Removing (commercial) wine labels

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lady_brewer

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Let me just start by saying that I am a complete wine n00b and still fairly n00bish at the beer. I have been looking around this forum and other places for some information on the various steps involved once my wine is ready to come out of the carboy... (ie bottling). Since I have now tried a number of things at home, I thought that I would share them, and people can add their own, jump in with advice, point out that I am wrong and throw rotten fruit (although fermenting fruit might be nicer.) I also had the thought that if I end up posting a few of these types of topics maybe I (or another person) could compile a wine FAQ sticky... so... on to this topic for real...

I was in one of the LHBS and noticed that they were selling bottles. I found out the price and ($14/ dozen) and thought there was no way I was paying that when I could get perfectly good bottles from friends for free. After cleaning almost half the bottles I need for my current batch I went to my other LHBS and bought 12 brand new bottles for $12 (his prices are usually better and he is really knowledgeable and easy going, but 40 mins from my house.) I still had some bottles to lean. Here is what I have tried and what worked and didn't work.

Soaking in dish liquid - I fill up the sink with warm water and a bit of dish soap and leave the bottles. When the labels are soaked I scrape them off with a kitchen knife, then they go back into the water. I then let them soak overnight and scrub off the remaining goo with a (nylon) scouring pad. I found that adding a drop of dish soap right on the left-over label goo really makes this easier. Pros: not actually that much elbow grease in the long run. Cons: Takes up the sink (I have a double) and I am really not sure how cool it is to use the dish liquid.

Variations of this that are a bad idea When my husband stepped into help I was happy. He has more grease in his elbows. His brilliant ideas included emery cloth (which seemed to work, but was messy) and sandpaper. I now have some bottles with some unsolicited etching. Good thing I don't plan to give all the wine away!

Boiling hot waterIf you fill up the bottle with boiling hot water and let it sit the adhesive will warm up and you can peel the label off. I found this on some site where people are trying to get the labels in one piece. The downside of this is that the bottle gets very hot, you can usually only use the water in one additional bottle, and you kinda have to be careful, because once it tears it can be really hard to get the rest off. As well this leaves some of the adhesive behind and you still have to wash or scrub. Pros: you can keep the label from the commercial wine. Cons: dangerous, waste of time and hot water, kinda a pain.

Suggestions I didn't try Apparently you can "bake" the labels off. You make sure that the bottles are completely dry and stick them in the oven at 350 for 7-9 minutes. Again this was so that you could pull off the labels intact. The instructions did warn that there had to be no liquid in the bottle or it will come out as steam, and again the bottles get very hot, so you have to take them out with oven mitts.

Also - people seem to be able to do fancy things with a razor blade. I didn't go there either.

And - there was one suggestion that I think involved smashing the bottle. I didn't open the link since it didn't seem to get where I was going.

Some things that didn't workYou know how sometimes you are drinking a cold beer slow and when it warms up the condensation makes the label almost slip off? Well I tried filling a bottle with water and sticking it in the fridge. I took it out a couple of hours later and got lots of condensation, but the label didn't budge. Ditto for just running cold water on it.

I also tried melting the adhesive with steam and with a hairdryer. I am not patient enough for that. I might as well have decided to collect sand and learn to blow glass. The steam or hairdryer may work, providing you have a lot of time on your hands. (In which case I could use a little help sanitizing all my stuff on bottling day.)

Anyway... just my thoughts... feel free to add you own, or comment, or throw fruit. :ban:
 
I soak my bottles in warm water w/o soap. I can do it four at a time in the kitchen sink or 6-8 at a time in a 5-gallon pail. I let them sit for about 20 minutes and peel the label off. Some may require a bit of scouring with a plastic scrubber. If the labels won't easily peel off, I discard the entire bottle. With practice, you'll find some brands that have very peelable labels.
 
Overnight Oxyclean Free soak in the utility sink and the next morning the labels are floating. There are a couple brands that it doesn't work because the label and glue are some kind of weird stuff and, like summersolstice, get tossed. Luckily I have several wine drinking friends that like the rewards of giving me their bottles, more wine.
 
I have had some labels that just peel off (under running water). At the moment I seem to be stuck for bottles and was given about 40 all of the same brand, so that is a lot to toss.

As for oxyclean, I am not even sure that it is available in my area. Still they are good points for others...
 
Any good easy ways to remove labels that are "Painted on" or "silk screened" on? At the moment it is all that I had for a few bottles and while I know what is in there I don't want others thinking that it is the kind of wine that is in there (the picture is of kiwi's and strawberries).
 
I have learned which labels come off easy and they are all I even bring home. If I go buy bottles they are a buck apiece. I am not spending 30 mins of scraping to get a $1 bottle.
 
I have had some labels that just peel off (under running water). At the moment I seem to be stuck for bottles and was given about 40 all of the same brand, so that is a lot to toss.

As for oxyclean, I am not even sure that it is available in my area. Still they are good points for others...

I hear you, on my first batch I was really searching for enough bottles. I was stuck using some with stubborn labels and ended up scraping some with a razor blade to get them off.

Once the word is out it gets much easier to get bottles. Every week or two I go into my office and there is a bag of bottles sitting there from co-workers. The VP of my department is my main source at work. :D

We also have a friend that drinks way too much but he is my best source. For his bottles, hubby needs to take the truck to pick up the bottles. Find a wine drinking alcoholic and believe me you will get more bottles than you can fill. :drunk:
 
Any good easy ways to remove labels that are "Painted on" or "silk screened" on? At the moment it is all that I had for a few bottles and while I know what is in there I don't want others thinking that it is the kind of wine that is in there (the picture is of kiwi's and strawberries).

I have been able to successfully remove screened-on labels from several different beer bottles by soaking them for a few days in a Star San solution that was a bit higher than normal strength. There are some stubborn bottles from some vendors that this doesn't work on, though, so YMMV.
 
You should also consider the wine-in-a-bag thing. I have so far been very very happy with this, generally because I bulk age anyhow. I fill one bag for immediate consumption and bottle the rest for saving.
 
I know it sounds like a lot of work (and it really is), but I've simplified the process to where it is now.

I get about 20-30 used bottles from a coworker every other month. I place all the bottles that will fit in the sink (about 28 and standing up) of warm water and a splash of bleach and an overnight soak. I fill up all the bottles with the bleach water to the top and run the water high enough that the entire bottle is submerged.

In the morning I take the plug out and drain 1/2 of the water. Be sure to inspect the lip for chips and cracks. If there are any just toss the bottle before working to get the label off. ;) It's a time waster to work on a bottle you have to trash it in the end.

I peel a label off as best as it will come off. Any glue/paper residue get scraped off with a Swiss Army knife blade and goes right into the trash can at my feet. Remaining glue gets scrubbed off with a green scrubby pad.

After all the glue is gone I set the bottle aside (still half full of bleach water).

After all the bottles are de-labeled I insert a bottle brush into my cordless drill and scrub the insides with the brush and drain the bottle.

After all the bottles have been scrubbed inside I rinse them with the faucet bottle washer then put them on a drying tree.

I've never timed it exactly, but I guess the whole process takes about an hour.:D

With close to 200 wine bottles I try to match them to other like-shaped bottles, seperating the champagne bopttles from the greens and browns, etc., until I can get like 12 or 20 together for one batch. If I get some odd shaped bottles I'll put them aside for something special, then there's the clear ones...I use them for colorful meads, etc. I'd like to eventually make a wine rack in the storage room. I'm not too concerned about light because they're stored in boxes.

I have never been able to get a silk screened/painted on label off of a bottle or a glass...
 
I'm pretty lucky in that I really now have all the bottles I need and when I empty a bottle I peel my homemade label and stick the clean bottle on the bottle tree to dry. The other night I had a mead party where we consumed 18 bottles and so I'm just cleaning a few at a time. When the bottle tree gets full, I put the clean bottles in empty wine cases until needed and I now seem to have all the bottles I need without looking for more.
 
A buffing/polishing wheel mounted on a bench grinder, with some jeweler's rouge, will remove screen printed or painted labels. Just buff very gently and use just enough pressure and rouge to remove the paint. Also if you have the clear plastic kind that look like screen printing, peel the label off and use Goo-Gone or another citrus oil based cleaner to remove the glue. Then wash as usual to remove the citrus oil.
 
Most of the time I just put the bottle of the wine one a shelf and label the batch with a small card..ie apple wine. However I am putting 35 gal of blackberry wine into bottles for a farmer (it was his blackberries and that is his cut.) I find that if I run hot water into the bottle and let it sit for 20 min or so and then I have a razar blade scraper that will slice off the botttle. Then I pour out the hot water onto a scrabie/sponge and it will take off most of the goo. Hope this helps...
 
You should also consider the wine-in-a-bag thing. I have so far been very very happy with this, generally because I bulk age anyhow. I fill one bag for immediate consumption and bottle the rest for saving.

I had never even thought to try bagging it.
Got any useful links?
Where would I get the equipment?
I don't think the LHBS has it.
 
For stubborn glue, I find that some cameo or barkeepers friend on a cloth will take it right off. The scotch brite with the cameo works better but the glue gunks it up so badly that the scotch brite doesn't last very long.
 
what ever you do, dont tell all your neighbors you need bottles. You will come home to piles of bottles on your porch
 
The best way I've found is to get a glass scraper, the kind that uses razor blades. Run the labels under scalding hot water for 5 seconds and they will scrape right off. Just scrape away from you! Those things are sharp.
 
+1 for the oxyclean soak. I mix the oxyclean double strength with hot water, let soak overnight. In the morning, you should see labels floating. Any bottles that still have labels get another 24 hours in the "oxyspa". There may be some that seem stuck on but can be scrapped off really easily. Once a bottle is clean, it gets a hot water rinse both inside and out. Check for cracks or chips. Very rarely I have had some labels that would not come off with the oxyclean. These get tossed into a special batch of "straight a" that I get from my LHBS.

I soak in a plastic tote that I got from our local wally world. For bottles, we get them from friends and from a couple of local restaurants. One place we eat we have a regular waitress how takes care of us and we take care of her so bottles are not a problem.
 
Not sure if someone else mentioned this or not. I use goof off on the glue for the plastic
Post Famalie type labels. For the paper labels I just soak for a day or two.
 
+2 for Oxy-clean

I have 19 in a Wally World plastic tub right now.
Tomorrow morning, most will be easily removed. Some will be fairly easy and some will require a razor scraper. Apparently there is no standard when it comes to gluing on labels!

I like the "bottle-brush-in-electric-drill" idea. Think I will use that one!
 
I usually use a soaking of oxyclean, vinegar, bleach, and dish soap, soak for a day or two.
Some labels are already off, and some takes the back end of a knife to scrap off the super glue some labels are using now days.
I'm starting to think that a dollar a bottle may be a great deal.
 
Nice to see so many suggestions... the wine labels are so much harder to remove than the beer labels.

I too am now thinking that $1/bottle is not so bad... since I still have a pile of bottles to clean and prep for my next batch.

Re: Oxyclean - I still haven't seen it. My LHBS seems to just carry the chemical cleaner (pink stuff) that they repackaged into a smaller bag. Anybody have any suggestions as to another commercial product that might work?
 
I wonder what postage would be to ship to Newfoundland? I could pick you up a tub of Oxyclean easy enough but have no idea how to mail it.

Can I mail/ship cleaning chemicals Internationally? The tubs weigh 3.5 lbs. Lady, pm me with your thoughts.
 
So oxyclean = oxiclean? And I bought a tub of it at Walmart (Oxiclean free).

Currently soaking a batch of beer bottles in it, trying out the wine bottle bath next.
 
So oxyclean = oxiclean? And I bought a tub of it at Walmart (Oxiclean free).

I believe they're the same thing. For some reason our marketing experts in the U.S. feel the need to spell product names differently from their Canadian counterparts.

I've found that glue residue can often be softened and removed with light oil. Generally I use baby oil, but you might not want to use that on your bottles if it's scented. The same goes for WD-40. It cleans very well but the smell is awful. Cooking oil also works but doesn't seem to penetrate as well for me.

Buying new bottles doesn't seem like such a bad deal when you figure you can re-use them many times. If you use milk or milk glue to attach your labels they soak right off without having to deal with gummy adhesive.

Dave
 
peel the label off and use Goo-Gone or another citrus oil based cleaner to remove the glue. Then wash as usual to remove the citrus oil.
I've found citrus oil based cleaners work really well on the glue that's left after the label is peeled off, plus the oil residue washes off with soap & water. And it smells much nicer than WD-40. Makes you want to go out and brew up a batch of Joe's Ancient Orange Mead...

I've also used a Brillo pad (steel wool with embedded soap) to scrub off tough hunks of glue.
 
So what are "good" commercial bottles, and what are "bad", with respect to removing the labels? My experience:

Good (a quick soak is sufficient): Jacob's Creek
Bad: Lindemans

Let's compile a list.
 
So what are "good" commercial bottles, and what are "bad", with respect to removing the labels? My experience:

Good (a quick soak is sufficient): Jacob's Creek
Bad: Lindemans

Let's compile a list.

GAH! Lindemans!! {shakes fist} I was just cleaning bottles last night and be damned if I could get the residue off a Lindemans bottle. My girlfriend told me to use some oil and sure enough that did the trick - took a bit of scubbing but it's clean as a whistle now.

Addition to list:

Good: Sutter Home
Bad: Naked Grape​
 
I've just started down this path. Should have read this thread.

I'm determined to figure this out. Even at $1/bottle it grieves my Scot soul. :)

Daughter #1 was a server at a local Olive Garden till recently. They serve a lot of wine. Her best girlfriend is still working there and has promised to bring me empty bottles.

My first effort was a Yellowtail bottle. argahhh. What IS that glue anyway? Talk about better living through chemistry! Finally got the label with hot water and a knife but am lucky I managed to do it without needing to go for stiches. /heh

Now I've got that bottle sitting looking at me in a Mexican standoff. I'm not about to quit yet and it's not ready to give up it's residual adhesive. I'm about to go out to the shop for some acetone or maybe some of my homebrew "Ed's Red" gun solvent/lube. Speaking of acetone, anyone tried nail polish remover?
:cool:

I'll give it a go with Oxyclean first...
 
Now I've got that bottle sitting looking at me in a Mexican standoff. I'm not about to quit yet and it's not ready to give up it's residual adhesive. I'm about to go out to the shop for some acetone or maybe some of my homebrew "Ed's Red" gun solvent/lube. Speaking of acetone, anyone tried nail polish remover?

I wouldn't count on nail polish remover. I've tried it on label adhesive before and was disappointed. (It has acetone but it's pretty dilute, and sometimes has other stuff like fragrance and moisturizers in it.) Try the Oxy first, then maybe give it a swipe with baby oil or even cooking oil on a Scotchbrite pad and see if that'll soften it.

If you're going to use gun solvent, I've discovered that Hoppes #9 will remove photocopier toner from vinyl. Use at your own risk though.

Dave
 
Anything Hoppes #9 will do, Ed's Red will do better (1qt ea Kerosene, Acetone, Dex II or better ATF, 16oz lanolin), but none of the new fangled solvents bring as many good memories as the smell #9.
 
I dry scrape the labels off commercial wine bottles with a razor blade (carefully).

Then I pour (liberally) 90 proof rubbing alcohol (from Walmart ... make sure you get the 90 proof) onto a paper towel and wipe most of the residue glue.

This will get rid of most of the glue.

Some bottle require a coating of Skin-so-soft (ask your wife) ... then rubbing with steel wool.

Wash inside/out with one step.

Store upside down in a wine box with a paper towel on the bottom of the box.

Then on bottling day, rinse inside with k-meta in a sulphiter ... good to go.
 
Well Ed's Red and scrap polo shirt cloth worked fabulously well on the Yellowtail residual adhesive. Dunno how it would work on an intact label yet.

Now about that smell... :)

We'll have to wait and see if the dish detergent was enough to deal with that.
 
I saw many of you are commenting on how this takes up the sink. I just took of some labels on a bunch of beer bottles. I used a cooler I had, laid the bottles in and some cleaner and filled it up with hot hot water. The cooler insulated the water and it was still pretty hot to the touch after 12 hours.

Once you fill it up, hold the lid on and tilt the cooler from side to side to fill the bottles with the water, then top off and let it sit!
 
Just a note on soaking that some newcomers may not have considered --- before soaking, partially fill the bottles with water or the solution that you'll be using for the soak (in order to keep them from floating, tipping to the side, sinking and filling up), then place them standing right side up in the container. Otherwise, when they lie horizontally in the solution that dissolving the glue, that glue residue will be on the inside of the bottles and is not necessarily easy to remove.

Most Finger Lakes region labels are a nightmare to remove, most European labels are easy with the very notable exception of the dozens of Hans Gangl bottles donated to me, and they have been the absolute worst. I was recently lamenting the problems with removing those labels (even the oxyclean didn't give consistent positive results) and was told to soak a cloth in rubbing alcohol (isopropyl) and lay it on the label for a minute or so, and the entire thing - label and glue - would come clean. I had read about that in this thread before, just didn't bother to try it. I had gotten to the point of just refusing all bottle donations (no matter how many times, or how adamantly, I tell people to at least RINSE the bottles out when they're still fresh, almost none come without dried-on sludge and vinegar smells!!!) and just going out and buying new bottles. Inspect, rinse, and sanitize is a much more efficient use of time, labor and resources. I guess it's a trade off in the end.

- Tim
 
Giving the oxiclean overnight sink soak($1store version) a try [emoji111]
 
Definitely made it easier - but depends on bottle source -- Trader Joe's came right off -- Aldi Winking Owl bit more work -- Generally...more expensive vinos took more elbow grease.

I've got the 22 I need to bottle up my Welch's vino at some point [emoji111]
 
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I wanted my bottles to be all the same so I bought them. Now I use generic oxyclean and soak in a bucket if I have a few and in the sink for less. The labels that come with kits usually come of easily. I use a nylon scrubby for any leftover glue.

For commercial bottles (beer for me) if the label doesn't come off easily they get recycled. On to another brand.
 
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