Wine capsules dropped in Waitrose trial

This week Waitrose started selling wine bottles without the plastic sleeves around the neck of a wine bottle.

Barry Dick, MW and Beer, Wine and Spirit Sourcing Manager for Waitrose said Bottle neck sleeves were introduced many years ago to prevent pests such as moths and weevils from ruining wines kept in dark, damp cellars. The caterpillars of this moth species would bore into the wine corks, causing the wine to leak, or taste musty. Nowadays few people have wine cellars and those who do tend to keep them in much better conditions. This has meant that the sleeves have remained for purely aesthetic reasons and are no longer needed to protect wine.

Waitrose’s own brand Loved & Found wines will test the lack of a neck
foil, but the hope is to make opening bottles of wine easier and save half a tonne of unnecessary packaging per year.

Trincadeira - Alentejo - Portugal - 2021 vintage - £8.99
Zibbibo - Sicily - 2022 vintage - £8.99
Mascalese - Sicily 2022 vintage - £8.99
Lacrima, Marche Italy - 2021 vintage - £8.99