Wine, Meet Your Future: Plastics

Winner will live in California, Tweet about wine

(NEWSER) - Hardy Wallace recently lost his job—but he’ll soon be making $10,000 a month promoting Murphy-Goode winery on the Web, as the winner of the much-touted “Really Goode Job,” the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The Atlantan, who has a wine blog and has taken sommelier education courses, was first in line at the recruitment drive and says, “I was trying to get this job before there was this job.” More»

Wine can go bad after less than a year

(NEWSER) - Some are looking to recycled plastic bottles as the future of wine packaging—but though they are more eco-friendly, such bottles are less wine-friendly, Reuters reports. They’re “fine for wine you plan to use under 12 months, but not for wines that are designed to improve in the bottle,” says the managing director of plastic bottle maker Portavin. “Simply put, air travels through plastic but not through glass.” More»

(NEWSER) - A California winery has a tempting offer for tech-savvy oenophiles, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The Murphy-Goode Winery will set up the right candidate with a $10,000-a-month job at its Sonoma County HQ blogging and Twittering about, well, wine. The 6-month gig includes room and board; the 2-month hiring process is expected to draw 10,000 applicants and is already yielding good PR. More»

Award-winning German winegrower ruined

(NEWSER) - An award-winning German winegrower has lost his crop of grapes to a band of brazen thieves just before harvest time. Almost three tons of high-quality red grapes destined to become wine were stolen overnight by bandits who brought their own harvest machine, reports Der Spiegel . Wine experts believe the theft was carried out by a desperate winegrower who lost his own crop to frost or hail, and the culprit will be found when a winemaker not known for quality produces a superb product this year. More»

Seriously, nobody is happy about it

(NEWSER) - One from the Bad Taste Hall of Fame: A Long Island winery is getting slammed for its decision to release two new wines ... in honor of 9/11. Almost every detail about the wine, as reported by the LA Times , is cringeworthy. The price? $19.11 a bottle. What to expect from Lieb Family Cellars ' 9/11 Memorial Commemorative Chardonnay? It finishes "with a toasty vanilla flavor." The marketing? The grapes were grown "90 miles from the site of the World Trade Center"! The chunk of the proceeds that will be donated to the National September 11 Memorial and Museum? Just 6% to 10%. More»