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Paris Hilton to be new face of Bordeaux
April 1, 2007
 By Oliver Styles
American heiress Paris Hilton will be the new face of Bordeaux wines, decanter.com can reveal.
Hilton, 26, is set to feature in a TV, poster and print campaign to run throughout the summer and autumn in Europe and the US.
It is understood the ads, which will feature the strapline, 'Paris: One Night in Bordeaux', will be announced at the Vinexpo trade fair in Bordeaux in June this year.
An insider told decanter.com the millionaire socialite herself would launch the campaign on the first day of Vinexpo, arriving at the fair – which is attended by more than 50,000 members of the international wine trade – in a hot air balloon.
'She will descend in a golden dirigible,' the source said, adding that safety regulations had caused headaches for organisers.
'They eventually compromised by allowing the landing zone to extend into the lake in case of an overshoot,' he said.
The Bordeaux wine trade body (CIVB) said that it was planning a new campaign to be launched 'in the autumn' but refused to confirm or deny Hilton's involvement.
This is not the first time Hilton has lent her image to a wine brand: last year she launched Rich, a canned Prosecco, in Austria (pictured). It is however a first for Bordeaux: the CIVB has never employed an international A-list celebrity as part of an advertising campaign.
The visit of the notorious jet-setteuse has set Bordeaux abuzz with speculation - mainly about which chateau she will stay at.
'There was a lot of discussion,' said another well-placed source. 'She [Hilton] liked the oriental feel of Cos d'Estournel, but found Chateau Palmer “scary” and Petrus “poky”. She will probably spend the night at Lafite, as she has family connections with the Rothschilds.'
Vinexpo begins on 17 June.
Have your say...
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 Poisson d'avril !
Good one though.
Maggie Rosen
Nice one guys.
Richard James, Thuir, France
What do you do if you want people to stop thinking your wine is expensive, shallow, pointless and without taste? Clearly the CIVB's view is to employ someone with, erm, all those qualities, and who is famous for being famous, not for actually achieving anything in life. Of all the possible "celebrities" in the world (and I use the term generously) this has to be the worst possible choice.
Richard Pepper, UK
...and Happy April Fool's Day to all at Decanter.com (I hope!)
Steven Kolpan, Professor, Wine Studies, The Culinary Institute of America, NY, USA
You had me going there for a moment. Allllll-most had me. That's either a sad commentary on how gullible I am or on the state of wine marketing today, that this seemed, for a moment, entirely plausible.
Mark Fisher, USA
Excellent.
Laurent Fortin
Good to see that you have a sense of humour.
C. Steven Trenholme, Toronto, Canada
I can't stop laughing...
John, Ohio
Thank you so much! This is the best April Fools' joke I've
encountered all day...
Manuel Camblor, New York, NY, USA
Oh dear, I fear a lot of people will believe this.
Nice one, though.
Bernard Carpinter, Journalist, The Dominion Post, Napier, New Zealand
It is hard to believe that the CIVB is planning to associate
Bordeaux' wines image to the pathetic figure of Paris Hilton, a fake celebrity known
for her tireless pursuit of fame by means of tasteless apearances and idiotic episodes, noticed and comented only because of her position as the heiress of the Hilton fortune.
Surely her rather vulgar looks match perfectly a canned Prosecco launched Downunder, but who needs her doubtful gifts in Bordeaux? The first growths, glorious seconds and assimilated or the struggling producers of lesser known Châteaux?
In both cases the association seems contrary to the image that Bordeaux needs to project of all its levels of production : true and reliable quality, sound investment, delicious wines.
Your informer must have got it wrong and Miss Hilton is actually trying to pay to associate her doubtfull charms to the glory of this great region.
François Sportiello
Ha! Thanks for the April Fool's pick-me-up.
David Furer, Brighton, UK
What were they thinking? They should be spending their money improving the quality of the wines (see these pages, "Bordeaux region is the biggest purchaser of wood chip") rather than spending on an overpriced, ostentatious, mediocrity, living from her predecessors' reputation…………ahhha! I see……….
Chris Davey
How come they didn't choose Mister Bean?
Mr Jean de Lataulade, Rouge et Blanc Ltd, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Well done! I started reading the article, but realized the absurdity in time…
Thanks for starting my Monday morning off with a chuckle.
Don Clemens, Terlato Wines International, Lake Bluff, IL, USA
And they say the Britts have no sense of humor...
Nice job!
Jim Williamson
It is funny but immediately recognisable as an April Fool because French law forbids the use of any celebrity to promote wine, unless that celebrity has a vested interest in the wine, such as ownership of the winery or being a winemaker. Still it reflects your wonderful Publisher's sense of humour.
Bartholomew Broadbent, Broadbent Selections, San Francisco, USA
So Paris is the new face of bordeaux wines....that's rich, pun intended. She who was caught with a DUI, drove with a suspended license and now waits temporary jail time in Lynwood County. From what I've read, she's having intense emotional problems. Sorry...but she wasn't thinking that at the time, she was speeding, sans headlights to get something to eat, not having eaten all day yet drinking down a margarita on an empty stomach no less. It's bad enough to get a DUI but to drive with a suspended license because your publicist said it was ok and you signed a piece of paper which you didn't bother to read.
Paris, where is your common sense.
Paris is a beautiful woman and although she's a mere 26, chronologically, and a marketing whiz with great savvy, that doesn't mean she walks through life thinking through what she does.....first. The "party girl" has caught up with her.
Carol Mariane Nye
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