Why Drink Canned Wine?


Why drink canned wine?

Canned wines are booming because they offer us convenience (easy to throw in a bag when heading to a friend's house or the park), smaller serve sizes (you don’t have to commit to drinking a full bottle) and they have a positive environmental benefit too. All really important factors as conscious consumers in our purchasing decisions for 2021 and beyond.

They are also fantastic at breaking down the pomp and complexity that wine can be perceived to carry, which can be a barrier to lots of people. They have the potential to be a brilliant open door to bringing wine into more people’s everyday life.

To be honest, the UK is far behind the USA in terms of its canned wine scene, so expect further developments. More and more premium wineries will begin to use cans as one of the formats their wines are sold in. It isn’t just grab-and-go everyday wine.

What are the benefits of canned wine?

The benefits of canned wine are the convenience and the small serves – if you just fancy the one glass, you can grab a can from the fridge and you’re off. Also, sustainability, as cans are recyclable and crucially much lighter in weight than glass bottles, so the fossil fuels burned transporting them is far lower. Which, of course, is great. Plus canned wines use far less, or even no, sulphites.

What are the negatives of canned wine?

They are totally fine and suitable for young wines, meant to be drunk immediately. But, their shelf-life is often around a year, so unsuitable for ageing wine. In addition, the development of the wine you get over time in a bottle, through the cork, isn’t possible in the airtight confines of a can. So, they’re only for easy drinking, young wines.

Should you drink canned wine from the can, or pour it into a glass?

This is always asked – the short answer is, do whatever you want to do. Most canned wines in the UK at the moment are fresh, spritzy styles that taste great from the can but as more premium wines begin to be sold in cans I think we’ll start pouring them into glasses as we do with a bottled wine more and more. The rule of thumb is, if you’ve paid lots of money for your can then you probably want to get it in a glass and stick your nose in it a bit to get the full character and experience of the wine.