EU Wine E-Label — User Guide

A friendly walkthrough for vineyards, importers, and brand managers using the EU Wine E-Label app to give every bottle a compliant digital label.

1. What this app does

When a consumer scans the QR code or NFC tag on a bottle, the EU Wine E-Label app shows them a clean, mobile-friendly page with everything required by the EU's 2024 wine labelling rules:

• Wine identity — name, vintage, colour, category, alcohol %
• Grape varieties and tasting notes
• Producer and bottler details
• Storage guidance
• Certifications (Organic, Biodynamic, PDO, PGI, Vegan, …)

The page is automatically translated into the consumer's language and inherits the look and feel of whatever surface it appears on.

Allergens, ingredients and nutrition declarations are handled by separate dedicated SmartLinks apps installed alongside this one. Each presents its data according to the relevant legislation.

Who it's for: vineyards, négociants, importers, and distributors who need to comply with EU labelling rules without hand-building a label page for every SKU.

2. The big idea — set it once, override only when needed

Wine information cascades through three layers, lowest priority first:

1. Vineyard — winery name, address, certifications. Set once for your entire catalogue.
2. Wine facts (defaults & rules) — the label info itself, set either:
   • as a global default that applies to every bottle, or
   • as a rule that applies to a group of wines (e.g. "all reds" or "all Burgundy Pinot Noirs").
3. Product overrides — only the fields that genuinely differ for this specific wine (vintage, lot number, exact ABV).

Anything you set at a more specific layer wins over the layers below it. You only ever enter common information once.

3. First-time setup (5 minutes)

Step 1 — Set up your vineyard

Open the admin. The first thing you'll see is a yellow banner inviting you to Set up your vineyard. Click it.

Fill in:

Save. You can reopen this any time from the Edit vineyard button at the top right of the admin.

Step 2 — Add a global default

Now you'll see the Wine facts workspace. On the Global tab, click + New and fill in any defaults that are true of most of your wines — things like country of origin, bottler statement, storage advice. Save.

That's enough to get a working label for every bottle in your catalogue.

Step 3 — (Optional) Add rules for groups of wines

Switch to the Rules tab if you want different defaults for a subset of your catalogue — for example, all your reds, all your Burgundy wines, or all your sparkling.

Click + New, then:

1. Define the rule — pick one or more facets (e.g. Wine Style = Pinot Noir, Region = Burgundy). The rule matches any product carrying all of those facet values.
2. Fill in the fields that should apply to that group — colour, category, typical ABV, tasting notes, etc.

Save. Every matching product now picks up those values automatically.

Step 4 — (Optional) Per-product overrides

Open the admin from a specific product (the URL will include productId=…). The Product tab shows up. Override only the fields that genuinely differ for this bottle — typically vintage, lot number, and the precise ABV.

4. Day-to-day — what consumers see

A consumer scans the bottle's QR or NFC tag. The platform routes them to the public label, passing along their language preference.

The label they see, top to bottom:

1. Header — winery name (small caps), wine name, vintage, colour, category, alcohol %, and a PDO/PGI badge if applicable.
2. Grape varieties — chips with optional percentages.
3. Tasting notes — italicised quote.
4. Details grid — alcohol, net quantity, country of origin, lot number.
5. Storage — guidance text.
6. Producer — full address, producer ID, bottler statement.
7. Certifications — coloured chips.
8. EU regulation footer — the legal disclosure.

Translations are picked automatically from the URL — consumers do not see a language switcher, by design. This keeps the label clean and EU-compliant.

5. Editing later

• Edit your vineyard — click Edit vineyard at the top of the admin.
• Edit a default or rule — open the Global or Rules tab, pick the record, change the fields, save. Updates ripple instantly to every inheriting product (unless that product has overridden the changed field).
• Edit a single product — open the product admin and use the Product tab. Overrides take effect immediately.
• Reset an override — clear the field; the inherited value takes over.
• Delete a rule — products that matched it fall back to the global default (and any other matching rule).

6. Widgets

The app ships a small family of embeddable widgets that surface wine info on collection home pages, search results, dashboards, or any host page. They all read the same 3-tier wine facts, so what you see in the widget always matches the full label.

If a product hasn't been configured yet, widgets show a friendly empty state instead of partial data.

7. Bulk import (CSV)

For large catalogues, prepare a CSV with one row per wine and import it from the SmartLinks portal's import tool.

productId,wineName,vintage,wineColor,wineCategory,alcoholContent,netQuantity,netQuantityUnit,countryOfOrigin,grapeVarieties,lotNumber,bottler,storageConditions,tastingNotes
prod_001,Clos du Château 2021,2021,red,still,13.5,750,ml,France,Pinot Noir 100,L2021-CN-042,Mis en bouteille au domaine,Store 12-16°C,Deep ruby with dark cherry aromas
prod_002,Domaine Blanc 2022,2022,white,still,12.5,750,ml,France,Chardonnay 100,L2022-DB-019,Mis en bouteille au domaine,Serve chilled 8-10°C,Crisp citrus with mineral finish

💡 Tip. If you set up rules first and assign the right facets to each product, your CSV only needs the fields that genuinely differ per bottle.

8. FAQ

Q: I edited a rule — do existing wines update? A: Yes, instantly. Inheritance is resolved at view time, so every matching product picks up the change immediately on the consumer side.

Q: I deleted a rule — what happens to wines that used it? A: Their own product-level overrides stay put. Inherited fields fall back to the next matching rule, or to the global default.

Q: A consumer sees blank fields on the label. A: Check (1) a global default exists, (2) the product carries the facets needed for any rules you rely on, and (3) the required fields (Wine Name, Colour, Category, Alcohol, Net Quantity, Country) are set somewhere in the chain.

Q: I want one value to apply to every wine, no exceptions. A: Set it on the Global default. Don't override it on rules or products.

Q: Can a product be matched by more than one rule? A: Yes. The most specific match wins per field; product overrides always win over both rules and the global default.

Q: My CSV import skipped some rows. A: Almost always an invalid productId (must match an existing product), a missing required field, or an unrecognised wineColor / wineCategory value. Fix and re-import.

Q: Why does the consumer page show a placeholder winery name? A: You haven't saved a vineyard configuration yet. Click Edit vineyard and fill it in.

Q: Can I change the language switcher on the consumer label? A: There isn't one by design — the language is set by the platform that embeds the label (usually based on the consumer's browser or scan context). This keeps the label clean and compliant.

Q: Do I need a separate label record per batch or per bottling run? A: No. EU label info is a property of the wine, not the individual bottle — if two bottlings genuinely differ in ingredients, ABV, allergens or provenance, they're legally different products and should have their own product entries (and GTINs).