In Conversation with Patrick Thornton-Smith

How did you end up working in fine wine?

I spent the first 30+ years of my working life in the world of derivatives across a combination of investment banking, broking and technology, with firms that included Barclays Capital, ICAP and FIS, in a range of roles based in the UK and USA. In 2017, at the ripe old age of 55, I decided to change careers and pursue a lifelong love of wine. Until 2023, I was Chief Customer Experience Officer of a major fine wine investment firm. I then set up my own boutique wine experience company and took a Non-Exec role with a wine technology start-up. In 2026, I joined Cellar-Advisor as Non-Exec Advisor.

What were the major aspects of Cellar-Advisor that attracted you?

Apart from working with the founder and some of the other team members for some years, the business model and aspirations stood out from the start. These collectively appealed, as the notion of 'customer first' had become jaded across some parts of the industry. The clear and unambiguous focus on this at Cellar-Advisor, along with the trust and respect of the team, made it a very easy decision.

Can you expand further on and comment on the current market conditions?

As has been well reported, the fine wine industry took a downturn for a number of reasons, including sharp price drops, socio-economic factors leading to declining appetite, image and, most recently, weather conditions. For many collectors and investors, this has been a challenging time, but given the cyclical nature of alternative assets, we are now seeing a positive rebound and indications of a long bull run.

With this backdrop, it has afforded the opportunity for some merchants and brokers to re-evaluate the overall business model and create new ones that reflect the lessons learnt over the past few years. With Cellar-Advisor, this culminated in a new clean model that allowed some old business features to be rejected and a platform to be built taking, from the customer's perspective, the best features and offering a very clear, simple offering that 'does what it says on the tin' and offers participants robust pillars of comfort, control and peace of mind.

These include: own client LCB accounts, clear pricing policies, a focus on a smaller range of wines that have real pedigree and realistic projections of price appreciation, rather than just selling every label possible, and an underlying focus on simplifying the customer's experience from inception to exit.

We have seen too many instances of some firms dragging the customer into an engagement where they often get exhausted with arcane processes and dubious procedures. This should be a fun, enjoyable and lucrative journey for each and every customer, irrespective of size and knowledge.

With your experience in technology, how do you view its role in the wine trade?

Good question. While the market was booming, much investment was directed into developing new technologies. The industry is broad, with many varied participants, so some of these new advances, such as helping with fraud and fake detection and vine and crop protection, for example, have been major steps forward.

When it comes to the space that Cellar-Advisor participates in, too much money has been spent on vanity projects directed by ego-based wannabe 'tech bros', while ignoring the key underlying principle of 'does this help the customer's experience?' OR 'are we doing this just to try and categorise the firm as a tech stock?'

In any investment class, huge consideration needs to be given to market liquidity, accuracy, regularity and efficacy of prices, ease of acquisition and ease of exit and, vitally, duration of hold. Fine wine portfolios should always be a medium to long-term hold and not viewed, in technology terms, as a highly liquid equity, currency, digital asset, etc., where a totally different set of technology considerations need to be given.

Customers do not need to be inundated by unnecessary 'bells and whistles' as, in reality, they do not need to see misleading price valuations second by second or even month by month. A technology valuation platform for this asset does not need more than an annual revaluation or, in some instances, a call to an agent to check the market prices. This industry still relies on trustworthy human contact and not on leveraging 'bots' or unnecessary AI tools just for the sake of it. Horses for courses.

Technology projects are costly and typically get paid for by the consumer. The Cellar-Advisor model is dedicated to enabling customers to maximise their investment, so all technology ideas are filtered through the lens of our customers and not just because we want to follow the tech crowd for egocentric reasons.

And finally, where is your most memorable wine experience?

Too many to mention! But I'll give you one. On a number of occasions, I have enjoyed a long summer lunch in the gardens of the private villa of the Antinori family, Villa Tignanello in Tuscany, with members of the family who are friends, along with other wine lovers, enjoying simple, locally sourced dishes and working our way through some of the family's Franciacorta, Cervaro della Sala and, of course, some vintages of Tignanello and Solaia over many hours until the sun finally dips behind the vineyard hills.

At times like this, I am glad I made that decision to leave the City!