While briefly surfing washingtonpost.com while eating, I noticed an article labeled “Think Outside the Box : Boxed wine is making a comeback — but is it drinkable? We put six brands to the test. ” I’m a beer drinker who the nuances of wine are largely lost on, but technological innovation and marketing interest me, so I opened the article. What a waste of my time.
Writer Dave McIntyre talks about six boxed wine options but I see no reason to bother considering what he has to say. After an opening paragraph that makes little sense – somehow equating boxed wine with stealing your parents’ alcohol from the fridge – he launches into this paragraph.
Yet wine in a box has some advantages: A three-liter carton takes the space of two bottles but offers the buzz of four. Smaller boxes offer possibilities for covert sipping in places where alcohol might be frowned upon. Boxes fit neatly into a picnic basket and won’t break on a patio or pool deck. And they are cheaper than bottles and corks, so the winery can pass that savings on to you.
Of the four possible reasons Mr McIntyre thinks you might want boxed wine, one is quantity of “buzz” and the other is drinking on the sly. If the standard we’re going to be talking about here is how ripped you can get, doooooooood, then why bother to talk about taste? Why not just print the alcohol content percentages, my man? You’ve clearly already made up your mind about this test and the possible outcomes.
The best bit, though? The opening of the following paragraph.
Despite these conveniences, the stigma remains.
Gosh, I wonder how those stigmas keep getting perpetuated, Dave?
This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs
Well I used to say something in my profile about not quite being a “tinker, tailor, soldier, or spy” but Tom stole that for our about us page, so I guess I’ll have to find another way to express that I am a man of many interests.
Hmm, guess I just did.
My tastes run the gamut from sophomoric to Shakespeare and in my “professional” life I’ve sold things, served beer, written software, and carried heavy objects… sometimes at the same place. It’s that range of loves and activities that makes it so easy for me to love DC – we’ve got it all.
