Want to make your wine taste better? Put it in an expensive-looking decanter

I’m not kidding. According to research by Professor of Marketing Baba Shiv and his fellow research team published in a scientific journal called Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the cost—or the perceived cost—of a bottle of wine affects how we judge it. According to the paper, which was authored by a number of Caltech and Stanford humanities, marketing and business experts, wine drinkers in their study did not do what’s called “rationalising” i.e. considering that a wine may taste better due to its higher price tag. They actually enjoyed the wine that was posed as more expensive. They genuinely experienced a better tasting wine.

To prove their hypothesis, the team used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to conduct the study, testing 20 subjects as they sampled three different Cabernet Sauvignons and a neutral tasteless control solution through a pump attached to their mouths to reduce movement which could affect the fMRI results. Blood flow to the brain was then measured. The wines were tasted in random order along with a price identifier—two of the wines were tasted twice, once with their actual RRP of $5, and again with a 900% price markup to $45. The second was identified by its RRP of $90 and then administered again with a 900% reduction to $10. The third wine was tasted once at its actual RRP of $35. The test subjects were asked to judge the “pleasantness” of each wine sample, and did this almost 100 times. 

The researchers found significant differences in the subjects’ individual ratings for the wines they tasted twice. Unbeknownst to them, they’d been tasting the same wine, but enjoying it more when they’d been told it was more expensive. They hadn’t been pretending, their brains actually lit up like they’d really sipped a better quality wine.

So if you want your guests to enjoy that corner shop Cabernet more, shine-up the cut crystal and tell them it’s a special bottle. You’re not lying. You’re doing them a favour.