(Wine) - When you’re shopping for wine, what makes you reach for one bottle over another? A single glance at a wine bottle is enough to gain a fairly strong first impression, but so many reasons can play a role in the selection: Is it the appealing label? The shape of the bottle? The vintage, region, or wine maker?

We wanted to learn more about how people choose wine, so we surveyed 2,000 wine drinkers to get some valuable insight. We asked our respondents how much the bottle’s appearance really matters, which types of wine they prefer, and where they buy their favorite bottles. Here’s what we found out.

We showed our survey respondents these three bottles of red wine and then asked them to choose their favorite. (The prices range from $10 to $150, but we kept them a secret to get honest opinions.) Did they choose based on how appealing the label was or the shape and color of the bottle? Or how expensive the wine looked? Were they familiar with the region or wine maker? Had they tasted (and liked) the wine in the past?

Next, we asked survey respondents to choose their favorite among three bottles of white wine. These wines ranged in price from about $10 to $80, but we didn’t disclose that. We asked them which factors contributed to their selection: the label’s look, the shape and color of the bottle, the perceived price, the vintage or wine maker, or a previous experience drinking the wine.

When it comes to choosing between bottles of wine, it turns out looks really do matter: More than 80% of people picked a bottle of wine based on the label’s look, 65% chose based on how expensive they thought the wine looked, and just over half considered the shape and color of the bottle itself. The region factored in for nearly 60% of people.