A great bottle of wine or champagne seems to go hand-in-hand
with any special event.
Married couples celebrate romantic occasions, glasses are served
at almost any high-class affair and who hasn’t brought a bottle of
wine to give as a token of appreciation when invited to a
party?
A great bottle of wine or champagne seems to go hand-in-hand with any special event.
Married couples celebrate romantic occasions, glasses are served at almost any high-class affair and who hasn’t brought a bottle of wine to give as a token of appreciation when invited to a party?
While any bottle of a great wine surely will be remembered for a long time, some local wineries are finding a way to make that special bottle of wine something that is special for another reason – the bottle itself – thanks to custom wine labels.
“You are able to do things that are really special,” said Gene Guglielmo, of the family-owned Guglielmo Winery in Morgan Hill.
From a corporate logo to a picture of a married couple to simple personalized messages, making a custom wine label can make a gift that the recipient will remember forever.
“You get a great private label and a great wine,” said Guglielmo, who said that many wineries in the custom label business use wines different than their own special vintages. “Our private label is still Guglielmo wine.”
When it comes to the design of a special label, Guglielmo said that if it can be scanned onto a computer, it can be made into a wine label. Imagination is the only barrier.
“If you have a photo, you can bring a photo in,” he said.
For one couple’s anniversary, they chose to put a photo of themselves on their wedding day along with a current photo. Another woman was given a wine bottle for her last day working for a company; the wine label had a picture of her riding off on a horse.
Once the design for the wine label is decided upon, the label is sent to Design Factory Graphics of San Martin, which is operated by Renee Roberts and her brother, Bob Snow.
Perhaps most surprising about Guglielmo’s labels is that a customer can order a single custom label for just $4, and the price drops with larger orders.
While Guglielmo said that his winery is just one of many around the country that have gotten into the business of custom wine labels, very few of them will do less than a case at a time.
“There are some that do it, but not that many, especially with the quality of wines that we do it with and the ability to do low numbers,” he said. “Some places will make you do a large number to do it.”
One example of a winery like this is Fortino Winery in Gilroy, which offers custom labeling if 24 custom bottles or more are ordered. However, that doesn’t mean there’s much of a fallout on business.
“We do a lot of that around Christmas time, and also there’s a lot of corporate business,” Fortino’s Events Coordinator Janine Kaloczy said. “The business is greatest around the holidays, but we welcome the business all year around.”
Fortino’s custom labeling system is different in that it is all done right at the winery. Customers are able to choose between a full-size wine bottle or a champagne split bottle and then choose from a selection of backgrounds for labels adhering to all sorts of occasions. Once they choose the label, they can add their custom message.
“We like to get them a month in advance,” Kaloczy said, “just in case there are any glitches in the system.”
