Marvin Shanken

Marvin R. Shanken (born October 4, 1943) is an American publisher and founder of M. Shanken Communications. Shanken's roster of lifestyle publications includes Wine Spectator, Cigar Aficionado and Whisky Advocate. Based in Manhattan, M. Shanken Communications has offices in Napa, California and Emmaus, Pennsylvania. Shanken grew up in New Haven, Connecticut. He is of Judaic heritage. He received an undergraduate BBA degree in 1965 from the University of Miami, and then an MBA at American University in 1968. Shanken started his career in real estate and investment banking, then moved into publishing in 1973, purchasing Impact, a small wine and spirits industry newsletter. His company has expanded to other trade publications including Market Watch, Shanken News Daily and Impact Newsletter. In 1979, he purchased Wine Spectator a few years after its 1976 founding, and launched Cigar Aficionado in September 1992. He also spearheaded Wine Spectator’s entry to the digital world, with mobile apps including Wine Spectator WineRatings+, Xvalues and Wine Spectator Restaurant Awards. As editor and publisher of Cigar Aficionado, Shanken has interviewed famous-yet-elusive leaders, artists and celebrities including Fidel Castro (1994), Francis Ford Coppola (2003), General Tommy Franks (2003), Arnon Milchan (2008), Michael Jordan (2005, 2017) and Robert De Niro (2015), Ray Lewis (2016), Alex Rodriguez (2018) and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson (2020). In 2020, Shanken's interview with Michael Jordan was posted online. To date, it has been seen by over 6 million viewers. He is also editor and publisher of Wine Spectator. In 2017, he assumed the same title at Whiskey Advocate. Shanken was one of the first magazine publishers to host reader-focused events, with the launches of the New York Wine Experience in 1981, WhiskyFest in 1998 and the Big Smoke in 1993. Today there are over a dozen events annually in New York, Washington D.C., Chicago, Las Vegas, San Francisco and Miami.