Jay-Z and Beyonce toast Obama with Ace of Spades

In a move befitting for hip-hop royalty, dynamic duo Jay-Z and Beyonce hosted a $40,000-a-ticket fundraiser for Barack Obama last night featuring a 350-bottle Armand de Brignac Champagne tower, as reported on db.com. Designed by Jeffrey Beers, the bespoke tower, composed of 350 bottles of Armand de Brignac Brut Gold NV, took centre stage at the glitzy event at Jay-Z’s 40/40 Club in New York.

“Floor-to-ceiling gold bottles fill the entire space. It’s beautiful, breathtaking. It’s the first thing you see when you walk in,” a spokesperson for the club told The New York Post. According to The New York Times, Obama kicked off the intimate dinner for 100 guests by thanking Beyonce and Jay-Z for their friendship. He went on to say that he felt a sense of kinship with Jay-Z because, “we both have daughters and our wives are more popular than we are.”

Beyonce’s speech was short and sweet: “I can’t tell you how proud we are to host tonight’s event with President Obama. We believe in his vision,” she said as she introduced the US president. The White House, which meticulously controls Obama’s image, is not expected to release any photos from the dinner. Before the event, Obama made an appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman.

Jay-Z’s relationship with Armand de Brignac, produced by Champagne Cattier, stretches back to the Champagne’s launch in 2006, when bottles of it appeared in his music video for the single Show Me What You Got.

The fizz, a favourite of rappers such as Kanye West and Drake, is facing a false-advertising lawsuit from Krug and Dom Pérignon owners LVMH over claims that it is “rated the number one Champagne in the world,” which LVMH believes is “intentionally misleading consumers.”

White House gatecrasher sued over wine tours

Virginia's attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, has filed a lawsuit against the White House party crasher Tareq Salahi, claiming he defrauded customers who bought wine tours from his website, VirginiaWineTour.com. As reported on thedrinksbusiness.com, Salahi and his then-wife Michaele gained notoriety in 2009 when they gatecrashed a White House state dinner hosted by president Obama for Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh.

The controversial stunt landed the pair on reality TV show The Real House Wives of D.C. for a season. The lawsuit, filed on Monday in Fauquier County Circuit Court, accuses Salahi and his Virginia Wine Tourism Inc. and Celebration Entertainment Productions LLC of not delivering promised tours, not providing refunds for cancelled tours and misrepresenting businesses as “official partners.” Some customers reported their tours were cancelled the morning they were scheduled to begin due to a "vehicle malfunction.”

Others complained they were not taken to the wineries they were promised, that the mode of transportation wasn't what was advertised, or that that refunds, even those promised in writing, were never delivered. Cuccinelli said VirginiaWineTour.com displayed logos of several businesses, including United Airlines and Facebook, but that he had reason to believe that many, if not all, were not official partners.

Salahi is the sole director and presumed sole owner of Virginia Wine Tourism and the presumed sole member and manager of Celebration Entertainment Productions. The companies offer winery tours through VirginiaWineTour.com ranging from $200 to $1,350 per day. An attorney who represented Salahi in the past has not returned messages seeking comment. 

Wine in cans selling out Stateside

Young Americans are developing a thirst for wine in cans, according to Ben Parsons, owner of hip Denver-based urban winery The Infinite Monkey Theorem. Local retailers have been selling out of Parsons’ US$6.99 Sparkling Black Muscat in a 250ml can, emblazoned with the brand’s eye-catching monkey logo. The British-born winemaker launched the can last July with a reworking of the iconic Barack Obama blue-and-red “Hope” poster, with the tag line: “Yes, we canned.”

“I’ve always wanted to put wine in a can,” Parsons told thedrinksbusiness.com. “They’re user-friendly, recyclable, and cut through the pretension of wine. It’s a perfect fit for the brand.” Targeting the can at Millennial drinkers and generation X’s aged 21 to 40 has paid off. “It’s ideal for music venues, and I’m in talks with Virgin Atlantic to try and get it onto their in-flight wine list,” says Parsons, who admits the wine won’t age: “It’s got a one-year shelf life like any other can.”

The entrepreneurial winemaker is planning on going national and would like to take the can internationally in the near future, saying: “I’d love to see it in London nightclubs and vending machines in Tokyo, why not?” The stumbling block is its 250ml size, which is an illegal size for selling alcohol in some US states. “I’m petitioning to allow 250ml cans in all US states, it’s a crazy law,” says Parsons, who is about to unleash a canned sparking Syrah and Pinot Gris onto the market.

Surprisingly, given its peony pink colour and sweet flavour, Parsons has found the wine to be a huge hit with men, much to his delight. “I want to change people’s perception of wine and make them see it as an everyday drink. I’d like to see more producers put their wines in cans so it becomes more acceptable,” he says. The first US winemaker to offer wine in cans was forward thinking film director Francis Ford Coppola, who started selling sparkling wine Sophia Blanc de Blancs (named after his daughter), in hot pink 187ml cans in 2004.

Having enjoyed success in the US, Parsons is considering upping sticks and heading back to London to set up an urban winery somewhere suitably hip like Hackney or Shoreditch. “I could source top quality fruit from all over Europe and make a bunch of different wines. I’d like to open a casual dining restaurant beside the winery selling my wine on tap from kegs,” Parsons enthuses. If anyone can get Londoners drinking wine from a tap, he can.