Coming up with a unique name for your wine labels

[Neviawen]

I was just wondering, I finally got ink in my printer and I was going to print a few labels for some bottles I have aging. However, it's pretty tricky coming up with a name for my wine. Everyone here seems to find something unique to name their wine and they all have neat labels. Is it bad if I come up with a name but there is already a commercial wine with the same name? I am not selling this wine and have no intention of ever marketing it. It's only gifted to friends/family or drank by ourselves of course. Pretty much every cool name I can think of someone already thought of.
How dumb is it to make a label with the same name as a commercially available wine or do you think I should keep on brainstorming for something else I like?
~Kate

 

[cindy]

I think its more personal to name your wine yourself especially given as gifts.
plus if you name your wine a commercial name then people might expect it to taste
the way the commercial brand does and it may or may not dissapoint.
what kinds of wine are you tring to find names for? maybe we could all help you come up
with something suitable.. just a thought. I'm not saying your wine isn't fantastic I'm
saying with a commercial name it will already have exspectations hmmm... am I making any sense?

 

[tonyandkory]

I think if you come up with it yourself and it just happens to be the same as something else there is nothing wrong with that.

on the last two Batches we bottled I could not come up with any thing and resorted to the name of the fruit in another language.

Turned out pretty neat.

There are people on here that like to help with labels if you are artistically declined

Some of the bottles I have on the rack that are for the house we use a paint pen to write on them... it washes right off and is easy to do.

 

[BobF]

I think I like the paint pen idea. What pens and where did you get them?

 

[tonyandkory]

I am not sure about the brand but I believe we bought them at Michales.... they are just the kind you can write on glass for car windows or such.

 

[kat50496]

Kate, I use the same label design for all of my wines, just changing the wine name or varietal and color pallet. I designed my lable after the CK Mondavi label.

For blends I usually try to use the most common designation of that particular country. For instance, if I make a Rhone blend like CC Showcase Chateau du Pays or WE Veaux Chateau du Roi, I would just put something like Rhône Vin rouge with Vin de Table underneath. I just figure that the grapes being sourced, although from the appellations being advertised in the kit, probably are not of the quality of any of the higher AOC type designations.

This makes label production pretty easy, and it's easy for friends to recognize my label when we have wine parties with alot of different bottles.

 

[edv]

These days I simply use a Sharpie Pen on the Corks, sorta like a cattle brand, and keep track in my cellar notes.

When I made labels, I always tried to have fun.
IE this was one for Rosso Grande

 

[tonyandkory]

lol that's pretty funny/cool. Ed

 

[Rocky]

I used to make labels for all of my wines that had some significance but I have, lately, gone utilitarian. I just use a small shipping label (Avery #8160, 1" x 2 5/8") and I just put the wine name and year, e.g. "Verdicchio 2012." I do special labels ad hoc if I am bringing a bottle to someone's house and each label is unique to the person/occasion. I am not criticizing those that make labels. It is just not for me at this time.

 

[Runningwolf]

Is it bad if I come up with a name but there is already a commercial wine with the same name?
~Kate

Kate, It as absolutely perfectly ok to use a name already being used. I can't even begin to tell you how many times the name "Reflections" has been used. I came up with the name "Serenity" for one of my wines and a winery loved it so much they asked me if I would mind if they used it because no one else has that around here. I said of course not. But after we checked the TTB web site we saw it has been used at least 5 times. All I'm saying is if you saw a name you like and it fits your wine use it!

One thing I do is if I find a picture I really like and think it'll make a good label some day I'll save it to a special file. I also do this if I come up with a name I think would make a good wine name some day.

 

[Wiz]

Kate, I used to work for a company that introduced several new products each year. For each interval of 2 or 3 years these products were named after golf courses in the U.K. Pick a theme and go with it. I try to use some sort of rhyming name. For my fruit wines I have named them Blackberry Macho, Pina Pasión, Mango Chill, Papaya Mist, etc. For my grape wine I use a concentrate and call the wine cabernet sauvignon. I guess what I am saying, be as creative as you want or just stick to the basics. It's you that needs to be proud with what you have made.

Mike

 

[Fabiola]

I was just wondering, I finally got ink in my printer and I was going to print a few labels for some bottles I have aging. However, it's pretty tricky coming up with a name for my wine. Everyone here seems to find something unique to name their wine and they all have neat labels. Is it bad if I come up with a name but there is already a commercial wine with the same name? I am not selling this wine and have no intention of ever marketing it. It's only gifted to friends/family or drank by ourselves of course. Pretty much every cool name I can think of someone already thought of.
How dumb is it to make a label with the same name as a commercially available wine or do you think I should keep on brainstorming for something else I like?
~Kate

This is what I came up with

 

[NoSnob]

When I struggled with this I just came up with a hoity toity Chateau name followed by a street I live on. It sounded pretty authentic except to those who knew it was my street name! I did Google extensively to see if that name existed either in the U.S. or in Europe and apparently it does not, not that that really matters. Then I came up with another label name I sometimes use that reflects a unique local geographic feature.

If a particular winery name strikes your fancy, why not use it? Since we're not selling our wine I don't think any business would have a legal claim to forbidding our use of their name. Having an exclusive name does allow me to say I have a domaine not used elsewhere. Of course, any business could assume my winery name in a New York minute and I would have no recourse.

Here are some other (mostly harebrained) ideas:
Chez XX, Chateau XX, or Domaine XX
Funny animal images (the purple rabbit, the wet hen, the elusive snipe, etc.)
Special holidays or celebrations with significance to you and/or a SO
Transportation themes (trains, planes, autos, etc. - lots of good graphics available for this)
Themes using your ethnic or cultural heritage (mama maloney, aunty's cellar, emerald isle vineyards, etc.)
Unique geographic features (mountains, waterfalls, lakes, highways)

The wine label producers all have label galleries that could give you some good ideas. You could try NoonTime or MyOwnLabels online for suggestions.

Let us know what you came up with!

NS

 

[UBB]

This is what I came up with

I especially like the last one!

 

[Wiz]

Further NoSnob's post, I live in Costa Rica (a Spanish speaking country), on the side of a defunct volcano at about 4000 ft. elevation. The name on all my labels of who made each wine is "Vinos Montaña".
Mike

 

[Neviawen]

Here's one that I came up with. Don't laugh. It is similar to another wine label I saw somewhere but I modified it, changed the name a bit to fit my wine, etc. I plan on changing the witch and name of wine for each different wine I made. There's a ton of witches that I can pick and choose from. Witches come in all flavors!

 

[Dianna]

Kate, you could try taking one of the names you like and running it through a translator on the internet for different languages.
that is what I did and I am pretty happy with how it turned out. I started with German and italian because I was born in Germany and I just love the way the Italian language sounds.
I love the Witch label - run with it, but try the translator if you get stuck on wording.