of Wine is just that.

Opportunities – I work on the fringes of the wine industry. I don’t buy, sell or consult; I educate. I organise tastings, courses and enotourism activities and I’m looking forward to beginning to teach the WSET courses in Barcelona from early next year onwards. However, many opportunities to travel, taste, teach, judge and learn are reserved for those more centrally within the industry or who have a certain level of visibility. Needless to say, the opportunities that do arise are more likely to come your way if you’ve passed these grueling examinations.

Prestige – I’ve never heard anyone say this out loud, but I suspect candidates want a certain amount of recognition for passing the exams, and I’m not in the habit of lying to myself; I want it. It’s a prestigious title that’s respected throughout the wine industry and guarantees a certain amount of respect. That’s not to say that there aren’t incredibly knowledgeable and talented people who will never even attempt the course, just that being a Master of Wine clarifies it; you can work hard, study diligently and still fail the exams, but the other way around isn’t likely.

In order to actually apply for the Master of Wine course, there are some quite sensible requirements:

A candidate must hold an advanced wine qualification, such as the WSET Diploma, Masters Degree or a high level sommelier certificate. This is purely to ensure a certain level of base knowledge going into the course.

A candidate must have a minimum of three years experience within the wine industry. This is quite vague but seems to cover almost any involvement with wine providing it’s a full time role.

A candidate must have a reference supporting their application from a Master of Wine or another experienced, senior wine trade professional.

I hold the WSET Diploma, I’ve worked in and around the wine industry for longer than 3 years and I suspect I won’t have too much problem obtaining a reference. Check, check, check. There’s also a practical examination to pass upon application, but I can’t really approach that until I get there. So, what’s stopping me from applying this year? In a word: money.

The reason I’ve decided to detail all of this is that I can only find broad information about what it’s like to undertake the Master of Wine course. There’s a lot of information about the difficulty of the examinations, about the trials and tribulations of the feared blind tasting in particular, but very little information about the realities of organising yourself and paying for it all. The best write-up I’ve read so far was by Richard Hemming MW for Jancis Robinson’s website, titled ‘The Diary of an MW student’. Unfortunately it’s behind a paywall, but I can tell you that it ran for over 6 years and was broken down into 60 different pieces. It’s a great series of articles and I gained a lot from reading them. The problem for me is, Richard is based in the UK, works for Jancis Robinson MW and didn’t need to spend almost anything above and beyond his course costs, with so many tasting opportunities in front of him on a daily basis. My reality will be very different and the huge cost of the course remains the biggest obstacle for me personally.

So, how does it break down and how can I organise myself around the reality of it?

There’s really two major elements of paying for the Master of Wine course; the course costs, which are the same for everyone, and the money you spend on acquiring the knowledge and expertise to pass the exams. The latter costs are obviously very different for different people and relates a great deal to your profession, your location and your connections within the industry. So, first let’s look at the course costs. Note that I’ve converted the costs, which is in pounds sterling, to euros using the current 1-1.13 exchange rate and rounded up or down to the closest 0. If there is a single silver-lining to the Brexit madness, it’s that it’s made my UK based wine courses a tad cheaper:

Application Cost – €200
Stage 1 Cost – €4,200
Stage 2 Cost – €4,200
Stage 2 Exam Cost – €1,830
Total – €10,430

Now, this doesn’t include Stage 3 which is the research paper part of the course, purely because so few candidates get that far. The above costs represent the typical first 2 years of an MW student, going from Stage 1, passing the Stage 1 exams and progressing to Stage 2 and sitting the real examinations. Between the two stages, there are 18 potential course days in total to study and learn, 12 opportunities to submit written work and attempt practical mock-examinations, all graded and returned to you. You will also have an MW mentor as a support role, to guide you through some of the pitfalls and help keep you on track. The rest is up to you. The course is mainly built around self-studying and real classroom time is few and far between.

So, at a bare minimum you need to consider a little over €10,000 for your first two years of education and examinations. The pass rates for the exams are notoriously low, typically less than 10%, and in order to continue to the research paper you must pass both the practical and the theory elements of the exam within 5 attempts and at least one part of the exam within the first three attempts. Passing both elements of the exam on your first attempt is incredibly rare, so assume you’ll spend 2-3 years moving past Stage 2, with those costs multiplied by however long it takes.

I’m not going to speculate on the amount of attempts it will take me to pass the exams when I get there, so budgeting for the first two years will have to suffice for now. However, the costs above are purely the course costs and don’t include travel, accomodation, wines tasted, study material, time off work or any other cost related to completing the course. This next bit is hard to define, but I’ve drawn up some rough numbers for what I think it will be for myself, given that I have to purchase everything and have no access to wine as part of my profession:

Travel and Accomodation costs (Assuming 10-12 trips to London and other European cities over 2 years for classes, tastings, study groups and exams. Budget traveling) – €3,600

Wine – I don’t have access to wine as part of my various jobs, so this is an assumed cost as I’ll have to purchase it all myself. This is a lot trickier, as it depends a lot on what sort of tastings I can attend over the next two years as well. I’ll go into this in more detail at a later date as I have a plan to create a sort of 120 wine, coravin studying system but I should expect to budget €200-€300 a month for tasting opportunities – €6,000

Study Material – Fortunately, I’ve managed to accumulate a lot of the books I’ll need to read and reference throughout the course, but it’s always a good idea to include a budget for useful additions as they come along – €300

Wine Trips – A bit part of the course is supporting your arguments with first hand information. For example, if you’re writing a response to a question regarding a vineyard pest or disease, you need to reference an example that supports your argument, usually in relation to causation/treatment/results. Whilst I’m fortunate to have 11 wine regions within a couple of hours drive from Barcelona, supporting arguments have to be international so there will be a few wine trips to France, Germany and Italy on the cards too. – €2000

Total Cost of Travel/Accomodation/Wine/Study Material/Trips = €11,900

Total Cost for 2 years of Education, all inclusive = €22,300

Bloody hell. That’s making me nervous just looking at it. Now, it’s possible that I’m over-estimating certain elements of these costs and perhaps I’ll be able to offset parts of it, but you’ll notice that I haven’t included the amount of money lost by not working; I’m self employed after all. Therefore I’ll keep this budget as it is, as even if I do manage to acquire a scholarship/subsidised access to quality wine etc, I’ll need to factor that in. Now you see why I’m planning all of this a year in advance! As a result, I’ll be paying for these 2 years with 3 years worth of income. After that, well, I just have to hope I do well on my exams and/or find a way to increase my income!

Total Cost = €22,300
3 years budget = 36 months
Cost per month = €620

Here’s some context: by the time I start the course next year, I’ll be 30 years old. I live in Barcelona with my fiance, my 1 year old son and we rent an apartment in a quiet part of Eixample. Salaries aren’t high in Spain as a general rule and any job I can take within the wine industry that would give me more tasting opportunities would mean my fiance finding a new line of work (currently in a restaurant), which would increase living costs and I couldn’t do the course anyway. As it currently stands, I can just about make the above costs if I don’t do anything else; eating out, holidays etc. I haven’t had a holiday in 3 years as a result of investing into the WSET Diploma and starting wine education courses and tastings in the city, so I’m used to that at least!

As an aside: I hope no-one reads this and considers it a sob-story. I think the fact that I’m in a position to even consider something like this makes me remarkably lucky, but as I stated at the beginning, I want to be clear and transparent about the realities, costs and potential sacrifice that attempting the Master of Wine course will entail. I’ll update this series semi-regularly at first and then more regularly once I’m accepted into the program, as that’s when it will get particularly interesting. However, I’ll refer back to this and tweak it as the program unfolds and my numbers are put to the test. I’ll make another post later in the summer with a proposed study plan and in the meantime, I’ll get to work looking into potential scholarship opportunities and get that study plan started.

If anyone reads this who is currently a Master of Wine or a student in the program, please do let me know if my numbers are unrealistic, one way or the other. If you think they’re too high, I’d be particularly pleased to hear from you!

For anyone who wants to learn more about the course in detail, be sure to visit the Masters of Wine website.