When Meghan Markle launched As Ever Ros\u00e9, it wasn\u2019t just about wine. It was about reclaiming the narrative. A soft, French-inspired lifestyle rebrand wrapped in elegance, pastel tones, and poetic messaging. But instead of celebrating her triumphant return to relevance, the world responded with a resounding eye roll\u2014and a meme storm that hasn’t stopped since.<\/p>\n
It began with the buzz. The Duchess of Sussex, now a self-declared entrepreneur, was stepping into the luxury wine market. The branding was heavy on symbolism: resilience, femininity, rebirth. Her website read more like a self-help book than a wine catalog. And that was the first red flag.<\/p>\n
Critics, consumers, and comedians immediately took notice. John Stewart, never one to hold back, tore into the launch during a viral segment. \u201cYou’re not sipping history,\u201d he said. \u201cYou’re sipping PR.\u201d His takedown was brutal, comparing the wine’s taste to \u201clavender disappointment\u201d and its price tag to \u201cregret in a bottle.\u201d Audience laughter echoed what many already felt: Meghan Markle\u2019s wine wasn’t about taste\u2014it was about her image.<\/p>\n
The backlash wasn\u2019t just funny\u2014it was telling. As Ever Ros\u00e9 was supposed to symbolize a refined Meghan, focused on creativity and substance. Instead, it came across as yet another overpriced product leaning on her name rather than quality. At $42 a bottle, people expected elegance. What they got, according to early reviews, was flat, acidic, and flavorless. One sommelier described it as \u201cmade for people who drink with their eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the problem ran deeper than taste. It was the branding\u2014the overuse of vague, inspirational language like \u201cgrace,\u201d \u201csoftness,\u201d and \u201cempowerment\u201d\u2014that set critics off. There was little mention of grape origin, vineyard partnerships, or any credible winemaking expertise. It was, as one lifestyle columnist put it, \u201ca Pinterest board disguised as a wine launch.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meghan\u2019s team tried to spin the narrative. The wine was \u201ca reflection of her journey,\u201d a symbol of \u201chope through hardship.\u201d But consumers weren\u2019t buying the message\u2014or the product. Online complaints about shipping delays and disappointing taste began piling up. Several customers demanded refunds. Others mocked the bottle’s aesthetic as \u201cInstagram bait with no soul.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even Meghan\u2019s loyal fans began expressing doubts. \u201cI bought it because I wanted to support her,\u201d one Twitter user posted. \u201cBut it felt like she was selling us a story, not a wine.\u201d That sentiment echoed across Reddit threads and lifestyle blogs. The label\u2019s signature phrase, As Ever, once Meghan\u2019s elegant sign-off, has now become synonymous with satire. From As Ever Overpriced to As Ever Underwhelming, the internet had a field day.<\/p>\n
The irony? Meghan had warned us this was coming. In a recent interview with Emma Grady, she claimed \u201cevery failure is a win\u201d\u2014a quote now being reposted alongside brutal wine reviews. If that\u2019s true, she\u2019s winning a lot lately. From a canceled Spotify deal to stalled Netflix projects, Meghan\u2019s track record of turning buzz into success is shaky at best.<\/p>\n
What As Ever Ros\u00e9 proves is that branding can\u2019t carry a bad product forever. In an age of celebrity entrepreneurship, consumers are becoming smarter. They don\u2019t just want pretty labels and poetic mission statements\u2014they want value. Authenticity. Taste. And when a $42 bottle fails to deliver on all three, the backlash isn\u2019t just deserved\u2014it\u2019s inevitable.<\/p>\n
Worse, the marketing turned personal. The website wasn\u2019t just about the wine. It was about Meghan. Her journey. Her evolution. Her rebirth. But wine isn\u2019t therapy. It\u2019s not a memoir. And when you make yourself the center of the product, any criticism becomes a critique of you. That\u2019s a dangerous game in business, especially when the reviews are this bad.<\/p>\n
Industry insiders are already calling As Ever Ros\u00e9 a reputational wound. Retailers are pulling back. Influencers who once backed her ventures are silent. Even Meghan\u2019s most passionate defenders are growing weary of the self-importance that seems to saturate every launch. \u201cIt\u2019s always about her,\u201d one former supporter wrote. \u201cNever about the customer.\u201d<\/p>\n
This misstep didn\u2019t happen in a vacuum. It\u2019s part of a pattern\u2014projects built on personality instead of product. A children\u2019s book ghostwritten with inspirational fluff. A podcast that delivered more buzzwords than substance. A blog relaunch that never materialized. And now, a wine that tastes like watered-down ambition.<\/p>\n
John Stewart\u2019s roast went viral because it tapped into a growing public sentiment: Meghan Markle has become more brand than person, more marketer than maker. And when he joked that her wine tasted like \u201cego in a bottle,\u201d people didn\u2019t just laugh\u2014they nodded.<\/p>\n
So what\u2019s next? Meghan will likely continue launching, rebranding, reinventing. That\u2019s what she does. But if As Ever Ros\u00e9 teaches us anything, it\u2019s that the public isn\u2019t buying what she\u2019s selling anymore\u2014not unless the product speaks for itself. Because in 2025, consumers crave authenticity, not a Duchess monologue printed on the back of a wine bottle.<\/p>\n
And if Meghan truly wants to reconnect with her audience, she\u2019ll have to do more than bottle buzzwords. She\u2019ll have to deliver real value. As ever\u2026 honest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Meghan Markle launched As Ever Ros\u00e9, it wasn\u2019t just about wine. It was about reclaiming the narrative.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":275787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[27616,7709,7721,7719,102795,104165,7718,64428,7720,1281,447,104167,104166,7710,519,104168,29730,7711],"class_list":{"0":"post-275786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-as","9":"tag-british-royal-family","10":"tag-duchess-of-sussex","11":"tag-duke-of-sussex","12":"tag-embarrassing","13":"tag-ever","14":"tag-harry","15":"tag-markles","16":"tag-meghan","17":"tag-meghan-markle","18":"tag-prince-harry","19":"tag-rebrand","20":"tag-ros","21":"tag-royal-families","22":"tag-royal-family","23":"tag-sour","24":"tag-turns","25":"tag-uk-royal-family"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114882159944122717","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=275786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/275787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}