ABC Deems Wine Label Pornographic

An art poster from 1895 has been deemed pornographic by the Alabama Beverage Control Board, forcing distributors to remove a wine bearing its image from stores across the state.

The label in question.

Earlier this week management at MBC United, a Birmingham-based company that distributed the wine throughout the state, was informed by the ABC that the label on Cycles Gladiator wines had been deemed pornographic, that the label hadn’t been properly approved by the board and it would now have to be removed from stores. The offending label carries a reproduction of an art poster done in 1895 by an unknown Parisian artist introducing the Cycles Gladiator bicycle. The poster depicts a nude woman with flowing red hair essentially flying through space with a bicycle.

The side of her breasts and buttocks are visible in the impressionistic image, but there is no depiction of genitalia. Still, the ban on the wine was apparently prompted by a complaint to the ABC.

“Somebody complained to the ABC, and they found there was improper brand registration,” said MBC’s on-premise sales manager for Mobile, Drew Flanigan. “It’s actually a piece of art. I’ve seen the print for sale in some furniture stores.”

Flanigan said the main reason the wine was pulled is because the label wasn’t properly approved. Cycles Gladiator wines have been sold in Alabama for more than three years, he said. All wine labels are subject to approval by the ABC.

“It was more of an issue of label approval, but the nudity brought it to their attention,” he said.

Flanigan stressed that MBC is abiding by the ABC’s ruling and dutifully picking up the Cycles Gladiator bottles they’ve put out and putting them in storage.

“It’s not a huge seller for us, but it’s a bit of a pain to do,” Flanigan said. “It’s interesting we’ve been selling it for this long and then this comes up.”

Bill Leigon, president of Hahn Family Wines of Nappa Valley, Cal., said the ABC did, in fact, approve the label when the wine came into the market in 2006, but suddenly changed its mind late last year. He said they were unaware of the new ruling until now when it was deemed pornographic. Leigon said this is a new phenomenon for the company, which has sold more than 600,000 cases of Cycles Gladiator across the United States and around the world since 2006. No one else has complained about the label art, he said.

“It’s still available in 49 other states,” he said.

Leigon said his company will dutifully comply with all state laws and is doing so in this matter.

As for the label art, he pointed out that it is, “one of the most sought-after pieces of art in the world.” Leigon said original lithographs of the Cycles Gladiator image go for up to $50,000 apiece, putting them on par with pieces done by famed Parisian lithographer Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

“When I first came up with the idea for the label, it’s because I saw it (the painting) everywhere,” Leigon said. The company uses the image on its wines and on cycling teams it sponsors.

“People love our jerseys, and we have the image on them,” he said.

As for where things go from here, Leigon said there is a less risqué version of the label, but he’s not sure if the company will decide to sell the wine here with that label in place, or if they’ll just stay out of Alabama altogether. The company only sells about 500 cases in Alabama annually, he said.

“We’re deciding now what to do or whether we’ll stay out of the state altogether,” Leigon said. “We would very much like to sell our product and sell it as is in the great state of Alabama.”

Calls to the ABC’s enforcement division were not immediately returned.