Blog: Magandeep Singh

It was while having a shower that I realised that old writers had it easy. Nothing had been written, which left them with the entire fairway to prance about on. The simple probability of stringing a few random words together to end up with a sonnet was much higher then than it is today. The novelty of saying “I Love You” made it easy to get away with forgetting an anniversary. Today, nothing short of pimping her ride and getting her diamonds the size of what a rap star claims to dangle will buy you out of a fortnight on the sofa. A simple “I Love You”, today, sounds so banal.

So with all the good stuff written or tattooed or at least accounted for, we the people of today have a much tougher task being fresh. Given that our brains are also constantly shrinking with all the alcohol we consume, the task is further compounded. Sure, we make better weapons but do we write better poetry? I think not.

Wine marketing then could soon be rocket science. Or so I pray because that is the only way I will ever be able to afford the Continental GT in Beluga Black. Why drive when you can Bentley? Yes, that was pretty random.

Back to the potato at hand, wines won’t sell themselves. Let’s face it, the only reason a consumer actually buys anything at all is because someone made him buy it. Be it the visual display, the mental recall of an advert, the social group which may have suggested it or the binge impulse of pretty packaging, a person buys because someone is good at selling.

Wine is rarely sold. It is flaunted, flouted and peddled (why can’t you spell peddled with an ‘f’) but few people are brave enough to take on this eleventh Herculean task.  Just writing that line conjured up visions of a very strong and muscled person in a toga at a checkout counter; time for my medication.
But before I get delusional and start drooling, let me get this on paper. Wine marketing needs to change, and badly. Here are a few things that need to be chucked out of the window. Some of them may cause choking, so snooty people watch out.

Forget pairing:
OK, this might sound a bit too much to bite, let alone chew, but we have to stop thinking about pairing wine all the time. It is like expecting me to be on my best behaviour just because I am not in a straitjacket. Why can’t wine have fun? Peanut butter and jelly, beer and peanuts, weren’t exactly ordained and emailed from Moses’ Tablet PC! Sometimes, especially in the Indian context, when we eat so randomly (from a light yellow lentil to a heavy meaty dish) you can’t change wines like Hugh Hefner changes girlfriends. Be Indian, find one and annoy yourself with it all evening.

Forget Brands:
Luckily, in India I don’t need to stress this too much. The only brand we seem to be loyal to is the cheaper one, whichever that happens to be. No, I am not being condescending. The idea should be to create a comfort space which is not based on a high-end snooty brand. Instead it should aim at delivering comfort of accessibility in price and taste. I appreciate our money-mindedness: it helps us see things a lot more objectively and as a result we are not easily swayed by some mysterious Chateau owner from countryside France, with misty blue eyes, a cigarette-baritone voice, a dapper suit, and a ...I am sorry, what was I saying again? Hmmm....

Listen to the Label:
A study I conducted between lunch and my mid-day snack proved to me that people, no matter how intelligent, will still look at labels and will be attracted to pretty labels. The belief seems to go that if the label is to our (artistic) taste, so then could possibly be the wine. Darn basic and obvious info but aren’t you thankful I didn’t spend millions of public funds finding this out? The only thing it cost me was a bottle of cola, and a bag of crisps, and bail money for stalking the blonde from the Kleenex counter at the mall and breaching the restraining order again. And this is somehow meant to prove to you that label aesthetics are immensely important, especially if you can admire them from 50 metres.

Read the Region:
Trouble with a lot of wine-mongers is that they preach the wrong sermon. Instead of talking about where the wine will be drunk and how therefore it fits in, they end up droning on about where it was made and how that place is unique. The world is unique and special and I have my yoga teacher to impress that upon me. I do not need dull wine talk to contort my mind into shapes that even an asana can’t.

Consumer is Wrong:
The consumer knows what he likes only after he has tried a million things or has been brainwashed completely and utterly by some giant brand with moolah on their side to assist with the convincing. Till then, she knows nothing and will buy anything you make available. So, dear winemakers and marketers, hold on to whatever little scruples you may have accidentally salvaged and don’t try to sell plonk that will create the wrong impression of wines on an unsuspecting whisky junkie. Don't sell sweet because we don’t know or tannic because we eat spicy and definitely don’t sell us the crap that the West refuses to buy. We don’t like hand-me-downs, ask Mercedes, they learnt this only too well and it has taken them a lot more effort reversing that.

So that is the end of my rant. If you aren’t shocked, you are overdoing the Valium, or have just recently celebrated your Platinum marriage anniversary. Both, I am told, can be numbing like nothing else.

Just,
Magan.