The discerning gentleman’s exotic wine club

I’ve been reading on Decanter.com that Playboy have launched their own wine club last year, offering such delights as the ‘Gentlemen prefer blondes’ case of ‘six sensual whites’, and ‘Sexy spicy Spanish reds’.  Only available in the States currently, (I know, gutted!) this titillating selection offers a rather unconventional spin on the traditional wine club, a service whereby you pay some money and a case of wine arrives by post.  There are countless wine clubs on the market now, some of them offering boutique wines from small producers, others offering savings per bottle by putting a very simple label on the wine.  Some of them will contact you offering great deals based on what you have purchased before – so if you once bought a mixed case of Italian reds they will try to sell you another one.  I know a lot of people who buy wine this way, although personally I’ve never done it.

Why do wine clubs appeal to people?  Well, they certainly seem to offer great value on the surface – many people are drawn in on the strength of vouchers offering up to £40 off your first case – I’ve just received one in an Amazon package.  If you only sign up for the heavily discounted first case, there is a good chance you will forget to cancel the next one, and when it arrives it is a right pain to post it back, much easier just to crack it open and start drinking.

The light drinkers among us like the simplicity of receiving a case every quarter – it saves us having to spend time choosing something we are not particularly interested in, and we will always have wine in our house for when visitors come.

I suppose it feels personal too – my dad orders his wine from a club and I swear it makes him feel special when they call him up and say ‘remember you bought all that Primitivo from us?  Well, you’re going to love this Montepulciano, and it’s at a really good price…’ in fact, they could be just making up grape names for all he knows but he goes for it every time.  And the wines are okay.   I’m not 100% sure what my objection is – maybe it is because the wines are just okay.  Maybe because I’ve seen friends open cases of wine that contained a lot of ‘fillers’… along the lines of ‘so you like Sauvignon Blanc?  Good news!   We’ve included a couple of rather old Romanian ones!’

Anyway, I don’t want to dwell on wine clubs because their staunch supporters won’t like this blog at all, and I don’t actually disagree with them, it’s just a personal thing.  So instead, I thought it might be rather fun to come up with some other ideas for mixed cases for the Playboy wine club.  After all, it seems to be, at the very least, offering something different for the discerning fast living wine loving gentleman – so I am certain they will appreciate my input.

Rampant reds.… a selection of wines whose names sound like the pseudonyms of adult film stars.  This case contains a couple of Tawny Ports, a Ruby Cabernet, a couple of cheeky Blauer Wildbachers, and a raw, sensual, Mavrodaphne.

Uninhibited…. A half case that is a lot less interesting than it sounds.  Unconstrained by convention, this half case of Natural Wines will really push the international Playboy’s buttons (in all the wrong ways).

Erotic Whites…. as per the reds above, the case features a couple of Emerald Rieslings, a Palomino (the Danielle Steel novel, not the horse) a robust Pedro Ximénez and a couple of saucy Sannio Falanghinas.

And finally, The ‘Lower your expectations’ mixed case…. for this affordable yet disappointing case for the international Playboy who realises he can’t get Scarlett Johannson, and knows bugger all about wine, I’ve done some research into grapes from the Vitis Labrusca and Vitis Rotundifolia hybrid vines, which are, to say the least, a bit crap.  In this case you will find the sordid misfits who were not destined to make it in the adult film industry… Crimson Seedless, Sweet Jenny, Granny Val, Late Fry, Richard Walden, and brilliantly, Jumbo.

Okay so this is very childish, but aren’t you glad you read this, and not some boring blog about wine clubs that you could have read on any old blog?!  If you have any innovative ideas for seductive wines that Playboy could include in their themed mixed cases, or alternate ideas for themed wine clubs that we could have in the UK to rival Playboy, we’d love to hear them…

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