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Marilyn Monroe Naked: Now THAT’S Wine Marketing!
It was the very first centerfold of the very first issue of Playboy magazine. And now the famous image of a nude Marilyn Monroe is selling wine in a most imaginative way. The buyer of the collectors’ edition magnum of wine can undress her.
And I am not making this up.
The wine is the Marilyn Wines Velvet Collection 2003, a blend of 55 percent cabernet and 45 percent merlot from the Napa Valley that — oh, WHO are we KIDDING, we care about as much about what’s inside the bottle as we did about reading the articles in Playboy. These wines are collectors’ items, creatures of brilliant marketing, and wine quality is irrelevant.
The undressing part, you ask? Here’s what the Marilyn Wines web site has to say: “The historic nude portrait of Marilyn Monroe that graces Velvet Collection bottles is protected by a decorative plastic overlay that can be removed after purchase to reveal the stunning details of the original photo. Start at the upper right hand corner, using a fingernail, and carefully lift the plastic film away from the label.”
Slowwwww-ly.
This isn’t just a west-coast kind of thing. The Velvet Collection magnum is available locally. I saw it at Arrow Wine’s Far Hills store for $179.99, marked down from $220, but it may be available elsewhere as well.
But if you buy it, take it home in a brown paper sack — and hide it under the bed so your parents don’t find it.
Cheers!
Mark Fisher
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Comments
By susan
October 1, 2005 7:43 PM | Link to this
the marilyn label reminds me of a beer that was offered at alefest two years ago. it was from alsace and had a charming picture of a french girl on the label, her skirt kicked up in back to reveal her cute little derriere. since it was sold here, however, labeling restrictions required her to wear some panties that could be carefully removed by the beer drinker, sort of like scrapping the surface of a lotto card. i brought ‘fanny’ home, panties on and put the bottle on the kitchen window sill. within ten minutes of my arrival, my 20-year-old son had fanny undressed. another friend of mine, a wizened 35-year-old, was so intent on disrobing her he scraped right past fanny to the bottle glass. i guess he was too excited. hmmm. what is it about men and labels?