A few months ago, I started a shock campaign to denounce this growing movement of "Irresponsible" wine labels. Some of you may have been shocked by this verbal vulgarity and its strange, and sometimes disturbing, images. For others, you were only surprised and amused. But for all of you, it remains a misunderstanding of the real message, and the deep meaning of this campaign. So, here I am, in this letter "to you" to justify my words and my social misconduct, and to hope to convince you to embrace this "VV" revolution for “Vino-Veritas”.

Definition of a wine label**

Etiquette – also known as "propriety": is a set of rules and/or social norms known as "good manners" that govern appropriate and respectful behavior in society.

**Label: A card or brand placed on the bottle that is intended to collect mandatory (legal) or informational information about the contents (not the container). For the wine bottle, if the label on the front of the bottle is refined for aesthetic reasons, then it becomes the back label, and the original back label becomes the label (resulting in the loss of its original meaning).

Our most evolved and developed sense in our brain is sight. Essential and informative, it has its origin in a survival function for human beings. This allows us to inform ourselves of the danger to choose the appropriate actions and reactions to situations, and it calls on our judgment. On the other hand, in our evolution, writing (written language) has allowed us to establish a universal communication of its codes. It is for this reason, as soon as wine was the object of covetousness and exchange, that the first writings appear on terracotta amphorae, bottles and barrels. We use this primary sense to decode what cannot be seen, felt, or touched, such as "The Elixir of the Gods" (see Vol. 5 "Genesis... Reading an American Wine Label")

A dazzling evolution

I will not go back over the history of the label and its evolution.  If you want to know more, read Keynote speech at Wines and Vines Packaging Conference by Randall Grahm, a genius writer and winemaker, but also one of the fathers of modern American etiquette. Because I would like to dwell on the satanic deviance that the wine label has taken since 2020.

The image or logo has always had an important place on the label, and this since the marketing of the Bordeaux bottle in the 18th century. It has evolved, it is colorful, and it has even become funny, but never before the 21st century had it lost its primary function, which is to concisely inform the consumer about the content and origin of wine.

After "Food Porn", here comes "Wine Porn"

Sometimes certain marginal movements become fads, and often they flatten the foundations of its primary utility. This is the case with the wine label, where the back label has become more important than the label itself. One wonders why? What if the new consumer has forgotten to know how to read or that writing has simply become useless in the world of modern communication?

Yes, I am revolted to see his increasingly incomprehensible labels filling the shelves at the wine store. We have reached an absolute ridiculousness, where wine is sold only by the appearance of the packaging of the container. So, I say no to "Wine Porn", and you?

I therefore ask you, consumers, to refuse to buy a wine whose label consists only of an image without written information. You must demand to be able to be informed visually (without having to physically return the bottle) about the origin of the product: Name of the vineyard, Region of production, Country, Vintage (if applicable), and Alcohol content by volume. Because this is the minimum that a winemaker can do to prove the honesty of his product.

So do as I do and say loud and clear "Fuck the Label" and “Yes to facts information”.