It’s pretty tough to get a patent on a beverage or a beverage package. But here DeKuyper claims a patent on the package. The back label says: “DeKuyper Fruit Twisters Tangerine brings you a fun and flavorful drink experience with a unique patented twist cap technology that keeps its delicious fruit flavors and vibrant color separate until you twist the cap to release them.” This patent application was published two months prior to the label approval and looks related.
This seems like a great, great idea. Unfortunately, it does not seem to have gone anywhere. I can’t find a trace of it, two years after its 2007 approval. In addition to Tangerine, Jim Beam Brands Co. also has approval for Twisters Pear Liqueur and Pink Lemonade Liqueur.
Functional Packages, Part 3
The last two posts showed beverage packaging that serves the extra function of lighting up. Drink’n’Stick doesn’t just sit there on the shelf, passively. It is a wine package that beckons you to dress, or undress, the pin-up model.
Like Quickie, this is another great one from Vine Street Imports and Some Young Punks. The latter website says:
Few wines come with instructions — this one also comes with a wardrobe. Peel the clothing from the sheet to customize the accompanying temptress as you drink.
Wine Girl has a good slide show and description. She said:
I was distracted for a full hour by just the bottle. … There is a Bettie Page-esque pin-up girl on the label. There’s also a plastic strip that you can carefully unwrap to reveal that our Bettie is actually the equivalent of a paper doll. The plastic strip has all sorts [of] clothing on it. I think I tried almost every possible combination on Bettie before settling on a ruffly shirt and crop pants. Ladies, there are even scarves and hair bows.
You know, the bottle appeals to both sexes, as I discovered in the store. Unwrapped, it’s a Bettie Page pin-up in retro lingerie. The guys were all excited. … The ladies, on the other hand, were enamoured with the paper doll aspect.
Not bad if a package can make men and women “excited” and “enamoured” without even opening the bottle.
Functional Packages, Part 2
In the last post we showed a bottle that lights up.
This time, we have a functional package that goes a bit further. It lights up and plays music. Thank goodness for this video that captured it in action, before it faded off into oblivion. TTB approved Coyopa Rum back in 2001. At box 17, the approval says: “Bottle may be equipped to play music (no words or lyrics) … may light up. … ‘Label and package made in China.'” Box 16 mentions that it’s a “distinctive liquor bottle.”
Like a lot of products, it does not seem to have lasted very long. This old, undated article explains:
The idea for Coyopa came to [Sidney] Frank in a dream; a vision of a bottle that played music and was animated. … He hired an engineer to design the electronics for the interactive label, and turned to R.L. Seale, a premier rum producer in Barbados to create the … rum. … “They might think it’s crazy at first, or just a gimmick, but once you get a good look at it, you are mesmerized. My Active Label® is a true breakthrough.”
Perhaps 2001 was a bit too early; the functional packages seem to be rolling out with greater regularity late in the same decade.
Functional Packages, Part 1
Slowly but surely, more “functional packages” are coming to town. I don’t mean packages that serve the function of storing booze, or acting as a paperweight or a vase. I mean packages that do something beyond that; beyond what is traditional; beyond moving the beverage from producer to consumer and making it look good.
Ty-Ku is a simple example. It’s a pretty bottle, and it lights up when lifted. This video shows the bottle in action. In the days to come, we should be able to come up with a few other examples, including some that go a bit further down this road. If you know of others, please let us know.
Wing Man Beer
This is a series of about six labels, honoring The Wing Man. Dictonary.com defines the species as: “A male who will assist in the courtship or flirtation of another, usually by deflecting or otherwise befriending those in the company of the intended.”
This label, from Skyscraper Brewing of El Monte, California, has some good lines. But Skyscraper was fairly late to the party, getting their first approval in 2008. Coors jumped on this social behavior as far back as 2003, with this TV ad celebrating The (mighty) Wing Man. Before that, the term became popularized from the 1986 movie Top Gun and the 1996 movie Swingers.
Spruce Juice
Both of these beers are brewed with spruce tips. We’ve heard very little about spruce tips and so we wanted to see what this ingredient is all about.
The first example is Alaskan Ale Brewed with Spruce Tips, brewed by Alaskan Brewing Co. in Juneau, Alaska. This is not some newfangled concoction. The label for the second example, Steamworks Spruce Goose Ale, explains that beer with spruce goes all the way back to the Vikings. It says:
Beers brewed with Spruce, and other varieties of Pine, were introduced to Scotland by the Vikings. They would spike beers with fresh Spruce Tips prior to long journeys and before battle. … This, our modern day version, is pin-bright, complex and sprucy with a big mouth feel.
Captain Cook carried “spruce beer” on his voyages because spruce was a good source of vitamin C and helped prevent scurvy. Wiki further explains that “spruce has been a traditional flavoring ingredient throughout the upper latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere where it is found, often substituting for ingredients not otherwise available, such as hops.”
