#Wine is the broad umbrella hashtag for posts about wine, which Wikipedia defines as “an alcoholic drink made from fermented grape juice.” On its own the tag is too general to reach a specific audience, so wine posts almost always pair it with narrower tags for the grape, the region, the style or the day of the year.
Origin
Wine itself is ancient: the earliest known traces were found near Tbilisi, Georgia, from about 6000 BCE, and the earliest known winery, Areni-1 in Armenia, dates to about 4100 BCE (Wikipedia). The hashtag has no documented first post. What is documented is the calendar of wine days that grew up around it, some older than social media and some built for it:
- “Wine Wednesday” is old drinking slang for a day of the week; etymologist Barry Popik traces a Wednesday wine promotion in print to a December 1973 restaurant ad in Annapolis, Maryland (Barry Popik).
- Wall Street Journal wine columnists Dorothy Gaiter and John Brecher invented Open That Bottle Night in the late 1990s; since 2000 it has been held on the last Saturday in February (Wikipedia).
- The Sonoma Index-Tribune credits social media marketer Rick Bakas with creating Cabernet Day in 2010, as a day for people to share tweets about the wine (Sonoma Index-Tribune).
- Wines of Argentina established April 17 as Malbec World Day in 2011 (Wikipedia).
How It’s Used
Brands use the tags as hooks for timely posts. On National Wine Day in 2016, which fell on a Wednesday, Amazon tweeted: “#NationalWineDay falls on #WineWednesday. Coincidence? We think not.” (PR Daily). Consumers use #Wine for tasting notes, bottle shots, winery visits and food pairings, with sub-communities around #NaturalWine, #OrangeWine and #RoseAllDay, and lifestyle humour under #WineOClock and #WineMom.
Wine Hashtag Set
| Group | Example tags | Use for |
|---|---|---|
| General | #Wine, #Vino, #WineLovers | Broad reach, any wine post |
| Varietal | #Malbec, #Chardonnay, #CabernetSauvignon | A specific grape |
| Region | #NapaValley, #Bordeaux, #Mendoza | Place of origin, wine travel |
| Style | #NaturalWine, #OrangeWine, #BoxedWine | Production method or format |
| Day | #WineWednesday, #MalbecWorldDay, #CabernetDay, #OTBN | Calendar moments (see below) |
| Trade | #SommelierLife, #WinePairing, #WineClub | Hospitality and sales |
Wine Day Calendar
| Day | Date | Started by |
|---|---|---|
| Open That Bottle Night | Last Saturday in February | Gaiter and Brecher, held since 2000 |
| Malbec World Day | April 17 | Wines of Argentina, 2011 |
| Cabernet Day | A Thursday around the start of September (Sept. 1 in 2016) | Rick Bakas, 2010 |
| Wine Wednesday | Every Wednesday | Long-standing slang, no single founder |
Platform Rules for Alcohol Content
Organic posts can use #Wine freely, but paid promotion is restricted. Meta’s ad standards say that “at a minimum, ads may not be targeted to people under 18,” set 21 as the US minimum, and bar alcohol ads entirely in countries such as Norway and Saudi Arabia (Meta). TikTok updated its policy in August 2024 to allow alcohol ads in some markets; in the US and Canada they must target users aged 25 or older, while promotion remains barred in the UK, Ireland and Australia (The Spirits Business).
Sources
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wine
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malbec_World_Day
- https://barrypopik.com/blog/wine_wednesday
- https://www.prdaily.com/wine-not-brand-managers-raise-a-glass-to-nationalwineday-online/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Gaiter_and_John_Brecher
- https://www.sonomanews.com/article/lifestyle/kathleen-hill-mcdonalds-recall-cabernet-day-and-great-tequila/
- https://transparency.meta.com/policies/ad-standards/restricted-goods-services/alcohol
- https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2024/08/tiktok-updates-alcohol-advertising-policy/