When did the business start ?

My great grandfather, Jules Armand, who was then a gamekeeper, started the farm in Saint-Loubès (33) in 1916. I now represent the fourth generation of owners. Initially, it was a small vineyard of 8 hectares. My grandfather, Felicien Meynard, inherited it and developed the vineyard. Then, in the 1950s, my father Fernand abandoned the vineyard after about two thirds of it was destroyed by spring frosts. A tree grower at heart, he decided to plant pear trees. He then bought some neighbouring land to expand the farm. I also bought some new parcels. Today, the farm has 27 hectares of vineyards and 3.5 hectares of fruit trees (pear).

What do you produce ?

When I took over the business in 1982, in partnership with my father, I revitalized the wine farm’s production, qualitatively and commercially. At the time, the farm had 18 hectares of vines and 5 hectares of fruit trees. Regarding the latter, we grow in equal proportions two lovely pear varieties, Doyenne du Comice and Passe-Crassane. Even though the Comice is hard to grow because it is quite sensitive to the cold, it is the most popular. As regards the Passe-Crassane, it has to be grown in the right soil or else the flesh can become sour and gritty. It is also quite prone to a terrible bacterium known as fire blight (Erwinia amylovora). Fire blight cannot be treated, so you just work around it.
To produce a high quality fruit, we protect it from coddling moth by covering it with an individual packet during the ripening period, which is removed before the packaging process. The fruit is also protected from treatment products, hail and too much sunshine. This demands a lot of labour. The Comice is harvested in September and sent to market in October and the Passe-Crassane is harvested end October for distribution in December. The production comes to 80 tons/year, depending on seasons. We have tried out other varieties, but it was a commercial fiasco. Regarding the wine, we produce three AOC Bordeaux supérieur wines, namely :
• Château Bois Malot (grape variety: cabernet sauvignon, 50% of the production),
• Château Valentons Canteloup (grape varieties: merlot mostly, cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon, 35% of the production),
• Château Thilède Grillon (grape varieties: merlot and cabernet franc in equal proportions, 15% of the vineyard).
Our average production is about 1,200 hl/year. It is sold to consumers (40%, trade fairs and shows, direct sale), wine cellars and restaurants (20%) and for export (40%, EU, USA and Canada, and a minor share to Oceania). We are cited in several guides and reviews and we won the gold medal at the Concours Agricole de Paris 2006 for a 2004 vintage (Valentons Canteloup).

What is your growth strategy ?

We are sticking to a qualitative policy, in both wine and fruit.
The wine-growing is taking up an increasing amount of time and space and sales are growing. We are going to concentrate our efforts again on the private clientele and export, perhaps large-scale exports.
For the fruit, we are in a niche that is more upmarket. As a result, we will not increase our production much. Quality is the result of authentic know-how and it is financially rewarding, but it generates high operating costs (labour, losses, etc.). We will concentrate more on the French market .

What do you think of the wine market ?

As a board member of the Syndicat des Bordeaux et Bordeaux Supérieurs, we have noted a slump in wine in recent years, a consumption crisis due to several important factors:
• social constraints (drunk driving, health) leading to overproduction,
• the burst of the Asian “bubble” (high demand between 1996 and 1998) causing the market to collapse,
• the wine-producing countries from the New World (Chile, etc.) attracted by the Asian market, who over planted (no planting quotas, costs lower than EU, low prices on entry and mid-range wines). After resting on their laurels, French wine-producers appear to be reacting now, both qualitatively and commercially.

What is you view of Rungis Market ?

We have been present at Rungis Market since 1983 for the fruit, and it represents about 50% of our production. The remaining 50% is sold at the MIN of Bordeaux and the greater Bordeaux region. We recently tried to sell a small portion of our wines at Rungis. This great market is a necessary, essential outlet because it is where you find top quality products.