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Bad examples:

* Champagne is a sparkling wine made with a specific method from a specific kind of grapes grown on a specific soil in a specific climate. You can reproduce the method elsewhere and use the same grapes, but you can't reproduce the soil or the climate. Hence, the end-result is different. It's a sparkling wine and there are a lot of sparkling wines that are equal or better than a mediocre champagne, but they're still champagne.

* Bordeaux is nothing more than a regional specifier. It encompasses the climate and the soil found there. It neither indicates quality nor taste - though many people associate it with both due to some of the best wines being produced there. What would any consumer win if all of a sudden wine produced in Berlin could be labeled "Bordeaux" - the one person winning here would be the seller. Is that fair?

* Cheese is even harder. Roquefort derives much of its taste and character from the microclimate found in the caves around the town of Roquefort. Something similar is true for Parmesan: Each cheese labeled as parmesan must be made by a specific recipe and is checked by a local authority. So I guess you could make the same product and ship it to Parma and have it certified - but would that be worth it?

Neither of the words is a descriptive word such as "Diamond" or "Sugar". The descriptive words in your cases are "Sparkling Wine", "Red Wine", "Whisky", "Hard Cheese". It's a brand name, like iPhone is Apples particular type of smartphone and Nexus Googles type.

All in all: What would the consumers gain if all of a sudden all blue cheese was roquefort and all hard cheese parmesan, all red wine Bordeaux, all whisky Bourbon and all sparkling wine Champagne? Pretty much nothing.

(*) Sidenote: Wiener Schnitzel must be veal in germany. If it's made from pork it's "Schnitzel Wiener Art". Now, that's stupid.



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