wine

What could be better than seven daughters? Would eight be better? Here is Seven Daughters wine. It is made with — you guessed it — seven varietals of wine. Is this better than one or a few great varietals? Would 12 be better still? We wonder if this is a good idea for making superior wine, a good idea for marketing, both, or neither. We haven’t tasted the wine, but we do think this makes for a good, clean logo and a good theme. The website is about as pretty as the second prettiest daughter. This wine is bottled by Monterey Wine Co. of King City, California and seems to be marketed by Terlato Wine Group.

Michael-Scott wines (above) have been around since 1998. Then, from out of nowhere, everything changed in March of 2005. That’s when The Office debuted on NBC, with Steve Carell in the lead role as the hapless Michael Scott. There is no word on whether this hit show has been good or bad for the winery, in Sebastopol, California. In a similar manner, it looks like Montecastelli Wine, Inc. started using the Palin brand name in 2008. Seven months later, the brand took on a whole other personality when Sen. John McCain selected Gov. Sarah Palin to be his running mate. It was not necessarily the good kind of publicity. Serious Eats reports:

“It was our best selling wine before (the V.P. announcement),” said Chris Tavelli, owner of Yield Wine Bar, which has offered Palin Syrah, a certified organic wine from Chile, by the glass since July. But after Sen. John McCain tagged Sarah Palin as his running mate, sales of the wine with the conservative’s inverted name plummeted — not surprising in famously liberal San Francisco.

The Palin Syrah is organically grown in Chile.

A few weeks ago we wrote about Recession Red table wine. We were sort of hoping we would have no reason to revisit this woeful topic anytime soon. And yet the markets have continued to shrivel, and so, not surprisingly, a significant number of alcohol beverage companies have picked up on this theme. Broke Ass Red Wine (above) is made in Argentina and imported by USDP of Minnesota. On the right, the Bailout Bitter Ale says:

A hoppy golden ale with recession fighting properties. … A bitter ale for bitter times.

We have trouble discerning a health claim in these words. And yet, the applicant felt compelled to state (at box 19):  “The brewery certifies that it is absolutely not making any representation on health benefits on this … product.”  An important clarification, we think — just in case the public might think the ale could cure athlete’s foot or the ailing world economy. Bailout Bitter is made in Canada and imported by KIAI of Atlanta.

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