25162619 Crimes, the popular make from Treasury Wine Estates, does everything incorrect. It breaks all the "conventional wisdom" rules. It is everything that shouldn't sell in the U.South. market. And yet it flies off the shelves. What'southward going on?

xix Crimes is an Australian wine brand, which is the first problem. Sales of Aussie wines have been in decline here in the U.South. for years. The Australian section of my local upscale supermarket'due south wine wall has shrunk to a shadow of its old cocky.

Sad and Doubly Cursed

Although xix Crimes has evolved into a lineup of 7 different wines,  including Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, the core grape diversity is Shiraz, and that'southward the second problem. American consumers drink plenty of Syrah and Shiraz in crimson blends, but they don't seem to want to purchase it as a varietal wine. Sales of Shiraz have been sinking right along with Australian wine in general — a double expletive!

And then there is the branding. 19 Crimes — outlaw vino! The proper name comes Australian history (history wine — oh no!). Great Britain once expelled its most hardened criminals to Australia. Whatsoever of xix crimes could go you sentenced to transportation to Commonwealth of australia — banished to the end of the globe. Who wants to buy a criminal wine?

And, each label, of the core brand features a photograph of a sad man — the mug shot of a bedevilled criminal. Who wants to buy a sad man wine? Who wants to associate themselves with a loser? How in the world can a wine like this get on the shelf, much less sell more than a 1000000 cases?

Vino by Design

Well, the answer is that xix Crimes seems to take been rather precisely engineered to entreatment to an important demographic — millennial men, especially those who come across themselves as a bit of a rogue. Outlaws, if you know what I mean, who place with others who defy convention.  Outlaw wine for self-styled renegades? At present you lot are offset to encounter the xix Crimes logic.

I bought a bottle of the ruddy blend and, after I stared at the sad man for a while, I tasted it. Sweet and tannic, that was my reaction, and better chilled sangria-style than direct upwardly. Not to my taste, but I am not the target audience.

Some of the about popular brands on the market today totally succeed with tannic sweet red blends pitched at a item market segment. A friend who seems to have some inside information told me that the 19 Crimes season contour is no blow but rather the result of lots of careful inquiry and consumer testing. No surprise there!

Every bit of the packet is carefully linked to the make identity and I'd encourage you lot to take a close wait the next time you buy wine. Simply yous will take to buy and open up the bottle to come across my favorite role of the branding system — the cork!

The cork? Well, that breaks some other stereotype, of course, since nosotros sometimes think of Australia and New Zealand wines existence topped by screwcaps. But there are many reasons why cork is and so popular today and 19 Crimes cleverly adds a new reward to the listing: collectibility!

You run across each cork is printed with 1 of the 19 crimes — my cork is #eleven: stealing roots, copse or plants or destroying them. That seems like a pretty piddling crime to get my sad guy shipped to Australia, but it might be just the affair to kickoff someone more into it to buy bottles and pull corks relentlessly until all nineteen criminal offence corks are captured.

Virtual Story-telling

19 Crimes is a story vino designed to appeal to a particular consumer category and Treasury has taken the adjacent logical step by creating a virtual reality app that animates the sad men (and the distressing adult female on the Chardonnay label), and then that they can tell their ain distressing stories.

Bringing the inanimate to life is a feat with a long creative tradition — think Pygmalion, Pinocchio, or — peculiarly relevant in this context — the scene in Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera "Ruddygore" where painted figures step out of their frames to evangelize a stern alert.

The 19 Crimes figures tell their stories, humanizing their identities, and so step back onto the characterization. Art may be served past this, just marketing in the form of consumer engagement is the clear intent. If you want to hear all the stories, I suppose, you need to collect all seven wines in the lineup. It must piece of work — I've heard that Treasury has  expanded its virtual reality program.

19 Crimes provides many lessons for anyone trying to empathize today'due south wine market, only perhaps the most of import is that it is dangerous to generalize about generations when it comes to specific products such equally wine. Many accept written that millennials seek authenticity in products and experiences — and this is an of import trend. But one size doesn't necessarily fit all and some millennials (and probably consumers in other generational categories, too) apparently meet themselves in a dissimilar light.

Identity trumps actuality. Outlaw! Y'all don't need no stinking badges. And now there is a wine for y'all.

Congratulations to Treasury and 19 Crimes for their remarkable success. What's next? Arrr, Matey. I'm thinkin' Pirate wine is a pretty practiced bet!

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Here is that scene from Ruddygore. Savour!