You are winegrowers from father to son
We have been winegrowers for more than six generations! I took over from my father in 2021, a real annus horribilis to start with (laughs). I set off on a general electronics track, but my genes caught up with me and I switched to viticulture and oenology at the wine school in Montagne Saint-Émilion.
I then had every intention of getting to the heart of the matter! So I quite naturally spent a year on the family property before joining the team at Château Beaulieu, starting as a farm worker before becoming vineyard manager, then cellar master, and finally technical director in 2022, while taking over the property in parallel from 2021.
What lessons did you draw from that?
I was lucky to cross paths with the greatest oenologists and trainers of the Place de Bordeaux, among them Georges Pauly and Hubert de Boüard. People with whom you learn very quickly!
It was obvious that I needed to earn my stripes elsewhere before taking over Les Genêts more calmly, with solid baggage and experience. I am about to vinify my 20th vintage! I am starting to have a few things under my belt, even if I must say that 2024 is definitely a vintage apart!
You took over from your father; what did he tell you, precisely?
He repeated this adage at every opportunity: “As long as the grapes aren’t in the vats, nothing is settled!” A phrase I will certainly hear again at dinner this evening, and which seems to me particularly apt for 2024, a complicated year if ever there was one.
Let’s not talk about 2024 then; tell me about 2023
It is my first vintage on the family property, full time. It is a winegrower’s vintage, marked by strong downy mildew pressure and demanding particular attention, with precise monitoring of the vines to end up with healthy grapes and decent volumes. That allowed us to vinify differently.
Differently?
I was able to go for more purity in the wine, heighten the fruit and work on the tannic framework to move away from old, hard Bordeaux and from the sometimes undeserved reputation of Bourg wines. I was able to play on drinkability.
A year on, I can say the bet has paid off: my Malbecs are successful, my Cabernets varietal, and my Merlots round and silky. While 2010, 2015 and 2022 are very fine vintages, this 2023 corresponds, in my view, to what consumers are asking for.
To meet this demand, does Bordeaux still need to reinvent itself?
Yes, completely. We need to respond better to the market and move away from the cliché of wines to be kept for years in the cellar. Consumers and consumption have changed, and people no longer have cellars. People are looking for wines ready to drink, and when I receive distributors on my property who come to do bottlings at the château, they tell me, “it goes from your place straight to the customers!”
Does Bordeaux need to reshuffle the cards?
Yes, while knowing that it is a way of working that is very well suited to small appellations and less so to the grands crus. We need to offer more fantasy and more identity. As at my place, in Côtes de Bourg, with a 100% Malbec. It is a great success; Larson, incidentally, selected it from among about fifty samples. We must reinvent ourselves and not forget that the winegrower is also a trader attentive to his market. I stick to that by producing a wide range of wines, often following exchanges with customers.
Tell me about your range
Château des Genêts is our classic with light barrel ageing; the 100% Malbec is unoaked and without artifice. Since 2022 we have had the Cabernet series, a blend of 70% Cabernet Franc and 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, very much the opposite of the Malbec. The range is completed by L’Esprit des Genêts as a Vin de France, from Sauvignon and white Merlot, and saignée rosés made from the first wine.
A range recently completed by an orange wine…
Yes. In 2023 I wanted pure Sauvignons and I got white Merlots. This variety is a little neutral, so my oenologist Romain Traste and I decided to make an orange wine from it, hand-harvested. We decided to ferment it in Wineglobes. Not to do things by halves, for this Collection Privée cuvée I opted for a bottle designed by Chantal Thomass!
Why not a Clairet?
I’m thinking about it. It has had bad press for some years even though it meets expectations perfectly. It seems to me that a demand is emerging. It certainly deserves to be tried soon.
What sets you apart from the others?
My aim is to operate as in the Loire Valley, with a small property and a multitude of different cuvées. We are going to rely on a micro-parcel approach! Our property extends over three types of soils and subsoils, from clay-limestone through clay-gravel to clay-silt.
This approach should serve us to bring even more complexity to our blends. And the second wines should allow us to let our hair down! (laughs)
Are blends still the DNA of Bordeaux?
Yes, and it must remain so. On the other hand, the purity of the wines and of their expressions needs to evolve. Sometimes 5% Malbec is enough to change a profile, like the Médoc’s Petit Verdot which, present at 3%, densifies and complicates everything. There are years when the blend is not particularly called for, as in 2022 with the Malbec.
How do we get out of the rut?
Surprisingly, I feel the market is moving, that it wants to get going again, with in particular a demand for whites that sell before rosés. I would like to increase my volume of whites, by the way! Personally, I take great pleasure in tasting mineral, taut whites. More broadly, I campaign for Bordeaux wines to be consumed differently! The difficulty is that we work with a perennial annual crop while the market moves every 6 months! So we need to act one step ahead. Easier said than done.
