The new iPhone demands new Wine Apps. NOW!!

Amid the plethora of articles  reviewing iPhone wine apps (of which Jonathan Ray’s is but the latest), one question has remained unasked. Where are the wine producers?

We have apps that allow you to scan barcodes, apps that allow you to search and rate wines and apps that allow you to inventory your cellar. But where are the apps for the wines themselves? In music, art, film and fashion we have dedicated apps for brands, new releases, events and designers but in wine we are poorly served.

Until now. Well sort of. At the risk of appearing a Concha Y Toro fanboy, let me present the Casillero Del Diablo wine app for iPhone.

The clever boys and girls from Chile have actually produced a mobile version of their website (no doubt because the flash version doesn’t render on the iPhone) and a specific app for the iPhone itself.

They claim “both initiatives are conquering a space in the network, and becoming one of the most successful initiatives in the recent history of Casillero del Diablo”. Hmmm.

You can view the mobile site by clicking through to this link on your mobile browser http://diablowinesmobile.com/. Here you will find the story of the “legend” some nice advertising material, a store locator (USA only) and a whole bunch of other stuff. It renders well, and looks striking.

The iPhone app was created for the Peruvian market (yes, Peru) and is in Spanish only. You can still download it from the iTunes store in the UK by searching for Creasa Bores.

The application itself is basically a food and wine matching tool and it’s, well, a little underwhelming. For example you select your type of food e.g. Chinese (a pretty broad category there then) and then the app gives you a wine to drink e.g. Casillero Del Diablo Riesling. The wine itself is presented in the form of a rather badly scanned PDF. Yuk.

So, full marks for the mobile site and one star for the iPhone app. Let’s see more of these please.