Bicycles, nymphs and wines

 I'm not sure about the connection between drinking wine and bicycling, but some marketers of vino apparently want to create one.

Cycles Gladiator from Hahn Estates in California is the newest label sporting a bicycle — and a red-haired nymph. Oh la la!

It joins Red Bicyclette, a French wine that I was surprised to learn comes from none other than mass wine producer E & J Gallo in Modesto, California.

Planning to hold a wine tasting after the next group ride? I didn't think so, but you could. Together these labels represent whites and reds.

The Hahn winery started the Cycles Gladiator wine with grapes from the same vineyards as its Rex Goliath, which it sold to another winery, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

The label comes from a famous poster that French artist G. Massias painted in 1895 to publicize a new bicycle — the Cycle Gladiator. The Hahn winery says the label creates a mood:

“His mythological image of the ‘winged bicycle’ captures the stylish grace, beauty, and unfettered freedom of our hillside vineyards. Let Cycles Gladiator whisk you away for the ride of your life.”

Red Bike

No stylish grace or beauty with Red Bicyclette, just a feel-good impression created by the marketers at E & J Gallo.

An interesting article by Tim Moran of the Modesto Bee, tells how the label got its start when co-president Joseph Gallo decided it was time to sell a French wine. Gallo's brands run from Thunderbird to Bartles & Jaymes to Turning Leaf. It didn't have a French wine.

The Gallo marketing team headed off for a 10-day tour de France, and came back with 5,000 pictures which they posted in a room. They looked for images and symbols that portrayed a kinder, gentler France. This was about the the time the US invaded Iraq and we were vilifying the French for not supporting our assault.

A recurring object in many pictures was a red bicycle. That seemed non-threatening; add a dog and a few baguettes and a silly-looking guy in a beret and, Voila!, the Red Bicyclette wine label.

After exhausting wine-tasting sessions, Gallo came up with a flavor and partnered with the Sieur D'Arques in the French Languedoc region to produce it.

The goal is to become the No. 1 French import in 2006. Drink up!

(See also “Another Brand of Wine, Another Bicycle Label,” Bikinig Bis, March 30, 2006)