Redskins celebrate 80th season with commemorative wine

With the National Football League into its second week of the regular season, many teams are already on a win-lose roller coaster. One such team is the Washington Redskins, which, after winning its first game against the highly regarded New Orleans Saints, lost to the St. Louis Rams this past Sunday.

While the team may be attempting to figure out how to start winning again, it’s also celebrating its 80th birthday. An event that is worth its own wine reserve, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, a local newspaper.

The professional football club approached Nick Goldschmidt to produce its commemorative vintage. The vintner had very short notice to prepare his 2011 Redskins Reserve Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon.

“To get a 2011 wine this young and to be this ready, we took extra pains to be sure it was going to be drinkable on release,” Goldschmidt told the paper.

While the source may claim that “drinkable” is an understatement of the quality of the wine, the main point is that the wine is adorned with a commemorative, custom label that celebrates the franchise’s 80th birthday.

The label itself is simple and white, with the border in the team’s gold color and the emblem – in the bottom center – containing both the gold border and maroon fill. In the upper left corner, is the word “Reserve” vertically written in maroon with the grape’s varietal and location following in much smaller golden letter. Overall, the label is very quiet yet clean and attractive.

It’s clear that much thought was put into the label, despite the actual bottling process being put to the last minute. Regardless of the preparation, commemorative wines are a great way to boost sales for a temporary period and provide an excellent outlet to create custom labels that aren’t part of the standard rotation of products.

In order for other vintners to take advantage of any commemorative opportunities and create these special wine labels, they may want to invest in a Primera LX900 color label printer.