Elton Sells America His Zero For $25

According to People, Elton John and David Furnish's zero-alcohol sparkling wine, Elton John Zero Blanc de Blancs, hit U.S. shelves Tuesday at $25 a bottle. The launch statement says celebrations "should include people who do not drink alcohol."

The machine does not explain itself. It just labels. Four decades of the most famous alcohol story in rock music belonged to this man, and the marketing department decided the cure is a better business than the disease. The name is doing all the work: Elton John Zero. One word and you are not thinking about wine, you are thinking about the story. That is the celebrity-drinks pipeline in a sentence. The grape is a prop.

The details are the proof. $25 a 750ml, 100% Chardonnay from northern Italy, green tea extract for "tannins and texture." The brand page calls the bottle "a stamp of approval and quality from the Rocket Man," and the label is the blue off a greatest-hits album cover with a star on it. "Zero alcohol. Nothing taken away." Sure. It is already the best-selling premium 0% in the UK, and U.S. sparkling nonalcoholic wine sales are up 49%, which is the math of the sobriety business. Every sober person in America is a new customer who never has to feel left out.

Elton's own reason for the deal is the whole plan in one line. He says "you want to raise a toast to someone, toasting with water, it just doesn't do it." Correct. Water is free, and free cannot be rebranded. At $25 the toast is not about the drink, it is about the man on the label. Congratulations, Duke of Dry. Your hangover is now a franchise.

YOUR TURN: Would you pay $25 to toast a man who spent three decades toasting everything? Settle it below.