Alcademics.com

Top Ways Liquor Websites Fail

Nearly all liquor websites are terrible for those of us looking for product information, brand history, or recipes. 

These things, you would think, would be their prime focus. As I spend a lot of time looking for product information, I have to deal with these sites all the time. 

Without realizing it, I have switched to an operating mode where I won't go to the website but will hunt down the PR contacts for the brand to send me information. Sometimes the PR contacts literally copy and paste the information from the website into my email, but you'd be surprised at how often the website information differs from the press information. 

Most liquor websites are so bad they are unusable despite spending thousands of dollars on them. Here's why. 

The Top Annoying Liquor Website Traits

• Having the 21+ check on the intro page be anything more than a yes/no question. (I understand it may be corporate policy, but it's one that cuts down on visits.)
• Having to put in the day/month/year of the 21+ check by erasing the values preset in the boxes ("mm/dd/yyyy") - so that's about 20 keys clicks before you can get into the site.
• Having to also include the country of origin in the age check. (If the age is over 21, isn't it legal in every country?)
• In the country of origin age check,  the top markets like USA/UK aren't the top selections- so you have to scroll down past Uganda to select them. 
• No "remember this" option for the age check
• A "remember this" option for age check that does not automatically forward you past it, so "remembering" it only does any good if you've bookmarked an internal page.
• The website is an all-lifestyle site with music and happy people drinking the product, with no product information.
• The website is only commercials that you can see on television. 
• No clear "music off" button on every page.
• The "music off" button resets to "on" when you switch pages.  
• A flash welcome screen or site, so it doesn't work on many cell phones. 
• All text is images or flash, so you cannot copy and paste the information. 
• Especially recipes, which you may want to copy and paste to print out and have somewhere near the bar, rather than the desktop computer in the office.
• All recipes are video demos.
• A "creative" recipe database like a kaleidoscope or blob that lets you only find random recipes rather than specific ones you want.
• A general misunderstanding of making things "fun to explore" vs. "hard to find".
• A zillion recipes with no search function.
• All the information/history/product information in a tiny little textbox with a scroll wheel. What about the other 80% of the page space? 
• Not up-to-date for months after new products launch.
• Auto-resizing your browser.

Top Good Things Few Liquor Websites Do

• Have a "media" section with shareable product/bottle/drink images
• Link to your official Facebook and Twitter and YouTube accounts
• Have contact information: an email that someone answers or a referral to your Facebook/Twitter accounts if someone answers that
• Rich information - the site offers deep research, tours of the distillery, geeky specifics for those who want it. 
• Have a lifestyle section, but it is launched from a "launch the site" button rather than being the entire site. Then go ahead and resize the browser. 

Good Booze, Bad Booze: A Longer Life That You Won't Remember

One day science says drinking will make you live forever. The next day science says it will kill you tomorrow. Good Booze, Bad Booze is an Alcademics category where I put all these stories together.

8/31/10:Heavy Drinkers Outlive Nondrinkers  [link]

From Time: "But a new paper in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research suggests that — for reasons that aren't entirely clear — abstaining from alcohol does actually tend to increase one's risk of dying even when you exclude former drinkers. The most shocking part? Abstainers' mortality rates are higher than those of heavy drinkers."

Previous Good Booze, Bad Booze

8/24/10:One daily glass of wine 'can double risk of breast cancer'  [link]

8/22/10: Binge drinking exponentially increase heart risk in men with hypertension [link]

8/18/10: Moderate drinking, especially wine, associated with better cognitive function [link]

8/15/10: Drinking regular beer several times a week may up a woman's risk of developing psoriasis [link]

7/28/10: Drinking alcohol can 'reduce severity' of arthritis [link]

7/19/10: Stroke risk may double in first hour after a drink [link]

6/25/10: Red Wine Compound Could Point to Treatment for Eye Diseases [link]

6/22/10:Another reason to enjoy a glass of red wine [link]

5/19/10: People Who Drink Half Bottle of Wine a Day Are Healthier, Study Finds [link]

4/22/10: Red wine may protect the brain against stroke damage [link]

3/12/10: Beer Consumption Increases Human Attractiveness to Malaria Mosquitoes [link]

3/07/10: Forget salad, WINE 'makes women slimmer' [link]

2/08/10: Beer May Be Good for Your Bones [link]

1/29/09: Switching to lower-alcohol wine 'prevents cancer'  [link]

12/11/09: Beer for Your Prostate? Pistachios Against Cancer? Studies We Wish Were True  [link]

12/11/09: Three glasses of wine a week 'increases risk of breast cancer' [link]

11/19/09: Resveratrol Exhibits Antiviral Properties in Italian Study [link]

11/19/09: Alcohol 'protects men's hearts'  [link]

see plenty more news stories after the jump...

Top Misspellings on Cocktail Menus

I see certain words misspelled over and over on cocktail menus. Most of them are brand names in conflict with spellcheck. 

 

1.  St. Germaine
2. Liqueur vs. Liquor
3. Domain de Canton
4. Absolute Vodka
5. Hanger One Vodka
6. Caiparinha 
7. Lavendar 
8. Chartreuce 

Nickt-pickers: what else am I missing? 

A Homemade Giant, Crystal Clear Ice Cube Tray

As you're probably aware, I've been dabbling in experiments making clear ice at home. The way I've found that works best is to freeze ice in an Igloo cooler with the top off. (Please read the post before you tell me to boil the water in the comments- it doesn't work.)

This is now how I make all my ice at home- I haven't used trays in months.

Now I am working on ways to best carve ice and also trying to create an ice cube tray that will work in this directional freezing system. I found a method that works that I need to perfect.

Here's what I've done.

I went down to The Container Store and purchased these plastic gift boxes. They're 2 inches by 2 inches wide (4.5 centimeters) and around 5 inches tall (11.5 cm) with the tops off.

These I put in my Igloo cooler. I've done it with the open top of the container facing up, and also facing down. Facing down works better, actually, because the air in the rectangles gets pushed out the bottom. Facing up, you get a 1cm cloudy patch at the top of the cubes. No big whoop.

Then I fill the cooler with water and freeze it. It comes out as a block of ice with the cubes stuck in it.

These separate surprisingly easily from the block.

Also surprisingly easy is how the ice pops out of these plastic containers. I just leave them upside-down for a couple minutes and the ice cubes slice right out.

As you can see in the above picture, there is a little bit of cloudiness when the trays are left with the open part facing up. I repeated this experiment with the open part facing down and there was less cloudiness. Either way, there isn't much to worry about as it can be cut off when cutting these big long cubes down to 2 inch by 2 inch by 2 inch ones.

Conclusions:

• These ice cubes are fricking awesome.
• I need to try it with cutting off the bottom of the containers so that they're a rectangular tube rather than a box. 
• I think this is actually scalable to make an ice cube tray with some tweaking. 
• Hooray!