Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Bottle Shock

Oliver Burkeman, from the Guardian, has written a hilarious article on the effect of the US Presidential race on wine sales in San Francisco: Bottle Shock. The extract below provides the crux of his observation:

“As we've recently learned, real Americans, in the American heartland of America, eat moose and go snowmobiling. But in liberal San Francisco, out-of-touch left-wingers prefer to sip wine while discussing their love of terrorists and homosexuality. Or at least they did until they realised what they were drinking: at Yield Wine Bar in downtown San Francisco, sales of a once-popular organic red from Chile have plummeted in the last few weeks, because its name is Palin Syrah. "It was our bestselling wine before [the VP announcement]," owner Chris Tavelli laments…”

(Guardian)

Burkeman’s article reminds of the impact the movie Sideways had on wine sales in America. In the movie, Paul Giamatti’s character, Miles, is a wine aficionado who loves Pinot Noir and despises Merlot (“No, if anyone orders Merlot, I'm leaving. I am NOT drinking any fucking Merlot!”). Following Sideway’s release, Pinot Noir sales went through the roof, while Merlot sales declined.

I get the impression that some American’s take things a little too literally.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

they seem lame to me - D