Alternative packaging seems to be all the rage in the wine biz. Fueled, it seems, by the success of boxed wines (success being best measured by robust sales) producers have now migrated to wines delivered in aluminum cans and plastic bottles.
The Australian company, Barokes, sent several canned wines to the San Diego International Wine Competition, and one of them, a non-vintage blanc de blancs sparkling wine, even won a medal.
I wasn’t much surprised because boxed wines, actually bag-in-a-box wines, have been claiming medals for several years. The packaging is frequently clever and inviting and there’s often some fairly good swill in the bag.
Consumers have largely taken to boxed wines for their convenience and storability (they don’t take up much space given the volume, sometimes up to 3 liters, and the collapsing bag protects the wine from premature oxidation) but are quick to point out they actually like the stuff, too.
Canned wines and wines delivered in plastic bottles provide a different sort of convenience for the consumer, however. For one thing, there’s no heavy glass, making them lighter and easier to carry in a backpack or picnic basket.
And if you’re at the beach or around the pool or the hot tub, cans and plastic bottles eliminate the danger of breakage.
So I was intrigued enough to road test a couple of wines — a Sauvignon Blanc and a Pinot Noir — en plastique made by Yellow Jersey from grapes grown in the Languedoc region of southern France. I did this live and on the air for the Gourmet Club, one of two radio shows I host for SignOnRadio.com, and I enlisted co-hosts Maureen Clancy and Caron Golden as taste-testers.
All of us were a little underwhelmed. These wines retail for about $11 each and aren’t as tasty as the better (and less expensive) wines I’ve experienced from a box. But the potential is clearly there.
As a sailor and a cyclist, I can see a day when the appeal of the lightweight packaging and the ease and convenience of tossing a couple of plastic bottles into a sack might overwhelm me. But I think I’ll wait until the wine itself is just a wee bit better.
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