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78 WINES&VINES November 2017 PACKAGING be realized with an increased price-point," Stebbins said. With cutouts, special effects and tex- tures, sleeves offer brand differ- entiation. Waterloo also offers eight-color UV glass screen- printed bottles. Shiny and shimmery is the new black for wine packaging, as we reported in our October packaging feature. Kurz Transfer Products introduced a novel process that applies foil directly to the glass, no label required, according to marketing coordinator April Lytle. Lytle said the process is still relatively new to North America, but European wineries have had many successful projects with it. Put it in the bottle Mobile bottlers provide such an important service to small winer- ies that cannot support an in- house bottling line. AT Mobil added a second mobile bottling line. Both provide self-contained nitrogen generators, in-line dry ink case printing (which saves a person and a label), laser bottle coding for time and date and hot glue case closure, which looks bet- ter and lasts longer, according to owner John Davis. Steam Sterilization on both trucks provides the Four Big E's (economy, efficiency, effectiveness and environmental). The new, MINI bottling and labeling line is designed especially for small lots, and fills bottles from 375 ml to 18 liters, Davis said. Ship it away When your precious bottles are ready to go, you'll want to protect them in transit. Traditional ship- pers use partitions for wine cases. Great American Paper (GAP Pack- aging) provides an upgraded ver- sion of these to box suppliers including Orora North America, Saxco and Tricor Braun, as well as international wine monarch Treasury Wine. The chip board partitions are especially green: fabricated from 100% recycled post-consumer mill- grade board, according to vice president of sales Jim Lindsay. Or you could blow them away with auto-inflatable wine packag- ing that allows shipments of one to 12 bottles by changing the box size. Just tear the inflatable per- forated unit to match bottle count, using a small tabletop machine that runs on 110 volts. High internal air pressure gives cushioning but is clear to let the receiver view the contents. The "shrouds" are fully curbside recy- clable, according to Inflatable Packaging owner Mich Tschantz. As many as 18,000 units fit on a single shipping pallet. Stock the tasting room From all our research into tasting rooms, we've learned that every one has a retail section, and that most of the best sellers are branded items. Proforma Wine Country, a woman-owned Napa business, brings them to clients with a solar-powered mobile showroom. Custom products in- clude shirts, vests, jackets, pet goods and more: more than 1 mil- lion items in all. Owner and cre- ative director Teri Beauchamp says she can provide "everything but the wine." Wine club premi- ums are another specialty. Trade shows are another venue for getting your brand out there with logo items, and Proforma Wine Country specializes in these. A staff artist can help create logo products in consultation with mar- keting departments, managers and owners. Most apparel and accessories can be ordered and decorated within one to two weeks; rush service is avail- able. Wine club gifts may take one to three months for delivery. Beauchamp has more than 100 winery clients in California as well as 15 in Texas, 75 in Oregon, 50 in Washington state and 15 in Vir- ginia. Wine country-related busi- nesses also use the service. The solar-powered mobile showroom allows California businesses to touch, feel and try on available products prior to ordering. Keep on shopping As mentioned earlier, this feature is just the tip of the iceberg. If these categories have whet your appetite, find contacts for these and similar vendors listed under "Packaging" starting on page 36. As always, we urge that you begin working with your packag- ing suppliers early in the game, and coordinate every piece of the puzzle so it fits seamlessly. These packages from Waterloo show screen-printed and full-sleeve options. The company applies sleeves in a steam tunnel. McDowell Packaging's technologies include foil stamping, micro embossing, rotary screenprinting and tactile features driven by a digital print engine.