WHAT IS A BRAND WINE ? A brand wine is made, bottled, and packaged by a shipper who puts his name on the label as well as his own brand. A brand wine is to a Bordeaux wine firm what "château" is to a winegrower: the expression of a specific, personal identity.

HOW IS A BRAND WINE MADE ?

In order to produce a wine he is proud to sell under his name, a shipper must first find the best possible wines from within the same appellation made by conscientious winegrowers.

These are rigorously selected not only on the basis of quality, but also according to the particular style the shipper is looking for (predominance of a particular grape variety, fruity or less fruity wine, tannic or less tannic wine, etc.).

		A KEY WORD : BLENDING Thanks to blending wines from diverse vineyards, shippers can produce brand wines that correspond to the demands of their clientele. Shippers can, for instance, select the quantity and quality of wine they need every year (while respecting the characteristics of each vintage). This is much more difficult for a single estate to do since they operate on a far smaller scale. Their production capacity is inevitably small and much more subject to the vagaries of the weather.
Due to multiple sources of supply, brand wines are fundamentally different from château or domaine wines, whose production is limited to one particular estate. However, in the last analysis, the blending done by a shipper simply corresponds on a large scale to what winegrowers do in their cellars on a small scale when they blend their various vats in order to produce different cuvées to satisfy their various markets.

AGEING

Once shippers blend the wines they have purchased, they age them with the greatest of care, with the help of technicians and oenologists. Ageing takes place in vat or, more commonly, in barrel for a duration that depends on the degree of oaky flavour desired for the brand wine.

Over the past several years, the largest Bordeaux shippers have built impressively huge barrel-ageing cellars (some can hold tens of thousands of barrels).

BOTTLING Once the brand wine has sufficiently aged, it is racked a final time and filtered. It is then bottled in the shipper's cellars, using the most sophisticated methods to ensure traceablity and hygiene. In this way, consumers are guaranteed authentic, quality wines.

THE GOAL OF BRAND WINES

A brand wine enables a shipper to display his expertise as a traditional négociant-éleveur. Thanks to their widespread distribution on numerous markets, their attractive, easily-recognisable packaging, and their reliable quality, brand wines are undoubtedly one of the best ways for the Bordeaux trade to find new customers seeking an introduction to the world of Bordeaux wine without having to deal with the complexity of châteaux, vintages, and classifications. Obviously, shippers aim to satisfy these new customers and make them loyal to the brand.

However, it cannot be said that the sale of brand wines is incompatible with that of château wines. On the contrary, brand wines are an excellent way of rounding out the range for consumers. They are also a gateway to the enormous diversity of Bordeaux's famous vins de terroir.