Quick Taste: Tempra Tantrum

By Rob Bralow

So you remember all my praise about the Tempra Tantrum yesterday? Let me quote you a little bit from that flashy, eye-catching, marketing exxxxxxxxxxxxxxxtravaganza:

"Tempra Tantrum is more than wine. It's an ode to originality, a hymn to passion, a praise to expression...."

Oh it goes on, but I couldn't bring myself to keep typing. That amount of flash and fluff makes people like me put the bottle back down on the shelf and walk away slowly.


These are critter wines, those wines that Australia made famous by putting a friendly little critter on the label and selling it for $10. Almost literally these are the same, with the same price tag, only from Spain. Right now there is a flood of this wine on the market because you (yes YOU out there) are drinking it. Don't ask me why, ask yourself.

For me, I would not buy these wines. They are sweet and sugary and not much else. However, if you like Yellow Tail, if you like Little Penguin, if you like turtles, doves, rabbits, dogs, cats, ostrich or any other animal you can think of on the labels of your wine, this might be right up your alley.

Nice Package

By Rob Bralow

In November I wrote about how The Whole Package is Important, and I thought I would follow that up with some really great packages to show you how its done.

And you thought I was going to take you to see some other packages didn't you... sometimes knowing my mother is reading this is just enough a deterrent. Sometimes...

But, back to some spiffy packaging. Some are simple like this one from the people running the program for Cotes-du-Rhones:


You have probably seen their ads in the major wine trade publications, the ones comparing a fabulous meal with a pizza or a hamburger (which I might add is definitely one of the important food groups). The message is that wines from Cotes-du-Rhone are for every occasion. I think Fred Fanzia might have that market covered, but I think wine all the time is not a bad thing.

Then I received this from Grand Marnier:


Their new marketing campaign is La Vie Grand Marnier, very red and flashy and all about women. Seriously, if they were thinking of targeting men in this ad campaign they missed, but I think that all of the Chic clothing hits women in the jealous spot. I think. Honestly, I'm a man and know so little about these things that one would have to sit down and explain it to me very slowly... They did go to the trouble of creating a video, although I find it a little strange that there is no website attached to the campaign and no mention of it on the Grand Marnier homepage. And the contest that is on the homepage has expired...

And then there was Tempra Tantrum





I felt like someone had decided what the flashiest almost clashing colors on the color wheel were and threw them at this box. This is marketing at its finest. Fredric Koeppel at Bigger Than Your Head also received this gawdy package and had some great commentary. For me, a person who thinks about marketing and public relations for clients, I think this is beautiful. I mean, it has all of the information that an uninformed, novice in the wine world could possibly want to know about the wines in the box. And it even comes with Toñito, not the Spanish football player but instead a somewhat bullhorn shaped webcam. I won't talk about the wines (that's tomorrow's post), but I will say that from a marketing perspective this is a nice package.