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Friday 17 February 2012

Rude wine name offends Cantonese

7th February, 2012 by Patrick Schmitt

A wine brand from Chile is unknowingly offending Cantonese speakers in Hong Kong with its explicit name.

spacer Called Chilensis, the label, from Via Wines in Chile’s Maule Valley, loosely translates as “f*cking nuts” according to a source in Hong Kong.

Following local press reports about the rude label demand has in fact soared for the wine, pushing prices up for Chilensis by HK$10 in a matter of days.

The wine was selling for HK$49 in Hong Kong off-licences and supermarkets, but has now risen to HK$59.

News of the inadvertently offensive brand name highlights the need for caution when releasing labels in the Far East.

Indeed, it has been reported by db before that Château Latour may have failed to perform as well as fellow first growths in the important Chinese market because its name loosely translates as “to fall down” – which is unfortunate considering the exchange of Bordeaux grand crus classés in business circles, particularly after important deals have been concluded.

Other embarrasing translations come from the soft drink sector, where, for example, Pepsi mistakenly used the slogan “Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back from the Grave” when trying to translate “Pepsi Brings you Back to Life” into Chinese.

Similarly, Coca-Cola’s first attempt to translate its brand into Chinese with “Ke-kou-ke-la” acutally meant “female horse stuffed with wax”, although the current “Ko-kou-ko-le” translates as the rather more suitable “happiness in the mouth”.

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This article was published on Tuesday, February 7th, 2012 at 10:17 am. You can follow any responses to this article through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response.

9 Responses to “Rude wine name offends Cantonese”

  1. spacer Stephen Mack says:
    February 8, 2012 at 1:11 am

    Whoever the source is which has suggested such a meaning for this name does not have a very good grasp of Cantonese. Such potential offence would only be caused if the wine was called Chilensin. Nothing spoils a good story more than the truth. .

    Reply
  2. spacer Chester Worthington says:
    February 8, 2012 at 2:35 pm

    I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t have been in the news if some who reside in Hong Kong were not offended. Twists of truth or not.

    Reply
  3. spacer The Sediment Blog says:
    February 8, 2012 at 4:09 pm

    Phew – thought for a moment it was C*ntflaps…

    The Sediment Blog

    Reply
    • spacer Winehos says:
      February 16, 2012 at 4:46 pm

      Hilarious.

      Reply
  4. spacer David says:
    February 8, 2012 at 11:47 pm

    “Following local press reports about the rude label demand has in fact soared for the wine, pushing prices up for Chilensis by HK$10 in a matter of days.”

    Am i missing something…just why do i need caution in naming wines in the Far East if the result is soaring demand?

    Reply
  5. spacer Stephen Mack says:
    February 9, 2012 at 12:16 am

    As much as I admire Chester’s faith in the media of only reporting genuine concern, there is not one single Chinese character which has the ‘s’ sound at the end of it so there is not one single Cantonese speaker who could possibly understand, let alone be offended, by the name of the wine.

    Reply
  6. spacer Alejandro says:
    February 9, 2012 at 8:17 pm

    They got lucky this time, and the marketing blunder turned out to be beneficial. But if the mistake had turned out to be something like “You have no honor”, or “your mother has the face of a horse’s ass”, I don’t think they would’ve had the profitable results they did this time.

    Reply
  7. spacer Punk Rock Stud says:
    February 15, 2012 at 2:34 am

    I think the high time has come to creatively insult the hell out of every market using every marketable word and make a killing slyly off of wines and other services.

    Reply
  8. spacer Punk Rock Stud says:
    February 15, 2012 at 2:39 am

    *hick* lets get sloshed! their all fu*cking nuts *hick* com’on! *hick*

    Reply
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Hong Kong, Latour, Wine,

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