If you’re a wine connoisseur (or pretend to be), you may have had late-night wonderings about the uniqueness of a particular wine bottle. Eventually, you may come to wonder why virtually all wine bottles have dents in the bottom.
Contrary to popular beliefs, these dents at the bottom of wine bottles actually serve a really important function. Well, at least at one point they served an important function.
According to Wine Spectator, the dent in the bottom of a wine bottle is called a punt.
Since early wine bottles were crafted by glassblowers by hand, they needed to add the punt. This is what allowed the bottles to stand upright in the home or wine cellar. Nowadays, the punt is not really needed. The wine bottles of today are being crafted by machines, not people. It would actually be easier to manufacture bottles that do not have the punt on them.
It’s kind of like yellow cheese: Back in the day, yellow cheese meant quality. Now, it’s potentially dyed yellow and not an indicator of quality. But, people still go after it over lighter cheeses because it’s the standard. Wine punts once represented hand-blown bottles. While they don’t anymore, they’re expected as a standard.
Some manufacturers love and use the punt as a way to make the bottle more appealing to customers. The manufacturer can bottle less wine because the punt takes space. But, the customer still feels like they’re getting the bottle’s worth because it’s not really obvious that the punt is taking up space.
So, now you know why the bottom of wine bottles are dented. Great cocktail conversation, don’t you think?