We talk with Freddy Grez, a prestigious Chilean winemaker who lives in Greece. He told us about his challenges and achievements after working in Porto Carras Winery.
How did you get to work in Greece?
Thanks to the good professional work of the “Wine Job Search” system of Andes Wines Headhunters, I had the opportunity to meet one of my greatest desires, knowing the land of Dionysus, Zeus, Athena and many other mythological Greek Gods and enjoying the hospitality and especially the affection of the personnel in the wine cellar at Domaine Porto Carras, which are things that I will never forget.
I arrived in Greece the second week of May 2010 and I am currently looking for a new working challenge in Greece.
Domaine Porto Carras is one of the most important wine producing companies in Greece, the winery with 2.000.000 liters of capacity, 475 hectare vineyards, excellent facilities and machines gave me the unique opportunity to meet, learn and work with Greek grape varieties for the first time in my life, which has been really rewarding in my professional life.
For me it was a dream come true to get to Greece, because since my school days, that is many years ago, my interest and desire to know this wonderful country were very important, due to of all the historical and cultural wealth, natural beauty and especially in recent years to discover the many varieties of wine grapes from this land completely unknown to me, despite spending so many years working in this wonderful world of wine.
However, the most important and fun part is that I never thought about coming to work in Greece. I always considered to travel as a tourist to visit and enjoy all that Greece has to offer to more than 15.000.000 tourists visiting the country annually, which is why when I had the opportunity to come to work, I did not hesitate, although at that time I had an actual job offer in Australia with the company that I previously worked in Fresno, California, (the Wine Group) yet and despite many contractual disputes, I preferred to come to work at Domaine Porto Carras because it is a Greek company and I also believed it was a very nice professional challenge for me, which I witnessed in these two beautiful and successful years working here in Greece.
2. What did you do in Porto Carras in the period you worked there? What were the challenges and achievements in terms of the wines you produced?
During the 2 years that I was in charge of the wine cellar at Domaine Porto Carras, I did many things, during my first two months I had to learn to know the different types of wines and grapes from Domaine Porto Carras, which is why I carried out periodic wine tastings (bottled and bulk) and toured the vineyards tasting grapes to familiarize with the flavors, aromas and all the characteristics of each variety, in order to make and produce the best wines possible from the beginning of my management, which fortunately happened that way.
At the same time, I familiarized with the way the wine cellar and bottling and labeling room was being handled, and generally all production processes (bottling, labeling, sending, etc.), also regarding the purchase of dried and winemaking supplies.
Once I familiarized with all the procedures, I learned to know the wines and grapes. It was the time to propose, change, execute and get rid of some things, especially anything related to both wine harvest machinery (press, pumps, grinders cooling equipment, etc.) and the rest of the winery machinery and equipment (filters, washing machine, bottling, corking, labeling, etc.).
The first thing I did was to make the wine harvest machines more productive, since they were being used incorrectly. I also modified the pressing programs in the pneumatic press. Thanks to this, we increased the yield of white grape musts by 15%.
In the white wine harvest, I changed the time of cold maceration (skin contact), depending on the quality of the grapes and not following the same recipe that had been used for years (all whites to maceration), the results were immediately white wines, much more fruity, aromatic and balanced wines than before.
In red wines, I introduced the post-fermentation maceration obtaining smoother and fruity wines and melted and tender tannins that is I achieved to drastically change the flavor and balance of red wines. In addition with the changes I made in the pneumatic press programs, I managed to produce less rustic and more elegant press wines than before, so they can be used with drop wines without problems.
Also in red wines, I reduced the time of storage in barrels, this because in my opinion, red wines in general here in this company do not support more than 1 year in barrels, the result is that now wines are more balanced, they have a better wood-fruit relationship, which means they can be commercializes faster so the financial and operational costs are reduced that will directly benefit the company.
I also introduced some changes in the bottling and corking machine, achieving a better machinery performance, better filling level and more productivity.
I changed the working system of the bottling line, achieving better productivity, better performance and a more friendly way regarding the work of people, all of this reduced the production cost of products.
It should be noted that when making the machinery and workforce more productive, costs are considerably reduced, and so the wine cellar can be much more competitive in different markets.
I would also like to mention that in March 2011, I was proud to be the Jury at the 11th International Wine Competition of Thessaloniki, which is sponsored by the OIV.
I participated in presentations of wines in Porto Carras Domaine at fairs here in Greece and in November 2011 I made the presentation of wines in Germany (Frankfurt and Munchen)
3. What do you think of the wines in Greece? What should be done to obtain more reception?
Regarding my opinion of Greek wines, I think that in general red wines are a bit rustic (tannic, alcoholic and sometimes very acids) and white wines in general need more aroma, fruit characteristics and better balance in the mouth.
In any case, I am convinced of the potential of at least 80% of Greek wines that I have tasted, especially this last month, as since I ended my contract with Domaine Porto Carras, I had the opportunity to visit, learn and taste many wines from different areas and zones, even I had the opportunity to travel to Crete, where I tasted very interesting wines and also with enormous potential.
In my opinion, the best way for Greek wines to be more accepted in the international market is working more in vineyards (best production and disease controls) and introducing new winemaking techniques in wine cellars worrying more of all the equipment involved in the production of good wines.
5. What would you like to accomplish in your next step after having worked in Porto Carras?
Apart from being happy, I would like to help in everything I could to make Greek wines more recognized in many parts of the world for their quality and good prices, and I am convinced that this can be done in an orderly and rapid manner, as due to the potential of many of them, this is easier to make than it looks like.
Reliability and consistency is all needed in what is done and I hope to be part of the new and successful phase of wines in this beautiful country called Greece.
Andes Wines
andes@andeswines.com
@andeswines
(56) 2-3702997
