Comments on: the stormhoek label design: “why shouldn’t a small wine company see apple or google as its competition?”

By: Stormhoek: "freshness matters."

Stormhoek: "freshness matters." — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 16:51:21 +0000

Collective wisdom

Our Packaging Update and Please don’t tell the competition I Spent a bit of time at the LIFT conference last week and there was some really good discussion on the subject of open source design. It reminded me that we…

By: Jacques Marneweck's Blog

Jacques Marneweck's Blog — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 03:48:35 +0000

Microsoft’s real competition: Stormhoek

Interesting to see that Stormhoek are competing against Microsoft. Oh, you gotta read Hugh Macleod’s blog to get this one. But, there’s a lot of truth to this. Let’s say you have $400 burning a hole in your pocket. You…

By: Stormhoek: "freshness matters."

Stormhoek: "freshness matters." — Tue, 29 Nov 2005 00:06:57 +0000

News Flash: Most wines do not get better with age.

“Freshness”, a key idea behind Stormhoek, is not a gimmick, nor is it simply a sales tool. It is a critical indicator of wine quality, particularly in whites. Please forgive me for the long post, but for those who are…

By: hugh macleod

hugh macleod — Wed, 16 Nov 2005 04:57:20 +0000

Thanks for all the great feeback, Everybody. Me and the groovy cats at Stormhoek spent the weekend going through your ideas, and have moved the conversation forward to here: http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/002020.html So I'm closing down this comment thread, and moving on to Phase Two. Thanks again.

By: Johnny K

Johnny K — Wed, 16 Nov 2005 03:17:39 +0000

I like your site very much, but I'm not sure about the idea of getting some product design for $2000. I live in the US but I read this London blog as well. http://noisydecentgraphics.typepad.com

By: Kirill Smirnov

Kirill Smirnov — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 20:00:51 +0000

I’m not quite comfortable with wiki, so I post here as well.
I’d rather suggest to try something inexpensive instead of changing the shape of the bottle or making individual labes for every new bottle. Why not to wrap completely every bottle with cheapest paper, like a gift wrapper? Two reasons a) you can use more surface as a label and it makes you very flexible in implementing new designs (if you actually need any) and b) why not? create a legeng (people tend to love things like this) that this is the only wine which first meets daylight in your glass, which preserves… whatever you want to preserve in good wine. And by the way, I would agree with Brock Tice — the bottle should be transparent. Nothing to hide, true. But if you have to protect your wine (I have no glue, do they have to?) paper wrapper can do the job.
When I stare at the endless wine lines in a supermarket I would preferably notice bottles which look different, and I’d rather believe that the bottle which looks outstanding has something outstanding inside. So why waste time and money in creating new labels (who said you can create something truly fresh and convinient simultaneously) if you can change the way it looks and the way it percepts? When last time you were looking for a bottle of wine as a gift or just for something new besides this same looking merlots and sovignons, weren’t you looking for something outstanding? Er?

By: michelle

michelle — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 09:32:49 +0000

Just a few quick comments — most people posting here have no idea about the legalities of wine labels. Every country you want to sell your wine to will have rules — like the size of the font and font size relativities between different things (e.g region to product name to vintage), the size of the label, the detail on the front and rear labels, etc, etc. As I ran my eye over the posts I noticed things like “use an envelope instead of a label” — but a lot of countries have very strict rules about having all the info stuck (ie not removable). Plus you need to consider the practicalities and costs associated — the minute you move to labels with cut-outs, or etching on the bottle, or any of that flash stuff the packaging costs skyrocket. Winemakers will also have a lot to say about the colour of the bottle — the darker the better to reduce the effect of heat and sunshine on the wine. And ultimately, if you’re after repeat sales it doesn’t matter what the label looks like — it’s what the wine tastes like that matters.
So sorry Hugh, don’t want to burst your bubble — but you probably should have given people some boundaries to work within. I work in the wine industry and the label is one of the most regulated areas in the industry. The last thing you want to do is spend time and money on a label only to find it won’t be approved for sale in say the UK or US!! It’s all well and good to think outside the square — but it’s worth knowing your limitations too.
For more info check out your country’s wine industry board for all the rules — e.g. in Australia go to http://www.awbc.com.au.

By: Patrick Dodds

Patrick Dodds — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 05:25:22 +0000

FWIsW, I like the above idea of portraits (all in B+W maybe?) with “I drink this wine” — simple, fun and direct, perhaps with a brief biog. Could induce nausea if too smiley, beautiful or aspirational (“I’m a dj / architect / rocket scientist and have recently had my first novel published” would really turn you off in your local 7 Eleven on a rainy Wednesday evening) but otherwise has great potential. I also like Estelle’s ideas, tho’ I can’t follow them all. Finally, it is interesting to note how many comments refer to wines the names of which the commentee (?) cannot remember…
Sorry not to have ideas of my own yet — I’m working on them over a glass of Oyster Bay (chosen because of its taste, I originally tried it because it comes from New Zealand which seems to produce consistently more interesting and tasty wines than other countries, though maybe this too is all in the marketing).

By: Estelle

Estelle — Tue, 15 Nov 2005 04:27:56 +0000

Hello Hugh!
Thanks for the challenge and for sharing all the exciting adventures!
I hope you will forgive a poor english…
Few things I would like to say first about STORMHEAK:
–I don’t know the wine
–I have heard about it because you’ve talked about it
–I don’t feel like going back to their blog, but I like what YOU are saying about the blogging around their wine
–I like the idea that the important is telling stories others will like telling others..
–I like thinking people all around the world will taste this wine just because they’ve heard about it by Word Of Mouth
–I like being able to “trace” the stories so we get linked together
–At the end I would like to have a bottle of Stromheak for my next dinner so I can tell that story to my friends! I will tell them about all the ideas and everything on your blog…and if by any chance I have the right friends then we’ll be right on the spot for a very very nice conversation feeting right close to our needs?!
Ok, here is what I thought could be interesting:
(I wish I could show you that on a table cloth, that would be easier for me, I tell you!)
FRONT OF THE BOTTLE
–STORMHEAK
WINE MADE OF WOM*
(*Word Of Mouth)
–MAP OF THE LINKS made by / towards blogs talking about the wine (I think it is possible to visualize!)
The map is like visualizing the “chateau” were the wine was made. The “chateau” is everywhere but can be visualized and reached.
And then, a precision (very important!): BEST LINKED BY “the name of the blog” in 2005
–on the bottom, a fine line:
WOM made this wine very popular
or sometnhing around the Mouthfull…
–Every year or every cycle you can come up with (we never know with you!) makes a DIFFERENT COLOR on the top of the bottle and means different things like: “better drink it before they change their mind!” etc.
BACK OF THE BOTTLE
–TELL THE STORY
YOURS
AND REWARD BLOGGERS FOR COMPETING WITH GOOGLE
(his picture? the adress of his blog?…
the one who best linked…)
Well, I hope It is clear enough to talk about it!
Have a good one
And thank you again!
Estelle

By: Milan Davidovic

Milan Davidovic — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 22:21:04 +0000

Further to James' point about the environmental impact of discarded Tetra Pak containers: http://perc.ca/PEN/1991-10/fleischer.html

By: james governor

james governor — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 17:58:24 +0000

tetrapack? fricking tetrapack. jesus christ — the bane of landfill. save more than it costs? tell that to the rubbish mountain.

By: Stormhoek: "freshness matters."

Stormhoek: "freshness matters." — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 16:57:19 +0000

Labelling can be good…

It’s funny what happens when you start actually having a conversation with people… We started talking about the stuff that matters to us and lots of people have joined in. Stormhoek has been a catalyst for a lot of interesting…

By: Julia R.

Julia R. — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 04:22:59 +0000

Think inside the box: http://www.tetrapak.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetra_Pak

By: Jason Knight-Martin

Jason Knight-Martin — Sun, 13 Nov 2005 22:54:43 +0000

A friend posted this spot to me, so i decided to forward a thumbnail of an idea. Trying to do the exact opposite of what most wines I have seen do. Its an interactive .swf so when you roll over elements, an explanation pops up. http://66.90.104.220/stormhoek.swf

By: brian moffatt

brian moffatt — Sun, 13 Nov 2005 21:29:38 +0000

Since we’re speaking of personal shopping experiences…I buy Yellow Tail. Based simply on the label. I liked the label when I saw it, and the wine is okay for $12 CDN. I’m trying to think of the wine I bought before that…I can’t remember the name…but it had some sort of zebra effect on the label. Again same price range…Years ago — like twenty-five — I bought Sangre de Toro because of the little bull on the neck. There might be something in the animal symbol thing…regional? national? primal? If the Welsh made wine you’d put a badger on the label. In my neck of the woods there’s a new winemaking region — separate and distinct from the Niagara region — for the life of me it would be hard to stick a Moose or a Beaver on a bottle of wine. Probably a Great Blue Heron for for me. South Africa? Springbok? Been done? Beautiful animal. Graceful, majestic — oh no wait it’s gotta be about more than the wine.