CalTech and Stanford prove Fred Franzia was right all along about the price of wine

January 14, 2008 10:55 AM PST

Study: $90 wine tastes better than the same wine at $10

Posted by Stephen Shankland |

This graph shows the activity in the brain's pleasure center; there's more activity with wine subjects think costs $90 a bottle (top line) than the same wine priced at $10. The arrow shows the moment when the subjects started tasting the wine.

(Credit: CalTech, Stanford)

In a study that could make marketing managers and salespeople rub their hands with glee, scientists have used brain-scanning technology to shed new light on the old adage, "You get what you pay for."

Researchers from the California Institute of Technology and Stanford's business school have directly seen that the sensation of pleasantness that people experience when tasting wine is linked directly to its price. And that's true even when, unbeknownst to the test subjects, it's exactly the same Cabernet Sauvignon with a dramatically different price tag.

Specifically, the researchers found that with the higher priced wines, more blood and oxygen is sent to a part of the brain called the medial orbitofrontal cortex, whose activity reflects pleasure. Brain scanning using a method called functional magnetic resonance imaging (FMRI) showed evidence for the researchers' hypothesis that "changes in the price of a product can influence neural computations associated with experienced pleasantness," they said.

The study, by Hilke Plassmann, John O'Doherty, Baba Shiv, and Antonio Rangel, was published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

This chart shows that people ranked taste of a $45 wine higher than the same wine priced at $5, and the same for a different wine marked $90 and $10.

(Credit: CalTech, Stanford)

The research, along with other studies the authors allude to, are putting a serious dent in economists' notions that experienced pleasantness of a product is based on its intrinsic qualities.

"Contrary to the basic assumptions of economics, several studies have provided behavioral evidence that marketing actions can successfully affect experienced pleasantness by manipulating nonintrinsic attributes of goods. For example, knowledge of a beer's ingredients and brand can affect reported taste quality, and the reported enjoyment of a film is influenced by expectations about its quality," the researchers said. "Even more intriguingly, changing the price at which an energy drink is purchased can influence the ability to solve puzzles."

http://thewinedirectory.blogspot.com/2008/02/fred-franzia-was-right-all-along-about.html

http://calnapawines.blogspot.com/2008/02/fred-franzia-was-right-all-along-about.html

http://affordablewines.blogspot.com/2008/02/fred-franzia-was-right-all-along-about.html

The Spyglass Spots: Two Buck Chuck fuels urban legends...

Two Buck Chuck fuels urban legends...

Since its debut in 2003, the insanely inexpensive Charles Shaw wine, better known as Two Buck Chuck, has fueled urban legends.

The fables persist because no one can image how a bottle of wine could cost $2 or $3.

Charles Shaw's bitter divorce, one story holds, ordered him to split winery profits with his ex. He responded by selling the wine at a loss, denying his wife a penny. Another tale holds that bankrupt airlines sold warehouses of wine at a discount to pay the bills.

The truth is less dramatic.

The man behind Two Buck Chuck is Fred Franzia. A nephew of Ernest Gallo and lifelong friend of the Mondavi family, he is perhaps among the most coarse and colorful people in the wine industry. He sells Charles Shaw so cheaply because he has taken advantage of the grape and wine glut. He started out purchasing grapes, juice and wine from desperate and anonymous growers and wineries. He still does that, but also owns about 80 square miles of vineyards.

I give part of the credit for the increasing quality of under-$10 wines, and the growing levels of wine consumption to Charles Shaw and Fred Franzia.


We love Fred!

This Guy is Right On The Money

This Guy is Right On The Money

Ed Martin says [and I agree] : "I completely agree with the premise of the show, which is you should enjoy the wines you drink. One of the things I hated about working in the wine industry was the attitude that some people have about wines. My attitude has always been, if you like how it tastes, continue to drink it, no matter how inexpensive it costs, where it was made, how it was made, and who made it. Everyone has different tastes (and differing number of taste buds). Good wineries can make bad wine. Inexpensive wines can be good.At any rate, Fred Franzia was really funny. His stance is very anti-wine snob, but the guy is a consummate marketer. He knows the majority of folks that drink his wines are not wine enthusiasts. Most are probably intimidated by wine snobs. He plays the anti-wine snob role very well to sell his wines. Coincidentally, Fred Franzia and Michael Mondavi were roommates at Santa Clara. Both are really good at marketing, but Fred's got the edge here."

Fred Franzia wants Everyone to enjoy wine: The miracle of "Two Buck Chuck”

If only Porter Rockwell and the boys had not pissed off Emma with their drinking and chewing tobacco mess, we might still be able to enjoy a little grape with dinner.....