Wine Label Navigation, What's in a Name?

It was the last official Tuesday at the Tasting Station of the summer this week. We're shuttin' 'er down to focus on our list of pet projects and the day to day operations of a wine shop in the hazy, lazy days of July and August. We'll pick it back up in September when we jump in head first to the fall "tasting season". With temps in the triple digits its not surprising that some of our vendors chose not to cart around wines to taste so the load was light. Check out the score card below.

Still, one topic that arose while tasting with Kathryn from Ruby was that of wine labeling and the difficulties consumers can have communicatiing the specific wine they are seeking. She was tasting us on the Huber "Obere Steigen" Gruner Veltliner from Austria. Now, imagine that you and yours just had that beauty at a restaurant over the weekend and have decided that you liked it so much you'd like to order a case.

You stroll into BSFW to get a price quote. If you told me that I want to order this wine called "Gruner" I'd have to explain that there are hundreds of examples of that grape type in our marketplace. If you could pull up the name Huber that would be a step in the right direction but Huber makes five different Gruner Veltliner (!), which one? The chances of you remembering the Obere Steigen bit are dubious at best.

The solution? The smart folks at Huber, realizing the tongue-twisting nature of their wines, created a peel away portion of the back label that allows you to take all of the essential information pertaining to that wine home with you. In the wallet or purse it goes and the only thing left to remember was how good the Creme Brulee was.

Hopefully other wineries will follow suit and make life easier for consumers and wine buyers alike.

Did you know about these peel away labels? Have you ever taken advantage of the tool before?

Total wines tasted: 44
Wines that made “the short list”: 4
One new addition you can look for: 08 Huber "Obere Steigen" Gruner Veltliner