No dubious shops or run-of-the-mill stalls. Buy alcohol from retail chains that monitor their reputation and carefully select suppliers. Roughly speaking, if there is expired goods on the shelves in a supermarket, then the alcohol there must be chosen with particular pickiness.
When buying alcohol, you should always be given a receipt, and ideally, ask for a passport, even if you don’t look like a schoolboy for a long time.
Price
A very good thing is not cheap. If you are offered aged french cognac for 800 rubles, something is wrong here. If you want to buy an expensive one, first look at how much it costs, compare prices on the Internet, do not run after a good price.
It’s not interesting to counterfeit very cheap alcohol from unpromoted brands; it’s more likely that it will be there in the first place Bad quality. So take it good drinks, checking the authenticity.
Bottle
Branded alcohol is bottled in special bottles with unusual shape, edges on the neck, relief inscriptions. If you want to buy specific alcohol famous brand, try to find the manufacturer’s website and evaluate how the bottle differs from any other.
Pay attention to:
- Cover material. Made of plastic, metal or cork, whether the lid is wrapped or not, smooth or embossed, flat or convex. Lid good alcohol does not scroll, does not leak. On the caps of vodka bottles there is a number by which the bottle can be verified for authenticity on the manufacturer’s website.
- Neck shape. Long or short, with or without edges. A bottle with a dispenser is a sign that it was made in a factory and not underground.
- Bottle shape. Pay attention to the curves, shoulders of the bottle, and bottom topography.
- Relief inscriptions and images. On expensive alcohol there are often inscriptions with the name of the drink, symbols of the trading house, and other designations. On fakes, these inscriptions are either not repeated at all, or not all are reproduced, or the place of application is confused.
Excise stamp
The excise stamp is printed on special paper with colored fibers; all numbers and codes on it are clear, clearly visible and readable. The stamp must be applied absolutely evenly.
Organizations that have a license to sell alcohol must check excise stamps. For you and me there is the service of the Unified Social Portal of the Alcohol Market.
Enter numbers from excise stamp and check whether the brand matches the product. The service operates in test mode, that is, apparently, its data does not always correspond to reality. However, we tested five bottles produced and purchased in different places, and they all passed the test.
Label
Label quality alcohol done on good paper, often with embossing or complex elements.
If you are looking for a specific brand, compare the order in which the information on the label should appear. On branded products, all labels repeat the pattern, and product names are accompanied by a registered trademark icon.
It is mandatory to indicate the address of the manufacturer (legal and place of production), composition, and there must be links to regulatory documents.
Bottle contents
It can help if you buy alcohol in a clear glass bottle and know what the drink you want looks like.
- Cognac, if you turn the bottle upside down, leaves oily streaks on the glass. They are called cognac legs.
- Good whiskey behaves in the same way. We must remember that whiskey is a clear drink, there should be no sediment or flakes.
- Vodka - only clear, without sediment.
But on appearance The drink can only be distinguished as a completely artisanal fake.
Here we are only talking about fakes, but there is also simply low-quality alcohol, for example, wine made from a mixture of alcohol with dyes and flavorings. The only thing that will help here is to read the label with the composition and indicate the GOST standards according to which the alcohol is made. And your feelings. If you open a bottle and something doesn't seem right, don't finish it or check. It's better to lose money than health.
The most effective way to protect yourself from bad alcohol
They can counterfeit everything, even excise stamps. Therefore the most effective method protection against bad alcohol - the choice of place of purchase and alcohol, which you can check on the manufacturer's website.
How to recognize methyl alcohol
No way. Although there are recipes for determining methanol.
Dipping heated copper wire into alcohol, for example. When methanol reacts with copper, it will release formaldehyde and you will notice a pungent odor. Ethanol doesn't behave that way. But ethanol will also smell, although not as disgusting. There is another option with setting the alcohol on fire and revealing the shade of the flame (methanol burns greenish).
These methods work if you are comparing two clean looking alcohol And methanol can be added to alcohol in different proportions, diluted and mixed with dyes, flavors and ethanol.
Symptoms of methyl alcohol poisoning
At first, methanol poisoning is no different from alcohol poisoning: dizziness, nausea, headache. Then warning signs appear:
- Pain throughout the body.
- Loss of vision.
- Dyspnea.
- Cardiopalmus.
What to do to avoid methanol poisoning
- Drink only alcohol from trusted places and only high-quality alcohol.
- Never get so drunk that you miss the first signs of poisoning, that is, until you lose your footing and feel sick.
- If you have symptoms of poisoning, immediately call an ambulance and get to the doctors.
- Before the doctors arrive, provide first aid.
Although regular ethanol helps inhibit industrial alcohol poisoning, do not self-medicate with alcohol.
Fake alcohol may contain methanol - methyl or wood alcohol. It is also called technical, it is a terrible poison, and it is from it that people die or become disabled.
As with regular ethyl alcohol, once it enters the bloodstream, methyl alcohol passes through the liver, where, like its safer counterpart, it is oxidized by an enzyme called alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH). If not for this chemical reaction, industrial alcohol would not pose any danger: in itself it is not highly toxic. Therefore, the first thing a person feels after drinking such alcohol is the usual symptoms of intoxication.
However, under the influence of ADH, methanol is converted into formaldehyde and formic acid. These products are extremely harmful to health: they damage the central nervous system, in particular, the retina and optic nerve, leading to blindness and severe poisoning with failure of the kidneys and other internal organs.
Where can you buy alcohol?
Only organizations can sell alcohol, not individuals. Low alcohol drinks– beer, cider, and mead can be sold by both companies and individual entrepreneurs. You can only buy alcohol in retail outlets that have a retail license. alcoholic products. A copy of the license must be located in a visible place in the “Consumer Corner”. When selling a drink along with a bottle, you must be given a receipt. Any sale of alcohol by hand or through an online store is illegal.
How to distinguish fake alcohol by bottle or label?
As a rule, legal producers bottle alcoholic beverages into consumer containers that have special features(original corrugations, embossing, etc.). The label and backing label must be glued evenly without distortion.
How to distinguish counterfeit alcohol by a federal special stamp or excise stamp?
All alcoholic products produced on the territory customs union, is pasted over with federal special stamps, and imported alcoholic products are pasted over with excise duty stamps. This marking confirms the payment of excise duty on each bottle of alcoholic beverages produced.
To visually recognize the authenticity of such brands, you can use the following recommendations:
1. They are printed on self-adhesive paper, which has a special radiation under the influence of ultraviolet light;
2. Copper holographic foil with a pattern and repeating images of the Coat of Arms is pressed onto the paper for printing excise stamps for alcohol 2014 Russian Federation and the abbreviation “RF”;
3. A security thread with an irregular window is inserted into the paper. In the window you can see an image printed on the thread in the form of pink stripes. When exposed to ultraviolet light, the image is visualized as the abbreviation “RF” in pink, blue and yellow-orange in an oval ring;
4. On back side The stamps are filled with the abbreviation “RF”;
5. An element printed with color-variable ink changes color from purple to brown depending on the viewing angle;
6. The brand number is printed using inkjet printing and consists of three digits indicating the rank and nine digits of the brand number itself;
7. The information on the brand and the bottle label must match. Here there is the name of the alcoholic product, the type of alcoholic product, the container capacity, the strength, the name of the manufacturer and its location.
How to spot fake champagne?
Distinguish what is in front of you - soda with alcohol or the real thing a sparkling wine(champagne) in bubbles. Throw something into the champagne glass, such as a cherry. If it instantly becomes covered with small and frequent bubbles, this is real champagne. If the bubbles are large and rare and quickly float to the surface, this is a fake. By the way, these are the bubbles that cover any object thrown into a bottle of soda.
How to spot fake vodka?
We will talk about checking the appearance of the drink before purchasing it. There are signs whose presence should motivate you to choose another vodka or even a store.
1. Price. As of December 2015, in accordance with the order of Rosalkogolregulirovaniya, a bottle of vodka with a capacity of 0.5 liters contains ethyl alcohol 40 percent must be sold at retail for at least 195 rubles per bottle. Accordingly, if the capacity of a bottle of vodka is one liter, then the price is twice as expensive. If you prefer a certain brand of vodka, then you should know the average price of a bottle. If in one of the stores the price is 15-30 percent lower, then the risk of purchasing counterfeit vodka there increases several times. Miracles do not happen; the cost of the same vodka in different stores cannot differ much.
At the same time, it should be noted that previously it was the low price that gave away counterfeit vodka, but now counterfeiters have become wiser and in most cases sell their surrogate at the price of the original. Therefore, related factors need to be taken into account;
2. Color. Real vodka absolutely transparent without turbidity or sediment at the bottom. To check this, just turn the bottle upside down, hold it for a few seconds and look through it at sunlight. Vodka should not have foreign particles, orange, light yellow or other shades. If the color changes, it means that you have poorly purified vodka, the alcohol or water of which contains foreign impurities.
How to distinguish regular alcohol from technical alcohol?
In some cases, low-quality alcohol can only be determined after the bottle is opened. How to distinguish an alcohol surrogate?
Methyl alcohol is no different in appearance and smell from ordinary ethyl alcohol.
Therefore, the main protection against poisoning is buying drinks in trusted places.
If for some reason you suspect that the alcohol is fake, try checking it at home:
– if you set fire to a strong drink based on ethyl alcohol, it should burn with a blue flame, while burning methanol has a green color;
if the drink is clear, throw a small piece into the bottle raw potatoes: V technical alcohol it will acquire a pink tint, but will remain white in vodka;
– if you heat a copper wire over a fire and lower it into a liquid, then methanol will give itself away as an unpleasant, pungent odor of formaldehyde; when tested, ethanol does not smell at all.
Of course, the most reasonable thing would be to refuse tasting in any doubtful case, even if chemical experiments did not reveal anything suspicious.
How to understand that you have been poisoned by a surrogate?
The insidiousness of methanol intoxication lies in the fact that its first symptoms are too similar to the consequences of ordinary drunkenness: a person may complain of dizziness, nausea, and severe weakness.
However, other warning signs develop within a few hours. It can be:
– severe pain throughout the body;
– deterioration of vision, in which the picture before the eyes may float and unclear dancing spots appear;
– slowing heart rate and breathing;
- a comatose state in which a drunk person does not react to external stimuli and does not wake up.
Such symptoms are a sign of great trouble. If you suspect methanol poisoning, you should urgently call ambulance and start providing first aid yourself!
The demand for expensive and luxury drinks is growing every day. As a result, many counterfeits have appeared on the market, the use of which often leads to severe poisoning. As a rule, counterfeit alcohol is quite tolerable alcohol. But at the same time, many pay for it as for elite alcohol. So how to distinguish burnt alcohol?
Where should you buy alcoholic drinks?
You can protect yourself from poisoning only by carefully choosing alcoholic drinks. Such products should be purchased only from those organizations that have the appropriate rights and certificates. Most often, burnt alcohol is sold by private individuals who make it themselves. However, some types of alcohol can be sold not only by certain companies, but also by individual entrepreneurs. Such drinks include mead, cider, beer, and so on.
You should buy alcohol exclusively at stationary retail outlets. When purchasing, the seller must issue a receipt. It is worth keeping if the quality of the product is in doubt. Other places selling drinks containing alcohol are illegal. You should not purchase alcohol through online stores, or from your own hands.
Price is the best guide
Burnt alcohol is often bottled in elite bottles and it is very difficult to distinguish by color or smell when purchasing. Therefore, first of all, you should pay attention to the cost of the product. Agree, a bottle cannot good whiskey or cognac cost no more than 500 rubles. Often such goods can be seen even in small stalls. This simply cannot be.
Of course, remember all the packaging features elite varieties alcoholic drinks is not so simple. In addition, a large assortment is very difficult to navigate for a person who rarely drinks alcohol.
Stickers and tax stamps
If necessary, you can request alcohol certificates from the seller. However, if you are not a professional commodity expert, you are unlikely to understand the provided papers. Particular attention should be paid to excise stamps and stickers. You should pay attention to this even when purchasing elite alcohol in supermarkets and specialty stores.
An excise stamp is a kind of quality guarantee. To avoid buying burnt alcohol, always ask for a receipt. They simply won’t let you know if it’s counterfeit.
What could be in the bottle?
Burnt alcohol poisoning is very difficult to tolerate. Death often occurs after drinking such drinks. Therefore, you should be careful when choosing alcohol. Of course, if the bottles contained just vodka, painted over, then such a product does not pose a great danger.
However, there are situations when methanol is sold under the guise of elite alcohol. This is very dangerous product. In fact, methanol is wood or which belongs to the category of technical liquids. This is a very dangerous and terrible poison. Because of it, people become disabled or die. practically no different from usual. It is impossible to detect the presence of this substance in the drink even after opening the bottle. Methanol is similar in color and taste to regular alcohol.
The first signs of poisoning: severe weakness, nausea, dizziness, pain throughout the body, slow breathing and heartbeat, a coma in which a person does not respond to stimuli.
Effective methods
It is very difficult to distinguish burnt alcohol from real alcohol. However, there are several proven methods:
- First, light the drink. Ethyl alcohol burns with a blue flame, while wood alcohol burns with a green flame.
- If the alcohol is clear, then you can throw it in fresh potatoes. In methyl it will remain white, but in methyl it will take on a pinkish tint.
- You can lower a hot wire into a container with a drink. Ethyl alcohol will not smell, but methyl alcohol will smell strongly of formaldehyde.
Finding out the quality of alcohol before you are taken away in an ambulance is quite problematic. But perhaps, let's figure out how to identify a fake before you are taken to the hospital.
Bottle appearance
Before buying expensive alcohol, open the official website of the manufacturer - there are enough photographs there that show the shape of the bottle, the features of the labels, and the details of the engravings. It is difficult to fake all the details and markings of a bottle, and often a fake can be identified by the appearance of the container.
But, unfortunately, even original bottle does not guarantee the quality of the content. Empty used bottles for sale on eBay famous drinks. A fake can be prepared from concentrate and alcohol:
Excise stamp
An excise stamp is a sign that the manufacturer has paid tax on alcohol. The state knows that such a bottle exists and, in theory, is responsible for the quality of its contents. Drinks are classified by strength and composition, and excise taxes for each class vary by color. For strong alcohol There are four main excise stamps, nine for wine. FS RAR even released .
Some excise taxes appeared only in 2015, so in the store you will more often see cognac labeled “Strong Spirits” than “Cognac”. And sake may turn out to be “ Wine drink”, and “Alcoholic beverage over 9 to 25%”. It's all confusing.
It’s easier to check the brand using the application of the Federal Service “Rosalkogolregulirovanie” - “Anti-Counterfeit Alco”. Here for smartphones on iOS, Android and Windows.
Receipt in store
Since July 1, a control system for alcohol sales has been in effect in Russia - EGAIS, its use is mandatory for all sellers. The system receives data from manufacturers, importers, wholesale suppliers and retail stores.
Sellers who work according to the rules issue a special receipt with a QR code. An EGAIS check will not be issued if you buy beer, if you order alcohol in a cafe or restaurant, or if you buy alcohol in a locality with a population of up to 3 thousand people (these checks will only be issued there from July 2017). In the cities of Crimea, EGAIS will work only in 2017, and in small settlements on the peninsula - in 2018.
In other cases, the seller is obliged to issue such a check. This is a guarantee that you are being sold legal alcohol. Before buying, ask the seller if they work in EGAIS. If they don't work, leave. If the store works according to the rules, the seller first scans the barcode, then the excise stamp, and after that issues a special receipt with a QR code, like this.
The smell of the drink
If you do not have a sense of smell and the experience of a sommelier, then you are unlikely to be able to distinguish by smell whether it is French cognac or something poured on small factory in outskirts of Moscow. If you are lucky enough to have a keen sense of smell, then let the drink sit in the glass for a few minutes. The aroma has disappeared, but the smell of alcohol remains - this is a fake, don’t risk it.
When producing counterfeit alcohol, methyl alcohol is often used instead of ethyl alcohol, which does not differ in smell and taste. When it enters the human body, methyl alcohol decomposes to dangerous substances - formaldehyde and formic acid. 30 ml methyl alcohol kill a healthy adult man.
When to check
Consumption elite drinks is growing every day, and with it production and consumption of counterfeits. Usually counterfeit is quite tolerable alcoholic drink, but we pay money for real imported alcohol.
No one can save you from buying counterfeits except yourself, because even on the shelves of shops and supermarkets you can find counterfeits. To teach you to distinguish the real one elite alcohol from fakes, "So simple!" I've collected some useful tips for you.
How to distinguish real alcohol from fake
Signs of a fake Jack Daniel's
- Metal cover – original Jack Daniel's Available only with a plastic lid covered with a plastic shell.
- Round “shoulders” of the bottle – since 2011, bottles have been produced in a new design.
- Smooth “shoulders” – the “shoulders” of the bottle should have the Jack Daniel’s inscription in relief on four sides.
- “Curved” label – the label must be glued evenly, and the order of the inscriptions on it must correspond to the established pattern.
IN Lately became widespread counterfeit Jack Daniel's in new bottles. At first glance, the fake is indistinguishable from the original, but there are still several signs:
- Absence of the Registered trade-mark on the bottle neck shell. It must be present on the original whiskey.
- Smooth bottle neck. In a genuine drink, the neck of the bottle has edges along its entire length.
Signs of counterfeit Olmeca tequila
- The presence of ribs at the top of the cap - the original tequila has a cap with a smooth top.
- Smooth bottle – there should be some corrugation on the bottle, especially noticeable on the “shoulders” of the bottle. The glass should not be smooth.
Signs of fake Jameson whiskey
- Original Jameson It has metal cover without any shell.
- This whiskey has two raised inscriptions: Product of Ireland at the bottom of the front of the bottle, and John Jameson at the bottom of the back.
- The 0.7 liter capacity is the most commonly counterfeited Jameson volume. If you have doubts about the quality of the drink, buy a bottle of a different size.
Signs of counterfeit whiskey Johnnie Walker Black Label, Red Label
Signs of counterfeit Jim Beam whiskey
- The present one American bourbon Jim Beam The top edge of the lid does not have ribs - it is smooth.
- Whiskey has two stripes golden color above picture trademark Jim Beam.
- A genuine Jim Beam has facets only on the lower half of the neck, while a fake has a faceted neck along its entire length.
- Real whiskey has Jim Beam embossed on the shoulders of the bottle on four sides.
Signs of counterfeit Hennessy cognac
They say that sales Hennessy cognac in the world as a whole exceed its production by 3-4 times. This means that only every 3-4 Hennessy bottle- original cognac, and the amount of counterfeit reaches 80%.
Signs of a fake Hennessy X.O
- Cognac Hennessy X.O in containers of 0.5 l. is not produced. The original cognac is bottled only in 0.35 and 0.7 liter bottles.
- The original cork and shell are made using a special technology (including laser engraving and Holosleeve holograms) and fit very tightly to the glass of the bottle. The shell should not evoke memories of inexpensive wines domestic production.
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