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| June 12th 2007 |
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| Form follows function? |
by Robert Joseph
In the commercial world, genuine innovations are rare. Ask most observers of the American scene about wines with animals on their labels and they'll probably talk about "critter brands" as if they...
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 were a totally new phenomenon. In fact, Torres launched its Sangre de Toro, complete with little plastic bull, as long ago as 1955. Cold Duck dates from 1969 and, in the 1970s, cat-loving wine drinkers could choose between the German Zeller Schwarze Katz and the Portuguese Gatão, puss in boots. There followed a confusing period in the 1980s, when Borges, makers of Gatão, removed the cat from their label on the grounds that consumers did not like them; at the same time, Chile's San Pedro winery first began to successfully export its own Gato Negro. The engaging little hippo on the Fat Bastard label first hit the market in 1997. Two years later came another pun in the shape of the wittily labeled Rhone-style Goats du Roam from Charles Back in South Africa. 2001, of course, saw the arrival of the animal champion of them all, Yellow Tail, which began life as a 25,000 case brand and has now grown to sales of 12 million cases.
In March 2006, Nielsen revealed that no fewer than 77 of the 483 successful wine brands launched over the previous three years featured some kind of animal on their labels. Or nearly one bottle in six. The authors of the report also estimated that annual sales of critter brands amounted to $600m and that they were selling over twice as fast as traditional labels. Yellow Tail alone now represents 12% of imported wine in America.
The idea of using packaging cleverly to promote wine to unsophisticated consumers probably began in 1927 with the birth of Blue Nun. Though the original model actually wore a brown habit, it was the first successful attempt to make German wines comprehensible. During the war, two Portuguese producers first showed their skill at packaging commercial pink wines: Mateus Rose (1942), which borrowed a traditional German bottle shape and the image of a quite unconnected palace, and Lancers (1944), which came in a mock ceramic “crock”.
The success of these wines makes it quite surprising that innovative bottles have made such rare appearances since. The most striking and long-lived custom bottles have probably been the Black Tower and Piat d’Or. Most recently, Fosters has dipped its toes into these waters with its new diamond-shaped bottle for the re-launched Rosemount; but the star in this field has to be the JP Chenet brand, whose twisted-neck, dumpy bottle, introduced by Grands Chais de France in 1991, is now the world’s largest French brand.
While some US retailers are still displaying critter brands together, the growing trend is to talk of “adventure” brands that include efforts such as Big Red Truck, E&J Gallo’s Red Bicyclette from France and Constellation’s Spanish response, Red Guitar.
While most professionals would recognize the effectiveness of appropriate labels, there is no denying that some styles of wine are harder to package than others. Sainsbury’s French wine buyer Abi Hirshfeld acknowledges that “buyers of New World wines are put off by traditional Bordeaux labels, but if you try to make Bordeaux appealing with a modern design, you risk alienating the older male customers who buy most of it”.
The cost of a wine label ranges from at little as $2,000 for something off the peg to as much as $100,000. When spending this much, it’s worth considering three of the most recent high profile wine acquisitions. The Big Red Truck, Rex Goliath and Big House Red brands all sold at prices that surprised industry observers. But in each case, the buyers evidently believed that the packages were well worth paying a premium for.
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