Tag Archives: wine labels

Why wineries change their label design

wine label designMostly, because they can. That’s one of the conclusions of an article I wrote for the Beverage Media trade magazine, trying to figure out why so many producers seem to be changing the look and design of their labels. Because, given the changes in the wine business, with more and bigger companies controlling more brands, it’s going to happen more often.

Or, as one retailer told me: “Sometimes I wonder why they need to fix something that isn ?t broken.”

And, though the article was written for retailers, it has lessons for consumers as well. Ever go into a store, look for your favorite wine in its regular place with its regular label, and not see it? Chances are it’s still there; it just has a different label. Don’t laugh. Retailers told me this happens all the time.

So what’s going on with all the re-labeling?

? It’s difficult to get a firm grasp on how often this happens. Brands that have changed labels over the past several years include Blackstone, Columbia Crest, La Vieille Ferme, Jacobs Creek, Columbia Winery, Cuvaison, Hahn, Parducci, and Langhe Twins.

? Producers, facing a need to make their product stand out among what may be 15,000 different wines in the U.S., are more willing to change the label than ever before. In addition, they know more about this kind of marketing, and will spend the money to do it where they may have been reluctant before.

? Consumers aren’t always the primary target for label changes. Producers sometimes do it to impress distributors and retailers, to reassure them that they care about the brand and will put marketing dollars behind it. This is completely different from every other consumer packaged good, and we have the three-tier system to thank for it.

? Most label changes aren’t complete makeovers, although that seems to be happening more often. Usually, the changes are tweaks to reinforce the brand’s image, and are only noticeable over time.

? Once-popular wines that aren’t anymore are the most likely to get a new label. Also, producers aren’t shy about changing labels on popular brands, if they see a chance to keep the current audience, which may be older, and attract a new, younger one.

Update: Nutrition and ingredient labels for wine

Nutrition and ingredient labels for wineThe Wine Curmudgeon’s views on nutrition and ingredient labels for wine are well known: The wine business is missing an opportunity to reach younger consumers by stonewalling the labels.

But not everyone shares my view, and my piece in the current issue of the Beverage Media trade magazine looks at the topic from a variety of perspectives. The highlights of the article, as well as a few of my thoughts, are after the jump:

The technical term for the labels is “servings facts,” and they can look like the chart on a can of soup or bottle of ketchup or (oddly enough) the paragraph style on something like ramen noodles. Late last year, the federal government issued a regulation to allow wineries who want to add serving facts to do so, but they still aren’t required.

But that’s just the beginning:

• One of the difficulties in following developments is that different federal agencies have different label responsibilities. The Food and Drug Administration oversees food labels, because they includes nutritional content. The Tax and Trade Bureau, which oversees alcohol regulation for the U.S. Treasury, makes rules for alcohol-related labels and uses different criteria. So what’s required for tomato soup may not be good for wine.

• The wine industry’s opposition to serving facts has not wavered in the decade-plus that the labels have been under discussion. It cites cost, a too-crowded label, burdensome regulation, and the government’s inability to enforce the law on imported wine. One of the best examples of their fear? This article (behind a paywall), written by a couple of lawyers for Vineyard & Winery Management magazine, “Requiring ‘Serving Facts’ on Wine Labels Could Prove Costly.” My favorite part of this article: Since wine is consumed for pleasure, it doesn’t need labels.

• A serving facts label includes serving size, and the industry is worried that its idea of serving size could be radically different from the federal government’s, especially on higher alcohol products.

• There is also the unspoken fear, says Bonny Doon’s Randall Grahm, that wineries “don’t want people to know the various tricks and certain stylistic effects that they use on their wine.” This includes the 60-some ingredients legally allowed in wine that aren’t grapes, including Mega Purple (grape juice concentrate used to darken red wine), oak chips, and things like egg whites and isinglass, a fining agent made from fish bladders, and something called polyvinyl-polypyrrolidone, an industrial adhesive.

• The industry is also worried, says Grahm, a long-time proponent of labels, that any additional sulfite information would “freak out” consumers, given the great urban myth surrounding sulfites.

Winebits 306: Grape shortage, Bogle, wine labels

? So much for the experts: Last week’s report that the world was facing an imminent grape shortage and a corresponding leap in prices sent the wine world into a minor fluff. Eventually, common sense prevailed and the news was discounted for what it was — at the very least odd and at the very most suspicious. There is no grape shortage, and the best reporting on the subject was done, as usual, by Lew Perdue at Wine Industry Insight. Stacy Finz at the Chronicle in San Francisco contributed a very sensible piece as well. Most telling was this bit in Finz’s article: “The report’s authors, Tom Kierath and Crystal Wang of Morgan Stanley’s Australian consumer and beverage branch, declined to be interviewed.” My experience, after some 30 years as a reporter, is that when someone doesn’t want to defend what they wrote or said, then there isn’t much reason to pay attention to it.

? Wine drinkers know a good thing: Bogle, the $10 wine that has been in the cheap wine Hall of Fame as long as there has been a Hall of Fame, continues to sell lots and lots and lots of wine. Shanken News Daily, the web news service (and part of the Wine Specator empire — oh delicious irony), reports that the company’s sales rose nearly 16 percent in 2012 to 1.75 million cases. That makes Bogle one of the biggest dozen or so producers in the country, and it has almost doubled its sales in the past 18 months since I interviewed Ryan Bogle. The Shanken article credits the quality of the Bogle wines for the label’s success, though in a very Winestream Media way, citing points — “more than 30 scores of 87 points or higher from Wine Spectator” — as proof of quality. Though, to be honest, as annoying as that is, I don’t know why I would expect anything different.

? An easier to read wine label, please: Lou Marmon, one of the best wine writers that not enough people know about, has a fine take on the foolishness that passes for wine labels these days. “Clearly front labels are critical to wine marketing,” he writes, “but is there any reason why they cannot be more accurate and informative?” Marmon details all the agonies involved in reading a wine label, whether misleading terms like “old vines,” cute labels, and variation in alcohol content. And, he points out, that doesn’t include the difference between European and U.S. labels, which take the subject in another, albeit equally confusing, direction.

Nutrition labels coming to wine — finally

Wine serving factsThe labels are voluntary, and wineries that don ?t want to add them don ?t have to. But voluntary is better than nothing, given the long and tortured history of the proposal.

The plan to add basic calorie, alcohol, and serving information to wine, also called serving facts, has been hanging around Washington even longer than the blog has been in existence — held hostage by the recession, a change in administrations, and the foolishness that passes for government in Washington. In addition, there was determined opposition from most of the beer, wine, and spirits industries, which saw the nutrition labels as costly and burdensome.

So the government agency that regulates liquor came up with the voluntary compromise, no doubt goaded by the biggest booze companies in the world. Diageo, among others, sees it as giving those who use it a competitive edge, and they ?re right. Which of us wouldn ?t be glad to see this information on a wine label?

A winery that wants to add the labels won ?t need to do anything other follow the samples in this link, says Michael Kaiser of the Wine America trade group. Hopefully, many will do it, since the long-term benefits will outweigh the short-term costs. An informed consumer is more likely to buy a product than consumers kept stumbling around in the dark by an industry that still acts, in many ways, as if Prohibition just ended.

And mandatory labeling? If and when that happens is anyone ?s guess, says Kaiser. And his group still opposes it.

Five things the wine business can do to help consumers figure out wine

Five things the wine business can do to help consumers figure out wineWine is still too confusing, though some effort has been made over the past several years to make it easier for wine drinkers ? new and experienced ? to understand what ?s going on. Check out this newspaper article from 1977, and you ?ll see what I mean:

The result of all this is that any but the most experienced wine aficionado often will (1) buy a very expensive wine, equating high price with quality; (2) buy a very cheap but unpleasant wine and then throw it all away; (3) buy the same wine all the time; (4) not buy wine at all.

Sound familiar?

Depressing, too, given so little of that has changed in almost 40 years. But there are five things that can be done to make wine less confusing. The list, after the jump:

Continue reading →

Winebits 270: Maker’s Mark, nutrition labels, cheap wine

? Bosses don ?t know best: Maker ?s Mark, the bourbon label owned by drinks giant Beam, announced it would water down its product so it could make more. A week later, the company ?s chief operating officer apologized for having such a stupid idea and said that it would keep the alcohol level unchanged. Why does this matter to wine drinkers? Because big companies like Beam are more likely to do silly things like this, given how removed and insulated they are from their customers. Witness New Coke (which, amazingly, not enough companies seem to have learned from). As Big Wine continues its domination of the wine business, consumers will have to be wary of just such machinations ? substituting inferior grapes, changing the wine ?s formula, and the like.

? Are labels finally coming? The wine industry has largely been ambivalent about nutrition labels on wine, and the federal government has been in no hurry to do it, either. But an odd coalition of Big Spirits and several consumer groups is forcing the issue. Diageo, which has been granted permission to add a label to its Four Loko malt liquor, sees this as an opportunity to  add labels to its other booze products. Meanwhile, four consumer groups want the federal government to use the Four Loko decision to require ?easy-to-read, standardized ?Alcohol Facts ? " labels on all beer, wine and spirits. In the long run, these labels ? similar to what ?s on light beer ? will be good for wine. The problem is that the industry can ?t see past the short-term cost and aggravation of adding the labels.

? John Mariani on cheap wine: This is big news, given Mariani ?s position in the Winstream Media. and that he doesn ?t spend too much time writing about wine that most of us can afford to drink. But his last effort goes into great detail about $10 and $15 French wine, There are some nice wines listed, though availability may be a problem (like the Chateau Lamothe-Vincent). Maybe there is something to this cheap wine thing after all

 

Winebits 236: Mark West, wine labels, drug stores

? Constellation buys Mark West: Constellation, the second-biggest producer in the world, has purchased Mark West, best known for its $10 pinot noir (and long a favorite here). And why did Constellation snap up Mark West, which wasn't for sale? Because it needed a $10 pinot noir, said company officials. And why did it need a $10 pinot noir? Because that's the wine consumers are buying, which says a lot about where wine prices are going. This also speaks volumes about the massive sizes that are dominating the wine business. Mark West does 700,000 cases a year, and that wasn't enough for it compete with companies like Constellation, which does 40 million, with a grocery store brand like this. The final question — what will Constellation do to the wine's quality? If its past track record means anything, price will stay the same, but quality will decline to enable it to make its margins on a $10 wine.

? More consumer-friendly labels? Caroline Henry asks that question in Palate Press, reporting on a big-time conference in London. The answer? That it ?s an increasingly popular topic, and that the industry is divided. It ?s a thorough look at something we ?ve talked about here a lot, though missing from the discussion was anyone from the biggest and most important wine producers. It ?s one thing to hold a panel about the subject; it ?s another for one of the multi-nationals who make the bulk of the world ?s wine to offer their insight.

? Wine in drug stores: Walgreen ?s, one of the world ?s largest pharmacy chains, is testing an up-scale store concept that includes expanded wine offerings. Shanken News Daily says the 25,000-square-foot store in Chicago, about twice the size of a normal Walgreen ?s, will also have sushi, a smoothie bar, and expanded fresh food. The company is looking at former Borders bookstore locations for possible expansion. If Walgreen ?s makes the decision to take this idea national, it will join a variety of other retailers, including Starbucks, who see premium wine as a way to lure high-end shoppers to their stores. Whether high-end shoppers want to buy wine at Walgreen ?s is another story.