famous

Over the years we’ve seen a lot of extremely famous names on wine labels. Madonna and Justin Timberlake come to mind. Who is most famous of all? More famous than Ernest Gallo or August Busch or Jack Daniel? Elvis Presley has got to be one of the most famous people ever to adorn a wine label. There is no word on whether he liked wine, cared about wine, knew anything about wine — but the press release for these wines says:  “according to a recent Harris Interactive poll, over 71 million Americans consider themselves Elvis fans.” Most of the Elvis-branded wines seem to be bottled by Adler Fels Winery of Santa Rosa, California, under an agreement with Signature Wines and Elvis Presley Enterprises (EPE). Signature “signed an exclusive licensing agreement with EPE several years ago.” EPE is “aggressively involved in a worldwide licensing program, merchandising, music publishing, and television, film, video and Internet projects.” TTB approved Blue Suede Chardonnay and The King Cabernet Sauvignon in January of 2009.

Twenty years ago, wine was wine and Disney was Disney and there didn’t seem to be much overlap. Things change a lot. Now Disney is on wine labels, grown at Disney vineyard, and sold at Disney parks. Winesooth brought this to our attention in the form of the Ratatouille Chardonnay. It has the little cartoon rat on the front label, along with a reference to Disney and Pixar. Back in 2007, Dow Jones said:

Next up: Disney is launching a wine label via Issaquah, Wash.-based Costco Wholesale Corp. that is based on its upcoming animated film “Ratatouille,” the tale of a rat who wants to become a French chef. The chardonnay, from the Burgundy region in France and bearing the Ratatouille name and likeness, will sell for $12.99.

Five weeks later, Bizzia reported:

They’ve come to their senses and plan to back out of the wine market before their wine ever hits store shelves. Disney, with the help of Costco … , planned to market a wine named after their latest animated film, Ratatouille, with a label featuring the film’s main character, Remy the rat.  In my post earlier this month, I questioned why the number one family and children’s brand would even consider slapping their brand name and character’s image on an...

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.