Posts Tagged ‘famous’
Elvis Still Moving Wine
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.
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Red Bull Vodka and Beer
It’s a wonder that Red Bull (of Austria) has not yet come out with with an alcohol beverage. It would be likely to be a smash, in that the product is so very popular as a mixer.
Perhaps things are going so well with the energy drink that there is no need to mess with it. But more likely, these two products beat the Austrians to the punch. Miller Brewing Company has approvals for Red Bull Malt Liquor going back at least as far as the early 1980s. Likewise, Majestic Distilling has approvals for Red Bull Vodka going back to 1990 or so.
This Dog Style Vodka is one of the few TTB products to make explicit reference to the famous energy drink.
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business strategy, caffeine/secondary effects, famous, trademark
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Disney Wines
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 alcoholic beverage. I thought the strategy went beyond the realm of all common sense. Turns out, I’m not the only one who felt that way.
Disney has been getting backlash from California winemakers and opponents of underage drinking. It seems the use of a cartoon character that may be considered to target children violates the California Wine Institute’s advertising code. At the same time, the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control opened a separate investigation into whether the Disney-Costco wine marketing program might have violated state liquor laws.
Alas, before a full-fledged PR nightmare began, Disney shelved its Ratatouille wine. Again, I ask, where was common sense during the development of this product? Didn’t anyone in any of the new product development meetings stand up and say, “Wait a minute. We’re Disney. Maybe promoting liquor isn’t the best way for us to go with our brand.” Maybe there were people who raised a red flag earlier in the process, but for some reason the plans went on full force until everyone else on the planet heard about it and said, “What the heck is Disney doing?”
What do you think? Do you think Disney made the right move by dumping Ratatouille wine? Do you think they were crazy for putting effort and money into Ratatouille wine in the first place?
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Timberlake Tequila
The parade of celebrity beverage purveyors continues. This time it’s Justin Timberlake, with a Tequila called 901. TTB approved it in early 2009. The Examiner explains:
This past winter Justin Timberlake was “spied” wandering the Mexican state of Jalisco scoping out tequilas. We soon learned he was launching a label called 901 (as in both the area code of JT’s home state and the evening hour when the Par-taaayyy gets rolling…well, in other parts of the country anyway).
DIAB is the importer, based in St. Louis, Missouri. TTB records show exactly zero other approvals for DIAB, run by Kevin Ruder.
Ruder spent 12 years with Anheuser Busch, overseeing that company’s initial forays into spirits as well as the company’s “entertainment sponsorships and celebrity relationships,” according to the press profile. A couple of years ago, Ruder founded Diab … and spent two years developing 901 with Timberlake. They visited 10 distilleries in the Mexican state of Jalisco before striking a deal with Tequilera Newton.
A similarly famous singer was a few years earlier. In about 2007 Madonna launched a Michigan wine with her father.
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Beware the Famous Name
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.
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