Revisiting Bartles & Jaymes Wine Coolers: 33 Years Later
My Senior Picture, Redan High School Class of 1987
As we see posts of the Senior Challenge in support of all the high school seniors who had their world upended with today’s new Covid-19 reality, you can’t help to flashback to a time far, far away. A few months ago, I was surprised to receive a kit with Bartles are & Jaymes wine coolers, my 17-year-old drink of choice.
Bartles & Jaymes Wine Coolers
It was a time of big hair, 80’s clothes and many bad decisions as I wasn’t technically of legal drinking age. But those Bartles & Jaymes orange flavored coolers were formative. And I truly had a lot of fun drinking them with my core group of high school friends at parties, dances, parking lots and at Stone Mountain Park.
It was a very different product today – no more glass, no artificial flavors, a new and sleek logo and now in aluminum cans with more adult-oriented flavors. But maybe that’s the point. It’s wine mixed with sparkling water and fruit. It reminded me of an alcoholic seltzer – not too fizzy, not too sweet.
I tried two – watermelon and mint and cucumber and lime. By far, the cucumber and lime was my favorite. It seems that both of us have grown up a bit. I’d love to come back to my 17-year-old self with a lot of advice today, but the nostalgia for me of this product remains.
