# What year do you put on your wine labels?



## Hillbilly Bill (Dec 13, 2009)

I have seen this subject touched upon, but the threads always seem to diverge into discussions about label design, software, etc... hence the new thread dedicated only to the year on the wine bottle label

Tonight I bottled the remainder of my first batch of wine. I made my own labels and put the month/year on the label when the wine was bottled.

However... I read this week that wines are identified by the vintage of the grapes/fruit that the wine is made from. For instance, I may not bottle my grape wine until February, but most likely the grape vintage is from the previous year (or older). So... a grape wine bottled in February 2010 would actually be a 2009 vintage wine unless it came from the Southern Hemisphere and was extremely fresh.

There are all kinds of extenuating circumstances that can complicate this issue, but I will not get into that in this introductory post. I will simply ask: 

*How do you guys determine the year you put on your wine bottle labels?*

HB


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## Tom (Dec 13, 2009)

That's correct. Retail labels have the year the grape or fruit was picked. Some of the home winemakers use a "Bottled
on Date"


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## Runningwolf (Dec 13, 2009)

MM/DD/YYYY it was bottled. But I only do kits and juice.


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## St Allie (Dec 13, 2009)

Mine have the date bottled on them.. mainly fruit wines and I need them to be bottled a certain length of time before opening.

Allie


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## Tom (Dec 13, 2009)

Yea I have a "born" on month and year on my labels


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## Wade E (Dec 13, 2009)

I use that year the fruit was picked!


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## Luc (Dec 14, 2009)

Most of my wines do not age in the carboy.
They are bottled as soon as finished and clear which is typically a few months after starting the wine.
Therefore I put the bottling date on the label.

Luc


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## BobF (Dec 14, 2009)

Bottled date here, same as Luc.


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## rawlus (Dec 14, 2009)

i use a neck label with pertinent details and a series number for begun date, bottled date and sequence number... like 100309・110409・001, in addition to this info, i have vintage year and ABV as well as a box to put in 1/30, 2/30, 3/30, etc. bottle number and total bottling.
the bottle labels are generic for white and red wines for economy's sake... just some original artwork i painted and a black full bleed label for red wines and a white background label for whites.


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## BobF (Dec 14, 2009)

rawlus said:


> i use a neck label with pertinent details and a series number for begun date, bottled date and sequence number... like 100309・110409・001, in addition to this info, i have vintage year and ABV as well as a box to put in 1/30, 2/30, 3/30, etc. bottle number and total bottling.
> the bottle labels are generic for white and red wines for economy's sake... just some original artwork i painted and a black full bleed label for red wines and a white background label for whites.


 
OK, OK, you win!


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## rawlus (Dec 14, 2009)

haha. lol. what do i win?


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## BobF (Dec 14, 2009)

rawlus said:


> haha. lol. what do i win?


 
Free entry to Tom's next wine party! ;-)


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## Tom (Dec 14, 2009)

OR,
next Wine Club Meeting


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