History
On the 24th April the Board of the Agriculture Guild of Borba invited a group of wine makers to gather around and discuss the possibility of creating Adega de Borba. On the 30th April 1955 the first Board of the Adega de Borba Cooperative came into force.
Founded in 1955, Adega de Borba was the first of a series of wineries settled in the Alentejo region, promoted and helped by the “Junta Nacional do Vinho”, a public organisation that controlled and supervised the wine production in Portugal at a time when wine production didn’t carry much weight in the economy of the region. In fact if it weren’t for this promotion carried out by a state organisation which allowed the creation of a commercial and productive organisation for the Alentejo wines, the vine culture would have disappeared from this region, as all the incentives at that time were allocated to the production of cereals. The Alentejo as Portugal’s “barn” was an idea that was already implemented in people’s minds back then.
After 3 decades of resistance, in which only the great value of the grape varieties and the exquisite natural conditions allowed to sustain the production of wines in the Alentejo, it was the 80’s, the time when the potential of the region was evaluated and confirmed by the consumer. The region benefited from the fact that wine production was associated to large wine cellars. This idea triggered the growth of technological development in the area, far greater than in any other region in the country. Technology allowed the wine makers to start producing high-quality bottled wines at a time when the consumer became even more demanding and started to appreciate the quality rather than the quantity. Truth be told the creation of the Alentejo demarcated region and the construction of technical structures which released the use of new technologies available to the wine grower were essential in the whole process.
The euphoria that the Alentejo wines have been going through in these past few years is the outcome of a long and hardworking process both in the vineyard, with the selection of the best grape varieties and soils, and in the winery, with the improvement of the techniques and the purchase of state-of-the-art equipment. All this was at some extent ignored, at a time when the heartbeat of the region was not the production of wine.
Nowadays the Adega de Borba brings together 270 associates whose vineyards cover a total area of 2,200 hectares, 70% of which is cultivated with red grape varieties and 30% with white ones.
Constantly striving for the for reinforcement of the quality of their products the Adega de Borba Coop is currently developing an ambitious project to bring the winegrower closer to the winery so to bring out the passion of making great wines in him. After the selection and keeping of the best grape varieties and the acquisition of modern equipment, Adega de Borba believes that the commitment of the winegrower with the wine production is the only ingredient necessary to improve its products even further and achieve the full potential that the region has to produce outstanding wines.
