Tue 30 Aug 2011
A Sticky Situation
By
d'Arenberg's Chester Osborn
I know many members will adore the wine, so I shipped a small quantity (it’s very rare).
Straightforward so far. More complicated has been the debate it has caused at our office in Stevenage. The wine’s name, as you might expect from Chester, is especially quirky, quite lewd sounding in fact, and some may even say offensive (despite being technically correct)…
…see for yourself on d’Arenberg’s website.
Should The Wine Society list it in all its glory or not? We would be interested in your comments.
Pierre Mansour
Australia Buyer
Publish in its full glory…it is an interesting read on how it got that name! Plus, given you need to be 18 to be ordering from the Society, I would be disappointed if nobody could handle the name tag at that age…
Given the origin of the name (which is not at all rude) it should be listed in full.
I’d say go with it – the name is correct and I guess has the desired effect of getting people talking about it.
If Thomas Crapper can be mentioned in polite company, why not Herr Fuckel? I’d hope Society members would be interested in the explanation.
I’d buy it for the name alone, but can’t see it causing offence to anyone.
Definitely publish it, whether it is lewd or not is in the mind of the reader, I look forward to selecting it for one of my hobby business wine tasting events- my company’s name is Spit or Swallow Wine Tasting.
An ‘assexual spore’. Is the name a tautology? Do keep the full name, as it can be ordered thus: “Nudge, nudge, wink, wink – know what I mean?”
Poor Dr Fuckel, list it for heaven’s sake
Absolutely publish in full – that’s its name. The Society is responsible for making sure it’s good wine, not for censorship. I had a colleague once who had a problem with the pronunciation of Shiitake mushrooms, but you don’t see restaurants keeping them off the menu in case of offence.
on balance I would go with it but I can understand you pausing for thought given what I imagine your traditional customer base to be like. Most of them won’t be on Twitter of course.
As long as you believe it merits listing for quality/value/category reasons, then do so. Arguably one could take more issue with things like Cats Pee on a Gooseberry Bush, Arrogant Frog and all those other “witty” labels that emerged on the market in recent years.
Although they say sex sells, I’m not sure I’d like to read about it in next months wine society catalogue…
Seriously?! Who on earth in this day and age would be offended by this? What proportion of your members? Certainly not your blog-reading online-ordering twitterati. Perhaps some of the more traditional ones? But perhaps they would be offended with anything modern anyway …
Go for it! And put me down for some …
I’m surprised you need to ask! Go ahead; make my day, publish and be dammed
If it is the name of the wine then it should be published as is.
This is a scientific name with 4 of it’s letters that match a swear word so I don’t think there even needs to be any debate.
If the wine maker had just decided to call his wine a load of actual swear words then I just wouldn’t sell the wine to make my life easier.
I take it you don’t deliver to Scunthorpe?
Why not – I must get hold of a dozen
Yes, publish in full. Good to see that The Society is keen to hear members’ views and it has created debate!
Not one seemed to comment about Fukushima when the tsunami struck
Thank you all for taking the time to comment. Plenty of food for thought – with some hilariously witty messages reminding us that wine is, after all, about fun.
Yes. Publish the full name. At least it’s not a contrived name like FCUK!
By the way I had a nasy case of assexual spore once – must have caught it from Liana…
Go for it !
Fear ye not the righteous word, Publish and be damned!!!
Publish in full. Dr Fuckel shd not be punished post mortem, any more than Dr Titzling, (alleged) inventor of the brassiere. The only thing I find offensive is the phrase ‘Paradoxically to’ in the D’Arenberg website text: a solecism to be resisted, along with ‘Between … to’ and its cronies.
This sounds like King Riesling at its Aussie best. It’s not a question of should you stock it but why isn’t it here already? Buy, buy, buy!
Alas Martin, it’s a semillon/sauvignon and not another for your voluminous riesling collection! Hope all is well in Theale.
The erstwhile ‘other Martin’
Yes with a warning for people so they can’t complain. If they do complain anyway can I suggest you refund them their membership and ask them to shop elsewhere?